REVIEW: Unicorn on a Roll: Another Phoebe and Her Unicorn Adventure (graphic novel) by Dana Simpson

Unicorn on a Roll is the second collection of Phoebe and Her Unicorn comics. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Christmas is coming up, and, after much deliberation, Phoebe finally figures out the perfect present to give Marigold. Then we've got Valentine's Day - Phoebe has a bit of a crush on her spelling partner, Max, and she's surprised when she learns Marigold has a crush of her own, on a unicorn named Lord Splendid Humility. Phoebe meets even more unicorns when she's invited to Lord Splendid Humility's birthday party.

I really enjoyed the first volume, but I think this series truly clicked for me during the Christmas portion of this volume. It showed a lot of heart and demonstrated that Phoebe and Marigold have had an impact on each other.

I loved the introduction of Lord Splendid Humility and getting to see other unicorns.

All in all, this was a great second volume.

Extras:

An introduction by Lauren Faust, a guide to drawing facial expressions, instructions for making sparkly unicorn poop cookies, and instructions for making an origami horse face.

REVIEW: Phoebe and Her Unicorn (graphic novel) by Dana Simpson

Phoebe and Her Unicorn is a collection of fantasy comics. I bought my copy new.

Review:

In this volume, 9-year-old Phoebe is skipping rocks on a pond when she meets a unicorn named Marigold Heavenly Nostrils. As a reward for rescuing her from the overwhelming beauty of her own reflection (Marigold is more than a little conceited), Marigold offers Phoebe a wish. Phoebe eventually settles on wishing for Marigold to be her best friend. They spend time together, doing friend things like having a sleepover. Phoebe's arch nemesis, Dakota, also learns about Marigold, but Marigold's Shield of Boringness prevents this from being much of a problem.

REVIEW: A Guest in the House (graphic novel) by Emily Carroll

A Guest in the House is a horror graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Abby is a relatively new stepmom. She's quiet, biddable, and and does as her husband David asks. But as she hears things like her stepdaughter Crystal saying her mom lives in the water, and something about Sheila (Crystal's mom) having committed suicide when David said she'd died of cancer, Abby starts to develop suspicions about her new husband. Then she sees Sheila's ghost. The ghost tells Abby that David murdered her, and Abby has to decide what to believe and what she's going to do about it.

REVIEW: The Replacement Husband (book) by Eliot Grayson

The Replacement Husband is m/m fantasy romance with historicalish elements. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is set in a Regency-ish fantasy world in which people known as "goddess-blessed" exist. As far as I could tell, the goddess-blessed were men who were 1) gay, 2) required to marry other men, and 3) would magically bring good fortune to whichever man they married.

Owen is one of the goddess-blessed. After hitting his head and being carried home by Arthur (although Arthur's brother Tom convinces Owen he was the one who did it), Owen meets his saviors and instantly falls for Tom's charm and nonthreatening good looks. Tom proposes, Owen accepts, and then Tom turns out to be a cad. Owen, facing the prospect of ridicule and damage to his reputation, reluctantly agrees to Arthur's offer to marry him instead, unaware that Arthur has been nursing a crush on him since they first met.

REVIEW: The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish: Canji Baojun De Zhangxin Yu Chong, Vol.2 (book) by Xue Shan Fei Hu, illustrated by Ryoplica, translated by Mimi, Yuka

The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish is danmei, Chinese m/m fantasy romance. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

The incident with the second prince's mother is resolved, effectively ending his chances of becoming the Crown Prince. Meanwhile, the third prince becomes more of a problem. Prince Jing becomes closer to Li Yu (named Xianyu as a fish) - Li Yu is unaware that Jing has figured out that his human and fish selves are one and the same. 

Prince Jing is the definition of infatuated. The guy turns his entire home into an elaborate pond for Li Yu. The whole bit about the message carved into the palace walls gave me secondhand embarrassment. The guy does not care one bit what anyone thinks about his feelings for, as far as others are aware, some random dude who just showed up at the palace one day.

REVIEW: Lavender Clouds: Comics About Neurodivergence and Mental Health (graphic novel) by Bex Ollerton

Lavender Clouds is a collection of comics about Ollerton's experiences with neurodivergence and mental health. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This wasn't exactly what I expected. I really liked Ollerton's part in Sensory: Life on the Spectrum and was therefore looking forward to reading this. I recognized one or two comics from that collection in this one.

Unfortunately, for some reason the flow in this was really bad, and reading the volume straight through felt like being pelted in the face with an almost insurmountable level of executive dysfunction, depression, burnout, and social anxiety. 

Things get a bit more positive and hopeful by the end, but I could have used a few more rays of sunshine woven throughout the whole work. Lavender Clouds presents very little in the way of strategies for dealing with all of these negative feelings - they're basically just something to endure. Lots of folks will likely find this relatable, but be sure you're in a decent enough headspace before diving in.

REVIEW: The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish: Canji Baojun De Zhangxin Yu Chong, Vol.1 (book) by Xue Shan Fei Hu, illustrated by Ryoplica, translated by Mimi, Yuka

The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish is danmei, Chinese m/m fantasy romance. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

 Li Yu is an 18-year-old guy reborn as a carp in the danmei novel he read (called "The Tyrant and His Delicate Concubine," I think). It's some kind of gamified rebirth - something called the System tells him that he must either change Prince Jing's personality or he, Li Yu, will die. To accomplish his task, he has to become Prince Jing's beloved pet fish and fulfill various other quests and subquests.

In this particular volume, Li Yu must somehow save the life of Prince Jing's cousin and only friend, Ye Qinghuan. In return, Li Yu will get to spend increasingly longer periods of time as a human, which will make future tasks much easier, but could also make things more complicated if Li Yu is thought to be a yao (if I remember right, some kind of dangerous supernatural being).

REVIEW: The Cage (book) by Bonnie Kistler

The Cage is a mystery/thriller. I bought my copy new.

