6 Foodie Books You Should Definitely NOT Read While Hungry

Portions of this post originally appeared on Book Riot. I received copies of All For You and Mastering the Art of French Cooking for review consideration. For more on my review policies, please see my Full Disclosure page.

What Did You Eat Yesterday? by Fumi Yoshinaga

Shiro Kakei is a lawyer, but he's not one of these lawyers who work sixty hours a week and spend their lives at their desks. No, Shiro happily takes the most boring cases so he can put in his eight hours and go home, where he throws himself into his true passion: cooking!

I was expecting a light, entertaining slice-of-life story with What Did You Eat Yesterday?, but it was much better and more powerful than I thought it would be. First of all, for being printed in black and white, the food looked and sounded crazy delicious. This was my face the entire time I was reading:

Also, the recipes are kind of inspiring. As soon as I finished this manga, I started making side dishes for breakfast and dinner, trying to use up what we had in the fridge. I didn't consciously decide to start doing this, incidentally, it just seemed to happen naturally as an extension of reading the book. I have to agree with Shiro's boyfriend, Kenji, that adding side dishes makes the meal more satisfying. I began to feel so much healthier. Add to that Yoshinaga's beautiful, delicate drawings, awesome characters, and vignettes on how food can express love, carry memories, and is more than just following a recipe but also about using what you have and shopping for the best ingredients, and there really is nothing not to like about this manga.

Verdict: Definitely buy. In fact, after I returned What Did You Eat Yesterday? to the library, I bought a copy for myself, I loved it soooo much.

The Mystery Writers of America Cookbook, ed. by Kate White

Death and food go together like sun and shade. Why? No one knows, except maybe Hannibal Lecter. In this cookbook, some of the greatest mystery writers in America (Scott Turow, Louise Penny, Mary Higgins Clark, Charlaine Harris, James Patterson, etc.) share their favorite recipes, from family standards to food straight out of their books.

For some crazy reason I decided to start reading this while I was waiting for dinner. Bad decision, or worst decision? The recipes were so good I started ROTFDMAO (rolling on the floor drooling my ass off). But even if you don't like to cook, this book is filled with entertaining stories and essays from mystery authors. I cried at Richard Castle's "pancakes are love," declaration, laughed at Nelson DeMille's Male Chauvinist Pigs in the Blanket recipe, and loved Lorenzo Carcaterra's story about Grandma Maria's Pasta Puttanesca. Lee Child closes the book out admirably with an essay on The Right Way to make coffee. The chapter on side dishes is pretty weak, but this is America we're talking about.

Verdict: Buy. Actually, this is another book I bought after borrowing from the library. Good ol library!

All For You by Laura Florand

Sassy and cute Célie is chef to one of the best chocolatiers in Paris, but her life wasn't always truffles and ganache. She grew up in the banlieue dreaming of marrying her brother's bestie, Joss, until he abandoned her to join the Foreign Legion. Now he's back, acting like nothing ever changed, and Célie has all the feels.

I've never been one of those people who get hungry or crave chocolate while reading a Laura Florand novel, although I do find her food descriptions to be fascinating and on fleek. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I can't eat chocolate, who knows. But with this book, I not only started craving chocolate, I had an entire dream about drinking hot chocolate, the one chocolate treat I really, really miss indulging in. It's kind of strange, considering that All For You is probably one of Florand's less food-centric novels. But then again, it did give me all the warm fuzzies. It's sweet and comforting and just what you need to lift your spirits, kind of like a cup of hot chocolate in book format.

Verdict: Buy.


The following books were ones I wanted to include in the above Buy, Borrow, Bypass, but life and work got in the way and I wasn't able to finish them before the deadline. However, I do still want to review them, so here they are!

Taste Test by Kelly Fiore

Nora is a small-town girl who grew up working in her dad's barbeque joint, but her dreams are much bigger than that. When she gets the chance to be on Taste Test, her favorite cooking competition show, she leaves District 11 her dad and BFF, Billy, to compete in an arena against kids from across the country. Only one can survive win the chance to study cooking in Paris. The problem is, can Nora trust the other contestants, particularly the infuriating and arrogant Christian Van Lorten?

In case you can't tell by the summary, this book reminded me a bit of The Hunger Games. Too bad that title was already taken, it would have been much better than Taste Test. Anywho, this was a really fun, quick read. I loooooooooove books where the two main characters fight all the time. Nora had a few moments where I thought her behavior was unreasonable or annoying, and the ending left almost everything completely unresolved, but the bottom line is this is the kind of book you can kick back and read in an afternoon when you're after some lighthearted entertainment. As for the food, all but one of the recipes were dumped in at the end, and none of them sounded particularly appetizing or easy to make. I wouldn't call this a book NOT to read while hungry.