Review:

At a fashion company, Lucy (from HR) and Shay (from Legal) enter an elevator, which gets stuck and loses power. When the doors are finally opened again, Lucy is dead. Shay claims she killed herself during a panic attack. If it was murder, Shay is the most obvious suspect.

I'll start by saying the elevator and what happens in it really doesn't matter. The real story is what's going on with all the characters. It's an interesting overall story, but it's kind of odd that Kistler set it up so that "did Lucy commit suicide or was she murdered?" seems like the primary mystery when it's really more "Why did Lucy die?"

I couldn't tell whether the author wanted readers to think Shay was brilliant or not. Honestly, she got super lucky. She made some incredibly stupid decisions early on and only started to sharpen up later in the book. Jingjing was probably more badass overall.

This was a reasonably fun read, but pretty flawed.

REVIEW: Stitches: Short Stories (anthology) by Hirokatsu Kihara, art by Junji Ito, translated by Jocelyne Allen

This is an anthology of short horror stories. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This one's on me - I wasn't paying attention and initially got this thinking that it was an anthology of Junji Ito manga shorts. Instead, it's an anthology of (primarily) textual short stories by Hirokatsu Kihara, illustrated by Junji Ito. This didn't necessarily have to be a bad thing. Maybe it'd be a Japanese Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, with the illustrations making everything several times creepier.

Or not. Most of the stories were either not very memorable or were downright disappointing with their lack of follow-through. "The Kimono" was kind of sweet and creepy, and "The Play" was mildly creepy. However, several of the stories literally ended with some variation of "nothing happened, thank goodness." It was a letdown.

There is one manga story in the collection, created by Junji Ito and based on a "true story" collected by Hirokatsu Kihara. It starts off good and creepy due to Ito's artwork...and then the main character chickens out and changes the subject in order to avoid learning anything truly scary.

All in all, not really worth it, not even for Ito's artwork.

REVIEW: The Gray Man (book) by Mark Greaney

The Gray Man is a spy thriller, the first in a series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

The Gray Man (Court Gentry) was previously CIA until they burned him. He now works for Don Fitzroy, a man who is forced, in this book, to betray him in order to protect his family. Gentry eventually figures this out - he's being hunted because an outgoing Nigerian dictator wants his head in a box for killing his brother, and Fitzroy was a way to get at him because Fitzroy has weaknesses that could be exploited, whereas Gentry supposedly does not.

In an effort to save Fitzroy's family, particularly his twin 8-year-old granddaughters, Gentry drags his exhausted, bleeding, broken body all over Europe (particularly France).

REVIEW: Bingo Love (graphic novel) written by Tee Franklin, art by Jenn St-Onge

Bingo Love is a f/f romance graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This starts in 2038, with Hazel comforting a woman (who I later realized was Mari) who'd been kicked out by her parents for being gay. She begins telling her story, which goes back to 1963. Mari transfers to her school, and the two of them immediately get along. They become friends and eventually realize they're attracted to each other. When their parents find out, they break the two of them up and find men for them to marry. In 2015, Hazel and Mari finally meet each other again during a Bingo game and realize they're still in love with each other. However, there are plenty of family complications - upset kids and grandkids, Hazel's husband, all of whom feel hurt and blindsided.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 10) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy manga. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

This volume introduces a French fry thief who only ever steals a single fry. Nano does full-on battle with him. For a good chunk of the volume, Arawi does 1-3 panel comics, leading to moments like when a comic's title becomes its own single-panel comic. Mio almost (finally) hears the results of the manga contest she entered volumes ago, but her use of a pen name messes things up. There are more hair jokes. We get a flash forward, in which Mio is a manga creator, with Mai taking her sweet time to come help, and Yuuko traveling somewhere outside Japan (maybe discovering a new species??). There's also a storyline about a time capsule in which the girls are sending letters to their future selves. Nano, Mr. Sakamoto, and the professor somehow switch bodies, and there's some kind of corn power battle involving a snake.

This had some good moments (like the flash forward), but then it kind of went off the rails. I have no idea what Arawi was thinking with the 1-3 panel comics. Maybe getting tired? An extended flash forward section would have made for a great stopping point for the series.

This is the last volume I own, and I plan to stop here, although an English translation of volume 11 is available and an English translation of volume 12 will be released later in 2025.

Extras:

Several full-color pages.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 9) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy manga. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Mio meets Yuuko's celebrity lookalike, Double Cheeseburgirl. Mr. Takasaki freaks out about Ms. Sakurai seeing his pic of her as a high schooler and accidentally makes it look like he really has a crush on Ms. Nakamura. Nano and Mai get really into a book called Double Crops: A Textbook (which I later realized was written by Ms. Sakurai's father). Misato continues to have weird delusions of romance with Sasahara. Mio buys an over-priced cutting board from a weird vending machine. Also, Ms. Nakamura is now somehow living at the Shinonome Laboratory?

Yet another random and weird volume, with a lot of the weirdness somehow interconnected. So, basically a normal Nichijou volume.

It's been a while, but I think the one pen featured in a strip near the end of the volume is a reference to one of the teachers in Azumanga Daioh.

Extras:

A few full-color pages and a page about minor characters.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 8) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy manga. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Ms. Nakamura continues to try to capture Nano. Yuuko hypnotizes various students, with varying degrees of success. The newspaper subscription guys are back and trying their best. Misato thinks her younger sister Mihoshi is in love with Sasahara. There's an extended flashback to Mai's middle school days as a transfer student from Alaska, more hair-related humor, and we finally meet Ms. Sakurai's father, who turns out to be a narcoleptic novelist.

Definitely better than the previous volume. More characters are getting the spotlight, which is helping to keep the jokes fresh. I like the way some of the jokes extend across multiple strips and morph along the way.

My one issue was that the middle school flashback was a bit sudden and jarring.

Extras:

A few full-color pages and a page introducing some of the people Yukko, Mai, and Mio knew back in middle school.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 7) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy manga. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

In this volume we get more Go/Soccer demonstrations.Yuuko gets mistaken for some kind of celebrity and immediately regrets rolling with it. The principal has an increasingly terrible experience with Mr. Takasaki as his unfortunate witness. Yuuko and Mio attempt to smash an indestructible pumpkin. Also, a weird group arrives and tries to get itself some newspaper subscribers.

This volume seemed weaker and more random than previous volumes. Certain running jokes, like the dog thing, seem to have been dropped.

The best bits, for me, were the part with Mr. Takasaki and the principal, and the part where Yuuko thought she was having an unlucky day but inadvertently saved the prime minister's life.

Extras:

A few full-color pages and a little info on the weird guys who were trying to get newspaper subscribers.

REVIEW: The Magpie Lord (book) by K.J. Charles

The Magpie Lord is m/m historical fantasy, the first in a series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Lucien Vaudrey's father essentially exiled him to China when he was 17. He had no intention of ever returning to England, but then both his father and older brother committed suicide, making him the new Lord Crane. All he wants to do is settle the legal aspects of his new inheritance and return to China. Unfortunately, either he's going insane or someone is trying to kill him with magic. In China, Crane would have called for a shaman. In England, he finds himself a magician.

That magician happens to be Stephen Day, a man who loathes him for what the old Lord Crane did to his father. Still, Stephen can't sit idly by as someone uses magic for evil, so he does what he can to help Crane. Helping him with part of the problem doesn't solve everything, however, so he sticks around to do more investigating and find the true culprit.

REVIEW: Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees (graphic novel) written and illustrated by Patrick Horvath

Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees is a mystery/horror graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Sam is the manager of the small town of Woodbrook's hardware store. She's well-liked, although she really only has one true friend, Lola. The two of them have known each other since they were kids.

Sam has one tiny secret: for the past 20 years, she's been going to the city, picking a random person, and killing them. She's killed 40+ people so far. Her one rule is that she never kills in her home town. This is working well for her until someone mucks everything up by murdering a Woodbrook local and putting them on display during a town parade. If Sam can't find the real killer soon and stop them, she might find herself in the position of being blamed for murders she didn't actually commit. She certainly won't be able to continue with her usual method of letting off steam.

REVIEW: The Apartment (book) by S.L. Grey

The Apartment is horror. I think I bought my copy new.

Review:

Mark and Steph are a South African family still recovering, emotionally and financially, after a home invasion. Their marriage is starting to fracture, but they don't really have the money for a traditional vacation. Then Mark's friend Carla mentions house swapping, and they decide to give it a shot and set something up with a couple in Paris. There's some tension as Mark decides, without consulting Steph, that they should leave their daughter with Steph's parents while they're gone, but that turns out to be for the best as their vacation immediately shows signs of not being as advertised. 

The apartment in Paris is musty and awful, and almost all of the neighboring apartments appear to be abandoned. It also doesn't help that their credit card doesn't work, and that the only other person in the apartments seems to be a little crazy. When their nightmare "vacation" is finally over, it seems like their home might finally feel like a refuge again. Unfortunately, the "wrongness" from the apartment in Paris has somehow followed them home.

REVIEW: Dwellings: Six Twisted Tales of Adorable Horror (graphic novel) by Jay Stephens

Dwellings is a horror graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

I suppose this is technically an anthology of horror stories, although they all take place in the same town (Elwich) and have a lot of overlapping elements.

In the first story, a teen (twenty-something?) in the witness protection program kills a mobster and then goes crazy and kills a bunch of other people, thinking that he's doing it for the crows that keep following him around.

In the second story, a psychology student researching Foreign Accent Syndrome goes to meet Brandon, a suspected FAC patient, and begins to worry that there's something supernatural going on.

In the third story, a woman is angry because her grandmother has gone missing from a retirement home. She finds her grandmother's old puppet, which speaks to her, and ends up on the run from the retirement home folks, who seem intent on silencing her.

In the fourth story, a rich kid opens Fang Factory, a haunted house that makes use of infrasound, a hum that can't be detected by human hearing but that the body can still feel. Things go very badly.

The fifth story is a tangled little tale about a woman who's being chased by mobsters and who seems to be haunted by the spirit of Pesto the Clown.

The sixth story alternates between the past and present, focused on an older man who swears he has no memories of his childhood but who, on the encouragement of his therapist, keeps digging into those memories in order to find the source of his phobias about plants and nature.

In between the various stories, there are extra comics about a guy who repeatedly cheats the devil.

REVIEW: My Brother's Husband (manga, vol. 2) by Gengoroh Tagame, translated by Anne Ishii

My Brother's Husband is a contemporary realistic manga series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Yaichi, Mike, and Yaichi's family go to an onsen. Afterward, Yaichi meets one of Ryoji's old high school friends, who asks to come by and drop some stuff off - and who secretly arranges to go out with Mike to talk about Ryoji. Yaichi deals with a phone call from Kana's teacher about Mike, and Yaichi and Mike finally sit down and really talk about Ryoji.

REVIEW: Step Aside, Pops: A Hark! A Vagrant Collection (graphic novel) by Kate Beaton

Step Aside, Pops is a collection of some of Kate Beaton's Hark! A Vagrant webcomics. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Of the two Hark! A Vagrant collections I know of, I think this is the better one, although both are good.

I particularly loved the feminism-related comics - Beaton's characters' facial expressions are fabulous and funny. Her women are either too tired for this garbage or too cool for it. I also really liked the "based on covers and drawings in the public domain" comics.

Throughout the volume there are little comments from Beaton here and there.