Verdict: Buy or borrow.

The Red Notebook by Antoine Laurain

Laurent Letellier owns Le Cahier Rouge, a Parian bookstore. One day he stumbles upon an abandoned purse in the street and becomes obsessed with finding its owner after reading all the personal secrets she's written down in her little red notebook. She owns a red notebook, he owns a bookstore called The Red Notebook–clearly these two are meant to be together. But will they ever meet?

This is a charming, short novel in a similar vein to the movie Amélie, although not as fantastical and twee. It sounds like it could go into creeper territory but it really doesn't. I loved how there were a bunch of jokes you would probably only get if you spoke French–the name of Laurent's shop, for example; or the name of his daughter's cat, Putin, which can mean everything from damn to fuck depending on intonation (or the name of the Russian president, for that matter). Actually, now that I think about it, double meaning in names is kind of a theme in this book. As for why The Red Notebook is on this list, it's surprisingly chock full of delectable descriptions of food and drinking and eating, from pot-au-feu to hachis Parmentier. And if you don't know what either of those dishes are, don't worry–googling photos of them is half the fun. I started craving French food like whoa.

Verdict: Buy or borrow, but definitely read.

Mastering the Art of French Eating by Ann Mah

Francophile Ann Mah thought her dreams had come true when her hubby got a job in Paris. But just a few weeks after the big move, he had to go to the Middle East for a year, leaving Mah lonely and bored until this food writer finally had a lightbulb moment: she could write about French food! Using Mastering the Art of French Cooking as a travel guide, Mah set out to discover the stories "behind" the famous regional dishes of France.

Another day, another foodie memoir inspired by Julia Child. I mean, I get that she's a BFD to a whole generation of cooks and foodies, but it's getting to be a bit cliché at this point. I admit I had trouble getting into Mastering the Art of French Eating. I probably should have known better, seeing as how memoirs are not my thing, but I was expecting a lot more food in this book. Instead, it's mainly about Mah's struggles living as an expat–not just in Paris, but in other parts of the world (her hubby's in the diplomatic service). Which is fine, but I'm not super interested. I also thought the choices for and execution of Mah's quest were pretty damn lame. For Paris–the first chapter in the book no less–what dish does she choose? Steak and frites. Really? Out of all the dishes she could have written about? Giant snooze. In another chapter, Mah highlights two famous andouillette recipes of Troyes, but she doesn't even try them! At that point this book lost me. I will say, however, that the recipes at the back of each chapter sound tasty and I totally want to try them.

Verdict: Bypass, or borrow for the recipes.



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Review: KISS OF THE ROSE PRINCESS by Aya Shouoto

Anise Yamamoto's father has warned her that if she removes her rose choker, she'll be cursed by a terrible punishment, which is why she always wears it even in defiance of her school's dress code. But when the choker mysteriously disappears, Anise is suddenly confronted with four Rose Knights, who insist that she's their sovereign. Oh, and they happen to be the four hottest boys at school. Most girls would think this a dream come true, but Anise can't help but wonder if having to put up with these guys is her punishment.

It's been a while since I reviewed a manga, probably because it's been a while since I enjoyed one enough to finish it. Kiss of the Rose Princess is a very promising start to a series, with a great twist on a vampire romance storyline.

Essentially, the Rose Knights are vampires, in that they need to draw blood from Anise in order to wield their powers. At least one of them isn't human, although I'm not sure if that's true of all of them or not.

My favorite of the Rose Knights is Kaede Higa, who's more or less a regular teenage boy. He and Anise are friends... of a sort. If you consider their constant bickering a form of friendship (I love it when the hero and heroine fight in romance novels, by the way).

The other Rose Knights include Mitsuru Tenjo, the class president and most handsome and popular boy at school; Seiran Asagi, a gentle and sweet kid who has allergies (yup, roses... ironic); and Mutsuki Kurama, he of the non-humanness. He's also rumored to be an otaku, but I'm not exactly sure what that's supposed to mean in the context of this book. Whatever it is, it's not good.

Anyway, Kiss of the Rose Princess feels surprisingly modern, mainly because of Anise. She's very independent, good at sports, not interested in putting up with any of Kaede's crap, and quick on the uptake that more penises mean mo' problems. She's not some beautiful and passive princess type.

As for the artwork, I sometimes find graphic novels a little headache inducing, and there are times when the visual storytelling could flow better and be less confusing. But overall it wasn't too bad. I really liked the title pages.