REVIEW: The Walking Cat: A Cat's-Eye View of the Zombie Apocalypse (manga omnibus) by Tomo Kitaoka, translated by Caleb D. Cook

The Walking Cat is a zombie apocalypse manga. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This follows Yuki the stray cat as he's taken in by various humans in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. First, Yuki travels with Jin, a man looking for his wife, Satoko. When Jin learns that Satoko has left for an island that's supposedly untouched by zombies, he heads there as well. After that, Yuki lives with Kaoru, a girl who's part of the little island survivor community. Kaoru wants to become part of the resource hunting crew that periodically leaves the island, because she can't stand to be around her mother, who's made an abusive jerk the most important person in her life. After Kaoru, Yuki travels with Fuuta, a boy who comes across a group of kids who, for various reasons, hate adults. They travel to a little village only to discover that it's inhabited by a man who isn't interested in having company.

REVIEW: Paprika (book) by Yasutaka Tsutsui, translated by Andrew Driver

Paprika is a Japanese sci-fi psychological thriller. I bought my copy new.

Review:

The Institute for Psychiatric Research uses cutting edge technology to view and even enter patients' dreams and treat psychological issues. Although their work is finally legal, in the early days of their work their researchers often used pseudonyms. Atsuko Chiba is one of the Institute's most brilliant psychotherapists...and also secretly the dream detective Paprika, who helped high-profile clients with delicate psychological problems back when her work was illegal.

Paprika hasn't been needed for several years, but Atsuko's boss convinces her to bring her out of "retirement" in order to treat a friend of his, a senior executive at a car company, suffering from anxiety and panic attacks. As she works with her secret client, Atsuko also attempts to find out what happened to several stolen DC Minis, smaller dream machine prototypes. Someone within the Institute seems to be using them to "infect" her colleagues with the dreams of schizophrenic patients. If news gets out, it'll discredit all the work she and Tokita (the genius developer of the dream technology) have done and possibly interfere with their chances at winning the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

REVIEW: My Vampire Plus-One (book) by Jenna Levine

My Vampire Plus-One is a paranormal romantic comedy. I bought my copy new.

Review:

It's technically not necessary to have read the first book in the series before this one, although there are a lot of character cameos that will have more impact if you've read it.

Amelia Collins is a successful accountant who's working with a stressful client during the tail end of tax season. Making time for herself isn't exactly a priority right now, but she still wants to make an effort to be there for family events, like her cousin's upcoming wedding. Unfortunately, she made the mistake of joking about having a boyfriend when her mom was poking her, again, about her single status, and for some reason her entire family took her seriously. 

Although she at least tells her brother the truth, she can't quite bring herself to come clean to her parents, which means finding herself a fake boyfriend. Except Amelia hasn't dated in ages, and she's not going to ask one of her colleagues. Her best option seems to be the random hot guy with amazing blue eyes she accidentally ran into on the way to a family get-together. He's got a great sense of humor and, surprisingly, he seems to know a couple of her brother's friends. When he nervously admits to her that he's a renegade vampire, she figures it's another one of his jokes.

Except it isn't. Reginald (Reggie) Cleaves is proud of himself for having told Amelia the truth so soon during their arrangement. He's amazed at how well she takes it, but who is he to look a gift horse in the mouth? His and Amelia's fake dating arrangement will hopefully give him a chance to lose the Collective, a group of vampires who want to kill him because of a fire he supposedly started a century ago. And it certainly doesn't hurt that Amelia's gorgeous and maybe attracted to him as well.

REVIEW: Lovely: Ladies of Animation: The Art of Lorelay Bové, Mingjue Helen Chen, Claire Keane, Lisa Keene, Brittney Lee, Victoria Ying (nonfiction book)

Lovely: Ladies of Animation: The Art of Lorelay Bové, Mingjue Helen Chen, Claire Keane, Lisa Keene, Brittney Lee, Victoria Ying is nonfiction. I bought my copy used.

Review:

I've been indulging my love of art books lately. The artwork in this was beautiful, although I wish medium information had been included for all the pieces (edit: never mind, I just realized all this info is included in the very back of the book). For this reason, Victoria Ying's section was one of my favorites, because, in her text, she talked a lot about the individual images and the constraints under which she made them. She also gave a general idea of her techniques and the materials she used.

There's no particular theme that ties all the artwork together, beyond the fact that all of the artists have worked with Disney. Most of the artists have at least a few pieces focused on women, for example, but then there's Lisa Keene's section, which is entirely dogs and cats.

REVIEW: The Art of Frozen (nonfiction book) by Charles Solomon

The Art of Frozen is nonfiction. I bought my copy used.

Review:

This book was like one of those behind-the-scenes Blu-ray/DVD extras. Those don't always work well for me, and I have a feeling the exact same content found in this book, as a DVD extra, would have bored me. However, in book format it was wonderful - I got to spend time poring over images I really liked, and the illustrations were given the space and time to shine.

I particularly enjoyed the section on Norwegian rosemaling and efforts to incorporate it into the movie's designs. I also liked seeing the various character design sketches - it's amazing how much Elsa, in particular, changed.

REVIEW: LEGO: The Art of the Minifigure (nonfiction book) by Brian Barrett

LEGO: The Art of the Minifigure is a richly illustrated nonfiction book about Lego minifigures. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This book covers the history of LEGO minifigures, from the building figures that came before them to the "Stage Extras" to the huge variety of minifigures available today. There's a bit about LEGO history, the LEGO manufacturing process, and the impact of certain design and manufacturing innovations. The Star Wars minifigures are highlighted as a major minifigure turning point, leading to the creation of new wigs and other design features necessary to make the characters recognizable. There's also a bit about LEGO Life, LEGO Hidden Side and its incorporation of AR, the Women of NASA set, the design of the characters in The Lego Movie, and more. I loved the pages near the end devoted to The Original, a wooden 5:1 upscaled version of the classic minifigure, and the different ways LEGO artists customized it (which seemed like a fun idea until I went online and saw what The Original cost, lol).

I'm not a LEGO collector and haven't played with them in years, but it was fun reading about LEGO and minifigures from a design standpoint, to the point where I might read more about LEGO just to learn more about it. I wish "the gauntlet" (a series of tests that ensures that each minifigure fits the System in Play) had gotten a little more attention, but the little glimpse of it was still nice.

In terms of "pushing the LEGO boundaries," I noticed that the LEGO Friends figures barely got a mention. I also wished that the book had gone into a little more detail on some of the things that were a little more contentious at LEGO, but the book's overall light and pleasant tone didn't really allow for that.

REVIEW: The September House (book) by Carissa Orlando

The September House is a blend of horror and mystery. I bought my copy new.

Review:

When Margaret and Hal bought their home somewhere between three and four years ago, it was supposed to be a dream come true. They'd both always wanted to own their own home, but for various reasons it had never been in the cards. Now their daughter is all grown up and living on her own, Hal is doing better than he has in a while, and the house, due to a few deaths in its history, is reasonably priced despite being a beautiful Victorian.

The basement is a problem right from the start - something about it just feels wrong - but it's not hard to avoid going there. However, it's September when the house reaches its fully haunted potential. Hal can barely stand to be there during their first and second September, and by their third he's determined to find a solution. Margaret, meanwhile, just develops a set of rules and follows them. It's now time for her fourth September in the house, and she's fully prepared. Then her daughter calls, wants to know where Hal is, and won't take "he's busy" for an answer.

Hal left the house a month ago, unable to take its creepy ghost children and September's bleeding walls and constant nighttime screaming. Margaret is made of sterner stuff. She isn't about to let a few ghosts push her out of her dream home, and besides, it's generally a nice place to live 11 months out of the year. But she and Hal never told their daughter, Katherine, about the house's issues, and Margaret had never intended for her to find out. Now Katherine's insisting on visiting during the worst month of the year, determined to track Hal down since it doesn't seem like Margaret's going to, and Margaret has no idea how she's going to hide all of the house's oddities from her.

REVIEW: Defekt (novella) by Nino Cipri

Defekt is the second work set in Cipri's sci-fi LitenVerse world. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This takes place at around the same time as Cipri's first LitenVärld (knockoff IKEA) work, Finna, and features a cameo appearance of one of that work's characters, but I think it could be read and enjoyed on its own.

Derek is a model LitenVärld employee, always striving to support the store and its goals. Right from the moment he wakes up in his converted shipping container home behind the store to the moment he leaves work, he lives and breathes his job. It kind of creeps his fellow employees out. His supervisor encourages him to stop trying to make friends and just focus on his work, but he can't help but feel a little lonely.

Then Derek starts to feel a little...off. It begins with a sore throat. When it progresses to coughing up blood and gristle, a coworker encourages him to take his first sick day ever. He wasn't even aware that he could do that. Unfortunately, this then results in upper management questioning Derek's loyalty to the store and assigning him to a special nighttime inventory shift. Meeting his new coworkers is a shock, to put it mildly.

REVIEW: A Court of Frost and Starlight (book) by Sarah J. Maas

A Court of Frost and Starlight is the fourth book in Maas' Court of Thorns and Roses series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is basically a "holiday special" book. We're done with the previous book's war and are now in a peaceful, contemplative, rebuilding phase, in which Feyre gets to angst about all the people who didn't survive and the friends and family they left behind. Maas remembers that Feyre likes to paint (although I realized that she's never specified what kind of paint Feyre uses - I assume acrylics?), there's some fretting over Winter Solstice gift buying, and we get updates on both Nesta (who's doing terribly) and Elain (who's doing ok, although her almost-marriage and Lucien are still sore spots).

There are tiny hints of what might be going on in the next book, but overall, this really could have and should have been an anthology of short stories, or a bonus story at the end of the previous book. I'm guessing Maas isn't really comfortable writing short stories, though.

Overall, this was ok for what it was, but it didn't feel like a truly necessary entry in the series. 

I continue to be reminded of Anne Bishop's Black Jewels trilogy. At some point, I need to reread those books and see if they're actually better than these or if it's just nostalgia coloring my memories.

REVIEW: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (book) by Gabrielle Zevin

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is, I suppose, historical fiction.

Review:

Content warnings for so many things: miscarriage, gun violence, suicide, drug use, and probably more things I'm forgetting.

This is the story of Sam Masur and Sadie Green, their friendship, and the games they eventually make with each other. Sam and Sadie first meet as kids, in a hospital - Sadie is there because her sister is getting treatment for cancer, and Sam is there recovering from multiple surgeries to piece one of his feet back together after the car accident that took his mother's life. They bond instantly over games, although Sam eventually breaks their friendship off after he discovers something Sadie was keeping from him.

Years later, Sam is studying math at Harvard while Sadie is studying game design at MIT. They accidentally run into each other and have a brief but friendly conversation, after which Sadie hands Sam a disk with a game she made. The game blows Sam away, and he becomes determined to team up with her and design a game together. First, though, he has to help her with the deep depression she's currently dealing with.

Together, Sadie and Sam create a game called Ichigo. Over the next couple decades or so, in the midst of various ups and downs in their friendship, they start a company together and create more games. Although they enjoy bouncing ideas off each other, they don't always mesh well personally and professionally.

REVIEW: Escape Room (book) by Maren Stoffels, translated by Laura Watkinson

Escape Room is a YA mystery/thriller. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This alternates between four POVs, five if you count the occasional page from the POV of the person determined to punish one or more of the characters. Alissa is a pretty girl who hates it when people judge her by what they see on the surface. Her father is a firefighter who struggled with PTSD after one particular fire. Mint is the shy, withdrawn girl Alissa befriended. Although she hasn't told anyone, she thinks she has the ability to feel other people's pain. It makes it difficult for her to interact with others. Sky is another member of this friend group. Miles is one of Sky's coworkers, a handsome but secretly tortured young man who finds himself immediately drawn to Alissa.