Definitely a promising manga to keep an eye on! The second volume was only just published (in the US, anyway) and a third one is on the way in May, I believe, so it's early days yet, but I can see this series developing into something as addicting as Vampire Knight in future installments.



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Manga Review: BRIDE OF THE WATER GOD by Mi-Kyung Yun, vols. 1-7

Soah is a young woman whose destiny is to be the bride of water god, Habaek. But when she finally travels to the land of the gods on her wedding day, she discovers that Habaek is a grumpy little boy who doesn't expect her to fulfill her wifely duties. What she doesn't know--even though someone mentions it in every single freaking volume--is that Habaek is cursed to be a boy during the day and turns into a man at night. A handsome man, no less, who tells Soah his name is Mui and whom Soah really likes. Now she's torn between her husband and... her husband. If only we all had such problems.


Habaek as a kid in day mode.

I first heard about Bride of the Water God on Stella Matutina, and wanted to read it because it's pretty clearly based on the fairy tale Beauty and the Beast: Soah's father sells her to the town as a sacrifice, and she winds up going to a magical castle filled with quirky characters and a mysterious hubby who's not what he appears. Habaek may not be a monster looks-wise, but personality-wise the kid's a terror.


Habaek and his friends life among the stars.

The first few volumes of Bride of the Water God are really funny and entertaining. But they get harder and harder to follow as the series goes on. The stories are told in a very non-linear way, with multiple flashbacks and viewpoints. I approve of non-linear storytelling, but there's nothing to differentiate when you're reading a flashback scene, so that made it extremely confusing. Plus, I started to get very frustrated with the characters, particularly Habaek. It seems as though in every volume, Nakbin, Habeak's evil bitch of a first wife, comes back from the dead; except she's never the real Nakbin, even though Habaek thinks she is. I don't know if all of these impersonations are by the same person or not, but it doesn't really make a difference. The important point is it happens at the cost of further character development and moving the story forward.

As for the art, it's gorgeous--very ornate and detailed. One of my favorite parts of reading this series is Habaek's palace, because the architecture is fantastic and you feel like you can just walk right into it. That being said, there are times when the art is TOO ornate and it's hard to figure out what the heck you are looking at. Even if the story didn't have its own problems, the manga wouldn't flow well due to the occasionally incomprehensible art. Oh, and the characters speak with a lot of dots and exclamation marks (!). They gave me a headache.


Habaek in night mode with Soah.

Technically, Bride of the Water God is a manwha, which is the Korean version of manga. Maybe my ignorance of the Korean style of art contributed to my confusion and frustration with this series, but it does require some patience. Either way, I think it's worth checking out for the art alone, or if you enjoy beauty and the beast-type stories. And who knows, maybe everything starts to make sense at some point.

Manga versus Animé: xxxHOLiC by Clamp

Kimihiro Watanuki hates the fact that he can see the supernatural in our mundane world. One day a ghost chases him to a strange shop run by Yūko Ichihara, a femme fatale witch who grants wishes. After reading his fortune, Ichihara offers to stop his visions--but first he has to work for her. Ichihara has clearly taken Watanuki on as an apprentice, but Watanuki isn't clued into this fact as he follows her and learns the basics of fortune-telling and wish-granting.

This is a very fun, cute story. Watanuki overreacts to everything, which weirdly enough makes him endearing and a nice foil to the other characters. Ichihara and her little Mokona (rabbit thing) love to eat and drink, and they seem to ground the entire series in a state of earthly delight. The magical element is also really well-done: Ichihara's practices are clearly based in Buddhist philosophy, and the magic is unusual by Western standards.

That being said, I had trouble getting into this manga. I think it had to do partly with the art, which I occasionally found very confusing to follow, and partly with the fact that the storyline is integrated with Clamp's other mangas, which I haven't read. Sometimes trying to figure out where these stories were going was very tiring. There are explanations of Japanese culture and references from Clamp's other series at the end of the books, which was awesome, but that didn't help me much while I was reading; it only made sense at the end.

After about two volumes of the manga, I thought I'd give the animé series (available on hulu) a go. Although the animé compressed the story in parts and rearranged some plot elements, it was much easier to follow, particularly as far as the action was concerned. I wish I'd watched it before starting the manga, even though the animé came after the manga.

Despite my problems with it, I do think xxxHOLiC is definitely worth checking out, in either format.

Graphic Novel Review: LOST AT SEA, by Bryan Lee O'Malley

Raleigh is on a road trip back to Canada from California with a car full of people she barely knows who attend the same high school. To them she's just "the quiet girl" or a weirdo--depending on your viewpoint. What they don't know is that Raleigh believes she's lost her soul.