The four of them hear about a new escape room that requires a minimum of four people, and they decide to give it a try. Unfortunately, what they don't realize is that the escape room is a trap arranged by someone with a massive grudge.

REVIEW: Alien Bonds (book) by Carmen Webster Buxton

Alien Bonds is sci-fi romance. I bought my copy new (although I also have an e-book copy that I think was gifted to me by the author).

Review:

Industrial chemist Dina Bellaire has only just recently moved to the planet Wankanreo for her new job, and is still trying settle in when she attends a party and finds her entire life changed in one moment. Kuaron Du, a famous Wakanrean singer, is initially angry when he meets her, thinking that her presence has initiated glashunrah, a false, one-sided "fated mate"-ish bond that is the reason why Wankanreans are wary of humans and have instituted a "no touching" rule for all humans on the planet. When he realizes that their bond is real, shahgunrah rather than glashunrah, he leaves the party with Dina and the two of them go back to his place, where they proceed to have lots of (off-page) sex.

By the time Dina is able to think again, she confused and bewildered, although still drawn to Kuaron. She refuses to believe that they're actually bonded the way Kuaron says they are, and is determined to go to work. Unfortunately, that's not really possible this early during the formation of their bond. Wakanrean culture and laws have procedures in place that allow newly bonded couples to take as much time off as necessary, but the fact that Dina is human complicates things. Another issue is that Kuaron's father is Wakanreo's planetary administrator.

REVIEW: A Court of Wings and Ruin (book) by Sarah J. Maas

A Court of Wings and Ruin is the third book in Maas' fantasy romance Court of Thorns and Roses series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Feyre returns to the Spring Court as a spy. Tamlin believes her lies, oblivious to her revulsion at the deals he made in order to get her back. Lucien sees that there's more going on, but he keeps quiet, knowing that Feyre is his only link to his newly found mate, Elain.

Once her work at the Spring Court is done and she's back with Rhysand, it's time to prepare for the upcoming war against Hybern. Nesta and Elain both have abilities that could be useful, if they can be persuaded to care enough about what's going on around them to try to help. Feyre has more skills to develop, and there are many potential allies, if she and Rhysand are willing to take some risks.

Mixed in with all the battle preparation is a lot of relationship/emotional stuff: Feyre's relationship with her sisters, something brewing between Nesta and Cassian, Lucien fretting over Elain (who is refusing to eat or do anything now that the Cauldron has changed her and she can't marry the person she'd originally planned to marry), Mor finally talking about Azriel (although she didn't owe Feyre any sort of explanation, but whatever), more Tamlin, etc.

REVIEW: Last and First Idol (anthology) by Gengen Kusano, translated by Andrew Cunningham

Last and First Idol is an anthology collection of three science fiction stories. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is a collection of three stories. I'll cover each one separately.

"Last and First Idol"

This is the story of Mika Furutsuki, a girl who loved idols ever since she was six months old and only idols could calm her crying. Her dream of becoming an idol herself eventually leads her to attend a high school known for having produced one of the top new idols. At that school, she eventually catches the attention of Maori Niizono, a girl who doesn't care much about becoming an idol herself but who, for some reason, is determined to help Mika achieve her dreams.

Unfortunately, Mika's best efforts aren't enough. Her talent agency goes bankrupt, and both her sister and Maori Niizono confront her in the aftermath. Although Maori continues to be determined to help her, this only makes Mika feel worse. Feeling as though she's lost everything worth living for, Mika kills herself. This, as is turns out, is just the beginning of her story.

REVIEW: How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems (nonfiction book) by Randall Munroe

How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems is a blend of science/math and humor. I bought my copy new.

Review:

How To is very similar to Munroe's What If? volumes, in that it examines hypothetical scenarios and attempts to determine, scientifically, if they are possible and what some of the unintended outcomes might be. In this case, however, the hypothetical scenarios are all addressing common real-world problems, like making friends, digging a hole, playing football, etc., although they're all taken to extremes in some way. And okay, so there are a few less common problems thrown in, like how to build a lava moat and how to mail a package from space.

I found this to be just as entertaining and fascinating as Munroe's What If? volumes. I enjoy seeing how he thinks his way through the various problems. His stick figure illustrations add to the humor. This time around there were some fun guest contributions too. I got a kick out of the thought of Serena Williams agreeing to see how many tries it would take her to knock a drone out of the sky with a tennis ball. Dr. Katie Mack's "vacuum decay no, tiny black hole yes" answer was also fun. Astronaut Chris Hadfield essentially got a whole chapter to himself, tackling every emergency landing situation Munroe could throw at him (granted, some of the answers generally boiled down to "you'll almost certainly die, but doing [blank] would help improve your chances of survival very slightly").

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 6) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy manga. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

In this volume, Fecchan tries to look on the bright side of things. Ms. Nakamura (the science teacher) finds the Shinonome Laboratory and completely freaks out about being in what she's sure is enemy territory. Mio finds out about the manga contest she entered...or does she? Yuuko has another Fey Kingdom dream in which Mio is a super-powered villain looking for the magical wooden cubes (her barrettes or whatever they are). Ms. Sakurai finds porn (??) called DVD Vinyl in her brother's bedroom. The author pokes fun at rigged target practice games. We finally get to see a Go/Soccer match, and it is bizarre. Also, Sasahara and Misato walk together, and it completely wrecks Mio emotionally, with utterly ridiculous results.

I am wildly curious about the contents of DVD Vinyl, and it was nice to finally see a Go/Soccer match. Also, I found the target practice game bit hilarious, even though I've never played one of those in my life.

As usual, this series is weird and weirdly fascinating. There are occasional genuinely funny moments, but mostly I'm here to see what bizarre things happen next.

Extras:

A few full-color pages, some random notes about Mai's pets and other tiny details from the series.

REVIEW: Character Design Quarterly, 25 (magazine issue)

Character Design Quarterly is a magazine, although each issue has its own ISBN and it's possible to purchase individual issues, which is how I ended up with this one.

Review:

If you have any interest in how artists progress from a prompt or an idea to a completed character design and illustration, I highly recommend this. The artists in this issue include Lynn Chen (the creator of the issue's cover art), Simone Grünewald, Cam Kendell, Aurélie Lise-Anne, João Moura, David Navarro, Roger Pérez, Anastasiia Platoshyna, Alex Relloso, and Jennifer Voigt. There's also a creature teeth tutorial created by Lorenzo Etherington under the cover flaps.

The issue includes:
- a detailed step-by-step look at the creation of the cover art,
- a step-by-step look at the creation of "a family of circus performers on vacation,"
- some info on the creation of an owl character, an interview with Simone Grünewald (who was involved in the games A New Beginning, the Deponia series, and The Pillars of the Earth),
- a detailed look at the creation of a wizard character,
- some tips from Jennifer Voigt,
- a gallery of art by Eunbi Kang, Ben Eblen, and Shannon Hallstein,
- a step-by-step look at the creation of an illustration using the prompt "wind, adventure, youth, light,"
- an interview with Cam Kendell,
- some tips on using lighting to create different moods,
- and a detailed look at the creation of an "embittered, eccentric old man and his animal sidekick"

Not only is the artwork a treat for the eyes, the detailed process information is fascinating and makes me itch to play with my art supplies.

REVIEW: Science of Creature Design: Understanding Animal Anatomy (nonfiction book) by Terryl Whitlatch

Science of Creature Design: Understanding Animal Anatomy is nonfiction. I bought my copy used.

Review:

As other reviewers have mentioned, the title is a bit misleading. While Whitlatch does include detailed illustrations of skeletal and muscular anatomy of several types of real-life beings, including labeling that allows readers to note features that different animals have in common, there isn't as much here about science and Whitlatch's creature creation process as I would have liked. Some of her creature illustrations include info on which real-life creatures inspired them (for example, the "Welankus" that combines aspects of hellbender and Pinacosaurus anatomy), and Whitlatch occasionally highlights particular things about individual creature anatomy that she thinks readers should pay attention to, but it's generally up to readers to figure out exactly how Whitlatch use real-life influences to create believable fantasy creatures.

REVIEW: Food Anatomy: The Curious Parts & Pieces of Our Edible World (nonfiction book) by Julia Rothman, with help from Rachel Wharton

Food Anatomy: The Curious Parts & Pieces of Our Edible World is heavily illustrated nonfiction, but not, in my opinion, a graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is basically a heavily illustrated food miscellany. I came across it while trying to find food-focused artbooks. It covers lots of random information, touching on foods from all over the world (although you'll probably find yourself thinking of a particular food that could have been mentioned that isn't - one of the drawbacks of a work that tries to cover as much ground as this one).

There are illustrations for everything from place settings (formal American, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Korean, Indian/Nepalese) to different kinds of spoons and forks (but not, for some reason, knives, except as butchery tools later in the meat chapter), and more. I enjoyed some parts more than others. For example, the "parents of produce" section, in which the author looked at the fruits and vegetables that were selectively bred in order to make the edible varieties we see today, was interesting. The sandwiches section made my mouth water, even when I had no idea what the sandwich fillings might taste like. 

REVIEW: Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World (nonfiction graphic novel) by Pénélope Bagieu, translated by Montana Kane

Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World is a nonfiction graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

In this graphic novel, Bagieu writes about the lives of a little over 29 women. One of the things I really appreciated about this book was that the women chosen weren't the usual ones - I knew of a few of them, like Margaret Hamilton, Temple Grandin, and Josephine Baker, but quite a few of them were new to me.

If there was any sort of organization to this volume, I didn't see it, but thankfully that didn't turn out to be an issue. For the most part, I loved this graphic novel, which provided enough info about each of the women to give me an idea of whether I might want to look up more about them. You could tell that Bagieu was glossing over certain bits and/or playing certain aspects up (I'm pretty sure that was The IT Crowd's Moss making a guest appearance in Jesselyn Radack's section) - there's only so much detail you can include in a 291-page graphic novel about this many women - but I generally enjoyed her story-telling style. The chapter on Sonita Alizadeh prompted me to look up one of her music videos. Also, the miniature lover in me needs to see if I can find more stuff about Frances Glessner Lee and her crime scene "nutshell studies."

The one chapter that felt out of place was the one devoted to The Shaggs. Their father forced them to perform and record an album, despite the fact that they knew they weren't very good and none of them wanted to. Their father had so much control over their lives that they didn't have friends, and none of them were truly free until he finally died. When their music suddenly got attention again, it wasn't because they wanted it to - only one of the sisters had any interest in trying to continue her musical career.

Except for that one odd chapter, this was an extremely enjoyable and informative work, enough that I plan to seek out more of Bagieu's stuff.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 5) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Mio has apparently given up on keeping her BL manga creation a secret, because in this volume she enlists Yuuko and Mai's help in getting her pages done. Mr. Takasaki accidentally runs into Ms. Sakurai outside of work. We get our first glimpse of what's going on in the vice principal's head. Also, there is an incident involving several dogs.

I don't know how Mio got to the point of being okay with her friends spending hours looking at her art, but now that she's there, the series has other layers of comedy it can explore. Mai doesn't really care about what she's doing, and Yuuko, unsurprisingly, is terrible at helping out.

Mr. Takasaki is a disaster. I still have no idea what Go/Soccer is supposed to be, but it's mildly amusing to see Ms. Sakurai's younger brother blackmailing Mr. Takasaki into being the club's advisor.

As usual, this is more weird than funny, but reasonably entertaining.