It's in a cat. And the cats are following her.

This is the first graphic novel by Bryan Lee O'Malley, of Scott Pilgrim fame. It's not as hip as Scott Pilgrim and, being only one volume, the story has a much narrower scope. But here's what I love about this book: I know these people. Seriously, Raleigh? I honest-to-god know someone who is exactly like her, even down to the hair. O'Malley's characters are so familiar, but not in a oh-I-recognize-that-trope sort of way; in a oh!-these-are-totally-people-I-know-IRL way. Which is good, because the plots tend to be bizarro.



I also loved the story and the way it was told, which was very non-linear but perfect for the subject. It's a quieter story than Scott Pilgrim, with a gentler humor, but there are still some scenes that made me laugh, and I have to confess I got teary-eyed at the end. There were some loose ends left hanging, but overall the book was very touching without feeling manipulative or sappy in the slightest.*

As for the art, I love it. LOVE. Even more than Scott Pilgrim, the art in this book was totally delicious and contributed to the story so, so much. If my heart had a shelf I would this book on it.

If you like graphic novels or manga at all, you have to give Bryan Lee O'Malley a try. He is awesome and I'm officially fangrling him now.


*Note: I loaned this to my brother and he said he hated it because Raleigh was whiny. I guess you can't win them all!

Graphic Novel Review: SCOTT PILGRIM by Bryan Lee O'Malley

Here are a few things you should know about Scott Pilgrim:

1. He is Canadian.
2. He is 23 years old.
3. He is "between jobs."
   
4. He lives with his cool gay roommate, Wallace Wells.
5. He is dating a high schooler (Knives Chau, 17 years old).

Or at least he was dating a high schooler, until he meets Ramona Flowers, a ninja American who rollerblades through his dreams. Somehow Scott convinces Ramona to date his loser awesome self, which is great. Unfortunately, he has to battle Ramona's Seven Evil Ex-Boyfriends to keep dating her.

If God (or the devil) is in the details, then this series is full of both. O'Malley not only gives us a great story with fabulously fun characters and quirky humor, but he fills their world with tons of details that make it seem totally convincing. Some of them are fanciful--the baddy bads turning into coins or bunnies once they're defeated, for example--and some are delightfully practical, like a recipe for vegan shepard's pie or chord charts for songs by Scott's horrible band, Sex Bob-omb.

All the characters in this graphic series are great, but obviously the heart of soul of it is Scott Pilgrim. By all rights he should be total loser--he doesn't have a job, is a complete mooch, doesn't drink because he's too much of a pussy, and his band totally sucks. But he's so lovable it's impossible not to think he's the greatest guy ever! And his character has a lot more depth than you would think--for all his irresponsibility, there are reasons Scott behaves the way he does (not necessarily good reasons, mind you, but reasons). I love how something Scott will do to make you think, "Oh, ha ha, quirky Scott!" has an impact on the story later on.



As for the art, it's elegant and fab. This might be, visually speaking, one of the best manga-style comics I've ever come across. There's an easy flow to the pages that allows you to relax and enjoy the story, yet at the same time O'Malley really gets across all the characters' personalities and moods. Ramona and Envy (one of Scott's evil exes) are the two best-drawn in the whole series, with clothes and accessories that make them instantly recognizable and interesting--not to mention diametrical opposites of one another.

If you've seen the movie, Scott Pilgrim vs the World, then you pretty much know how this series is going to go. In fact, the first volume of the manga matches the film almost scene-for-scene. But the manga is way better because you get to know a lot more about the secondary characters like Wallace and Kim, the whole Negascott thing makes sense, and the final battle is EPIC. Both the movie and the manga use the seemingly silly plot to show how everyone has baggage and you bring that to your relationships. But the manga is also about how people lie to themselves so they don't have to face things, and eventually all those lies catch up with you. Fortunately, Scott and Ramona get to face theirs together.


SO.


Basically... this graphic novel is the shit and you all should read it! The end.

COWBOY BEBOP Vol. 1 by Yutaka Nanten and Hajime Yatate

Spike, Faye, Jet, and Ed are bounty hunters in the distant, intergalactic future. Flying through space on their shuttle, Bebop, the four try to collect bounties on criminals, only to fail every single time.

This is a fun manga. I picked it up mainly because the word cowboy was in the title and I was intrigued. If this is a "western," it's one inspired by Sergio Leone, not John Ford--the quartet's main concern is money and the bonds of their friendship are pretty much dependent upon self-interest and making the quickest buck. Or are they? Maybe the Bebop crew aren't as greedy as they appear.



The narrative has some pacing problems and feels super-rushed on occasion, but for the most part the story is easy to get into. My favorite chapter was "We Will Rock You," where Spike goes undercover in a prison to break out a transvestite named Cidne who dresses like Marilyn Monroe. It was very entertaining. There are a ton of American pop-references in the stories and it has a fast, hip feel to it.

The manga is based on an animé series, and is only meant as a supplement to that show, so there are only three volumes. That's pretty short for a manga, but in a way it's also nice--I know I can power through the whole thing if I want! I'm definitely going to look for the other books in this series; it's worth checking out.

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Harlequin Manga

Setting:  I honestly have no clue.

Stereotypes:  Where to start?  Women are delicate, illogical, hormonal flowers.  The purpose of a woman's life is to marry and have kids.  A "true" woman is feminine.  Men are emotional idiots, yet bastions of calm and logic.

Major like:  Ummmmm....

Major dislike:  These books make no sense.


Have you ever wondered what a Harlequin romance novel would be like in manga form?  No?  Well, that's probably why these comics are free.

They're also probably free because they're terrible.  Seriously, they're bad.  There's no story flow to speak of, it's impossible to tell what's going on, and they're really sexist.

In The Cinderella Solution, Charlotte's best friend Gabe teases her for being unfeminine and says she will never be able to "find a man" and will die a dried-up and pitiful excuse for a woman.  In response, Charlotte bets him she will be married within a month.  Just as her girlfriends give her a make-over, Charlotte happens to run into a new neighbor, who just HAPPENS to be the most eligible bachelor in the universe!  They go out on a date and Gabe is jealous.  You can see where this is headed.

In Expecting the Boss's Baby, three millionaire bachelors who grew up in the same orphanage decide to do good works.  But then one of them, Michael, discovers his secretary Kate is preggers after they did some horizontal filing one night after work (the clue:  she's acting like a typical hormonal woman when normally she is very calm and logical--like a man).  Michael of course thought it was just a one-night stand, but now he realizes he feels very possessive and Kate must be his even though she keeps screaming at him and ordering him out of her house.  But that's just the hormones talking, y'all!

Both of these mangas are based on actual Harlequin romance novels, and it would be interesting to compare them and see if the wtf-is-this-crap increased or decreased in translation.  If only I had the patience for such a thing!  I know these are only samples of the mangas, but these samples give me absolutely no desire to shell out money for the whole books.  If the plots weren't ridiculous enough, the utter lack of logical flow in the story telling would have warned me off.

And yet... AND YET... I still kinda enjoyed them.  Even though I don't want to pay for them, I wouldn't be adverse to downloading more of the free editions.

Damn you, manga!!!!!  You make even the stupidest things addicting.  Gagh.

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BBAW--Unexpected Treasure

It's day three of BBAW and I'm already exhausted!  (Not necessarily because of BBAW though.)  ANYway, today we're asked to share a book or genre we tried because of the influence of another blogger.

I picked manga, mainly because I haven't talked about how I was introduced to it before.  My brother has read manga forever, so it was on my radar, but I have to admit I wrote it off as something that wasn't for me.  Mind, this was my brother, so the manga he read was all about fighting Pokemons.  I didn't have any exposure to any other form of manga, or even graphic novels.

Before I started book blogging, I used to read Smart Bitches Trashy Books.  Not religiously, but off and on.  One day they had a short post on a manga you could read online for free called Midnight Secretary.  They warned me my entire day would be sucked away reading it--oh, they warned me!  But I couldn't resist just giving it an itty bitty peek, especially as it was called "Harlequin: Presents crossed with manga and vampires."

Midnight Secretary is about a shy girl named Kaya who is very desirous of being the best secretary she can possibly be.  Anal retentive secretaries, unite!  She starts working at Touma corporation, only to be set up babysitting Director Kyouhei Touma, the playboy son of the company's founder.  He doesn't seem to do any work, just ferries women in and out of his office all night.  Hmmmmm.  Let's try that again:  hmmmmmmmmmmmm.  Eventually, the secretary finds out her boss isn't just a selfish playboy--he's a selfish playboy vampire!!! *gasp*

This manga is totally dumb and weird and enjoyable and I could not. stop. reading it!  After nineteen hours straight I finished and had to find other vampire romance mangas to read like right away!  Which is how I started on Vampire Knight (fabulous) and Rosario + Vampire (very fun).

So there you have it.  The Smart Bitches convinced me try manga and opened up a whole new format of reading to me, and it was definitely an unexpected treasure.

What books have you unexpectedly enjoyed that were recommended by another blogger?

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Rosario + Vampire, Volume 3, by Akihisa Ikeda

I'm happy to report this manga keeps getting better.

When we last left our friends at Yokai Academy--a school for monsters, where the only human is freshman Tsukune--our motley band of heroes was being threatened by the school "enforcers," who had discovered Tsukune was human.  Or had they?  After Tsukune is beaten up and comes close to death, Moka, a cute vampire, pumps vampire blood into his veins and suddenly he's totally kick-ass!  Yeah, Tsukune!!!  Of course, Moka still has to save him in the end, but at least he got in a few punches.

In the latter half of the manga, word has spread around the school that Tsukune beat up the school bully.  The captain of the wrestling team is shocked and wants Tsukune to join his team.  Being no dummy (unlike the captain), Tsukune refuses, which eventually leads to him getting another dose of vampire blood from Moka and kicking the captain's trolly buttocks. 

What are the effects of all this vampire blood, you might be wondering?  Well, so far no one knows.  Tsukune himself doesn't remember becoming a vampire and the fact that Moka bit him without permission causes something of a rift in their relationship.  But don't worry, after a few minutes Tsukune appears to return to his completely normal, human self.

In the last chapter, Tsukune is tutored by the sexy math teacher who likes her students to be very, very obedient.

As you can probably tell, the characters are developing more now and the formula is starting to become interesting.  I have to say I found this volume to be very exciting and fun to read, and Tsukune is simply adorable.

As for the objectification of the female characters, there were six gratuitous panty shots (a good half of them for poor Kurumu).  Don't even get me started on the cleavage.  And the math teacher is a dominatrix.  Other than that, though, there's not as much creepy sexual stuff going on in this volume as there was in the previous one, which is fine with me.

So far this manga is definitely on an improving trend, and I can't wait to see what comes up in the next volume.

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Rosario + Vampire by Akihisa Ikeda-Volume 2

I've said it before and I'll probably say it again:  manga is some subversive shit.  At least by US standards.

You might recall that after I had finished Volume 1 of Rosario + Vampire, I was on the fence about continuing the series.  The stories were just too repetitive.  But one of my lovely blog readers told me the series improved, so I decided to give Volume 2 a try--and if this volume is anything to go by, the series definitely gets better!

In case you missed my first review, the manga is about a normal human boy, Tsukune, who attends a school for supernatural creatures.  Since no one is supposed to reveal their inner monsters, no one knows or suspects that Tsukune is human, except for Moka, a beautiful vampire whom Tsukune met the first day of school and has been crushing on ever since.

While the first chapter (or test) in this volume was still a little formulaic, the plot is clearly starting to get more varied as it centers on the group of friends that make up the newspaper club, which Tsukune and Moka started along with Kurumu, a succubus who is in love with Tsukune (and the girl on the cover of this manga).

In "Love Is a Witch," Moka is stalked by an 11-year-old bisexual witch who keeps squeezing her breasts.  She wants Moka all to herself, so she tortures Tsukune with voodoo and other magic, making him flip up Kurumu's skirt and show the reader wayyy more than I needed to see.  Everyone is annoyed by this little witch except Moka, who understands what it's like to be alone.

In "The Art of the Birthday" (creative title), Tsukune is having his birthday and wants to tell Moka he loves her on his b-day.  But Moka's too busy modeling for art class and the seriously creepy art teacher.  "You're so pretty, just looking at you makes me want to create art," she purrs.  Meeeeanwhile, girls are disappearing from the school, so it's creeptastic all around.  Is Moka in danger?  And will Tsukune man up and profess his feelings for her?

For "Deadline," the newspaper club is in a rush to report Moka and Tsukune's discovery of the identity of the person who was kidnapping girls from the school.  But Kurumu keeps wandering off, a she's being blackmailed by some Hayden Caulfield type with a camera.  Once again, we peek up her skirt.  Every female in this series is sexually objectified, even the 11-year-old, but with Kurumu it seems especially bad.

Finally, in "Wish Upon the Moon," the newspaper club faces down the school bullies who want to extort money from them for handing out newspapers.  However, this gang doesn't go down with a simple fight, and the story will continue in Volume 3.



The sexual objectification of the female characters continues to bother me, but overall this manga shows a marked improvement over its predecessor.  I do want to find out what will happen next in the story, so I'll be reading Volume 3 soon!

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Rosario + Vampire by Akihisa Ikeda

This is a very fun, cute manga, although it's insanely repetitive and I'm not sure I want to keep reading it.

Average guy Tsukune can't get into a decent high school, so he finds himself enrolled in Yokai Academy, the only place that will accept him.  At Yokai, Tsukune is anything but average--because he's the only human in the entire place!  Unbeknownst to Tsukune or his parents, Yokai is a high school for supernatural creatures who need to learn how to integrate with the human population.  Because of this, they're supposed to keep their monster identities under wraps--but very few of them can keep to this rule.

Fortunately for Tsukune and his continued bodily existence, the first day he arrives he meets Moka, a cute vampire girl.  Moka and Tsukune become fast friends.  Then for the rest of the series, Tsukune is lured into danger by some monster (usually female), Moka gets offended, then winds up changing into her kick-ass vampire form so she can save him from said monster.

I like formulas as much as the next person (perhaps more), but when a formula is already predictable and boring by chapter two, that's a problem.  This manga became repetitive very quickly, and while I really liked the characters and found Yokai Academy and the art work to be quite charming, I got pretty bored with the story line.

Another thing that started to bug me about this manga is how sexually objectified the young girls are.  There's an entire chapter where the plot revolves around peering up the girls' skirts.  It would be pretty obvious the author was male even if we didn't know who wrote it.  I also find it very interesting that all the girls at Yokai--who for the most part very sexually aggressive--are all MONSTERS.  Even though there's no overt sex in this manga, it's very sexually suggestive--but in strange, creepy ways.

I can see why this manga is so popular, but I'm not sure I want to continue with it.  Not because of the sexual objectification stuff, because that's a relatively minor part of the stories, but mainly because the formula is already wearing on me.  That being said, if I was younger I could see myself enjoying this series A LOT, so I think I actually would recommend it to people who are interested.

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My Year in Reading

"Everything Men Know About Women" by dailyinvention

It's the end of the year, which means it's time to start reflecting on my year in reading.  I guess.  The only problem is, 2009 pretty much sucked on the reading front.

I read very few books, even fewer of which I liked.  I burned out on two of my favorite sub-genres, historical romance and urban fantasy.  But on the plus side, I started book blogging, made a lot of bookish friends, and discovered new books.

So, instead of doing a top-ten list of books, which would only serve to torture me as there were barely three books I loved that much in 2009, I decided to do a montage o' highlights.



Favorite new author:  Meredith Duran

Duran is definitely an author to watch.  I've really enjoyed all her books so far, and Bound By Your Touch is probably my favorite historical romance of 2009.



Favorite new genre:  Manga

OMG, so addictive!  Manga is my new crack.  Seriously, you can't stop reading the stuff; it should come with a warning label.

Favorite challenge:

This is a tie between Jenner's Take a Chance Challenge and Galleysmith's Harry Potter Reading Challenge.  The Take a Chance Challenge was really fun and creative, but I think reading-wise the Harry Potter Challenge has been the most rewarding.



Things I ignored:

Dystopian fiction, m/m romance, e-books, chick lit, and most of my challenges.

Things I didn't ignore (completely):

Angels, The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker, YA, erotica, Jane Austen adaptations



Jumped the shark:

Christina Dodd.  The books she published this year that I read (Danger in a Red Dress, Storm of Visions) were pretty all-around horrible.  It's like she's not even trying anymore.

Subcategory--Authors who are going to get one more shot:  Gaelen Foley.  My Wicked Marquis was simply a train wreck.

Chunksters:

Despite my loathing of overly long books, I managed to read Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, Drood, and The Lost Symbol.

Things I wish I'd read more of:

I read hardly any sci-fi/fantasy this year, I don't know why.  Usually that's my second-favorite genre after romance.



Biggest surprise (in a good way):

Water for Elephants, which I read as part of A Buckeyegirl Reads' bookclub (when are we going to read another book for that, btw, Colette?).  I was pretty sure this book was either going to be horribly boring and/or depressing, but it was absolutely brilliant.  I also read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society for Colette's book club, and that was really good, too.



Hmm, now that I've broken it down, it doesn't seem like my reading year was that horrible after all.  What were the highlights of your year in books?

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The History of the West Wing

The History of the West Wing by Jiayu Sun and Guo Guo*

Source:  The library ordered this at my request.  They're my book bitches.

This very short graphic novel retells an epic tale that originated in 9th-century China.  How does an epic tale fit into 100-odd pages of graphic novel, you ask?  Well, the answer is, not very well.  But the artwork is kick-ass.

In Tang-dynasty China, some guy with long hair wanders into a Buddhist temple.  He has no job, but that's okay with him, since he'd rather do nothing anyway.  Sounds like a winner!  Pretty soon he hears about a beautiful girl who also lives at the temple.  He happens to see her and decides to contrive a meeting.  The girl, Pianpian, foolishly agrees to it and before you know it she's in lurv.  Then it turns out she's engaged to some evol secretary person, and a rogue general decides he wants her, and one begins to wonder if she and the lazy guy will ever get together.

I first heard about this book from Nymeth at Color Online.  Nymeth definitely liked it more than I did; she thought the romance worked, while I don't think it worked at all.  My biggest problem with it was that I didn't understand the motivation of the characters.  Why does Yuqing pursue Pianpian?  Is it because she's pretty, or because the other guys kind of dare him to do it?  And why does Pianpian agree to go out to meet him?  That's a pretty risky move on her part.  Is she reckless, naïve, hopelessly romantic, or just thinks Yuqing is really cute?

Basically, this story is edited down to near-incomprehensibility and I definitely can't recommend it as a gripping read.  I do, however, agree with Nymeth a hundred percent that the artwork is absolutely luscious and transports you to Tang-dynasty China.  It's so alive I could hear the characters laughing and talking as I read, and the rustle of the wind and the rushing of water.  Here are a few examples to whet your appetite:

Miangyu, Yuqing's old sweetheart.

Pianpian, sleeping the sleep of the innocent.

So while I can't recommend The History of the West Wing for the story, I definitely do for the art.  And at 100-ish pages, picking your way through the narrative is completely worth it to look at Guo Guo's full-color illustrations for a few hours.

*This is an Amazon Associates link.  If you click on it, you will wind up like Pianpian, in love with a lazy man.  Sadness.

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Manga Review: EMMA by Kaoru Mori (Vols. 1-7)

Emma by Kaoru Mori, Volumes 1-7

Emma was the only book I managed to finish on vacation (if you consider all the books in a series to be one book, which I sometimes do--especially when I read them all at once).  I love manga, but I usually stick to vampire romances.  However, I'd heard such good things about this series; and my library managed to get the entire set in literally hours before I left, so I decided I to give it a try.

Emma is about a maid named Emma and her adventures.  One would be tempted to call it a historical romance, but it's really more in the style of penny dreadful novel or a Dickens story.  There are lots of characters and different sub-plots running through all of class-conscious, nineteenth-century English society; not to mention abductions, runaways, secret engagements, parental twists, dancing girls, and random nudity (that last one must be for the menz).

The central plot, though, is a love story between Emma and the wealthy bourgeois, William Jones.  They meet when he goes to visit his old governess.  William is immediately attracted to our bespectacled heroine, who serves him tea, and he maneuvers to meet her in public.  Meeeeanwhile, his super-serious dad wants him to mingle with the debutantes and choose a wealthy society girl to be his wife.  Not to mention Emma is being chased after by every male between Covent Garden and Brighton.

The first volume was okay, but I didn't start getting into the series until the second volume.  In that book, William takes Emma to the Crystal Palace, and it's awesome.  And they kiss!  And is sooooo well done and romantic and different the way Kaoru Mori depicts it.  It was during volume the second that I started to get a feel for the characters, who I loved.  William lives with his father, two younger sisters, and younger brother; plus his unforgettable guest and BFF, Hakim the Indian prince, who magically travels (+ elephants and dancing girls) between England and India in the blink of an eye!  At first Will seems a little bland, but his character starts to come out when he's surrounded by his family and friend and interacts with them.

Emma is mainly a passive character all through the series.  I like the girl, but she loves to clean, which makes me question her sanity; and she seems mainly content to let the status quo remain intact.  The major tension in the books comes from wondering whether or not Emma will take a chance a break the class barriers that separate her and William so they can be together.

Mori obviously put a lot research into the historical setting, and I loved the clothes, food, and architecture she treats us with as the story goes on.  Although that's not always consistent.  There was one scene in the first volume where William is playing with a model airplane--hellooooo, nineteenth century!  But overall I was impressed with the sense of historical time and place that the books had.  The clothing especially was fabulous.

Not that this series is all about the tortured love affair between Emma and Will--c'mon, this is manga!  These things can go on indefinitely.  There are plenty of sub-plots and other affairs winding their way through the books, from Will's fiance (not Emma), to his fiance's sister, a little girl who finds his hat, his parents' stories, his siblings, and all the servants in the house Emma works in. 

Basically these books are just fun and entertaining, on occassion completely ridiculous, and totally addictive.  I dragged through volume seven because I didn't want the series to end!  And then the ending resolved nothing, and I was all, "What the hell?!"  But fortunately, a quick search on Amazon revealed that, even though volume seven is supposed to be the last issue, there are actually two more available and a third to be published.  Hooray!

I would heartily recommend Emma, especially if you love anything related to the nineteenth century.  And now back to vampire romances.

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