Extras:

A few full-color pages, profiles for the various high school staff members, and profiles for the Record of Fey Kingdom soldiers. I still don't understand those episodes - I assume they're dreams of some sort?

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 4) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Miss Sakurai's younger brother becomes (or always was?) a student at the high school, joining the Go/Soccer club and giving Mr. Takasaki anxiety. Ms. Nakamura, the science teacher, makes several attempts to capture Nano in order to study her. The principal continues to have more animal and toupee issues. Mio is exceptionally bad at sports or anything physical. Also, it looks like Nakanojou, the kid with the mohawk, is becoming more of a series regular, poor guy.

This series continues to be reasonably fun, if a bit too weird to truly be funny, with enough new things happening in each volume to keep the jokes from getting stale. 

Extras:

A couple full-color pages, a page detailing a few things from the professor's laboratory/home, and a page of random Nichijou facts.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 3) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Mai is in yet another embarrassing situation where people are likely to see her BL art. Mr. Takasaki has a crush on the guidance counselor, Miss Sakurai, but is too socially awkward to ask her to go out mushroom hunting with him. Mai and Yuuko get into a big fight inspired by Yuuko buying Mai fried mackerel for lunch rather than the fried macaroni she asked for.

In every volume there are jokes I just don't get, plus a few I sorta kinda enjoy. This volume went back to the more so-so feeling of volume 1, although I did get some amusement out of Mr. Takasaki's sheer nerdiness. I suspect that the man's closest friends might be his eggplants.

Extras:

A couple full-color pages.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 2) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou is a high school comedy series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Yuuko attempts puns and fails to make anyone laugh. There's a brief, out-of-the-blue flashback to when Nano first started going to school. (Also, the professor is apparently only 8 years old??) After some difficulties with a test, Yuuko offers to draw pictures for their teacher's next English text. She and Mio have an art battle that deeply frustrates Mio. A new animal cast member is added, in the form of Sakamoto, a little black cat that the professor adopts and gives a little bandana to that allows it to speak.

REVIEW: Nichijou: My Ordinary Life (manga, vol. 1) by Keiichi Arawi, translated by Jenny McKeon

Nichijou: My Ordinary Life is a high school comedy series. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

This manga follows the "ordinary" lives of a bunch of high school weirdos, including:

Mio - a girl who secretly enjoys creating BL manga

Yuuko (or Yukko) - Mio's best friend, who often forgets to do her homework and copies Mio's

Nano - a robot who thinks she is successfully masquerading as a regular high school girl (literally everybody knows what she really is)

Professor - Nano's creator

Misato - a girl who inexplicably has lots of explosive weaponry

Sasahara - a guy who acts like the son of a wealthy family

And various other characters, including a nervous guidance counselor, a principal who makes bad jokes and fights deer, and more.

I'd seen out-of-context scenes of the anime adaptation before but didn't otherwise know much about this series. It reminds me of Azumanga Daioh, except weirder. Also, context doesn't really make those anime scenes make much more sense. I still have no idea why the principal was fighting a deer.

Extras:

A couple full-color pages.

REVIEW: Wed to the Lynx (book) by Cara Wylde

Wed to the Lynx is fantasy romance (fantasy erotic romance??). I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is part of the multi-author "Arranged Monster Mates" series, which can be read in any order. They all take place in the world of Alia Terra, which was formed when the Shift merged the human world with portions of a variety of monster worlds. In the present, poor or orphaned women submit their DNA to the Temple in order to be matched with monster mates and thereby ensure that they and/or their families live better lives. 

Marigold is a human from a wealthy, emotionally distant family. After she rejects her friend's brother, her "friend" tricks her into giving her a small sample of her blood and then submits it to the Temple without Marigold's knowledge. Marigold is shocked and horrified when she's notified that she's been matched. She and her parents try to get her out of the arranged marriage, but it isn't possible, and so she reluctantly leaves with Shadow, the Lynx she was matched with, determined to act so spoiled that he'll eventually send her home again. Shadow, meanwhile, is an introverted author who has sought out a mate in order to keep himself from growing out of control during the upcoming mating season. He's determined to do his best to make Marigold feel welcome in his home and community, even if it means going outside his comfort zone and being more social.

REVIEW: Little Book of Video Games: 70 Classics That Everyone Should Know and Play (nonfiction book) by Melissa Brinks

Little Book of Video Games is nonfiction. I think I bought my copy new.

Review:

This covers the history of video games in 70 games - that's a lot for only 153 pages, so I went into this knowing it'd feel skimpy at times. The title is also a bit misleading, since some of the games mentioned, although influential or likely the first examples of particular aspects of video game history, weren't necessarily enjoyed by audiences when they were released and didn't sound like they'd be much more enjoyable now.

REVIEW: Spring Comes Riding in a Carriage (short story) by Riichi Yokomitsu, art by Atsuki Ito, translated by Yui Kajita

Spring Comes Riding in a Carriage is a Japanese realistic fiction short story. I bought my copy new.

Review:

I'm slowly working my way through all the Maiden's Bookshelf stuff that has been translated into English. This particular story was originally published in 1926 and is focused on a married couple. Their marriage started rough, with the husband having to fight against his wife's parents' objections in order for them to get married in the first place. Then the husband had to deal with issues with his mother-in-law. Now the couple is finally left to themselves, but they still can't fully be happy - the wife is dying (tuberculosis?). Her husband acts as her caretaker, simultaneously resenting the way he feels tethered to her and dreading the day she finally leaves him. She rages at him, accusing him of wanting to be elsewhere, with someone else, only letting up as she becomes more prepared to die.

REVIEW: Butcher & Blackbird (book) by Brynne Weaver

Butcher & Blackbird is a dark romantic comedy. I bought my copy new.

Review:

When Sloane and Rowan first meet, it's three days after Sloane has killed Albert Briscoe and accidentally gotten herself locked in the cage Briscoe used to keep his victims in. Rowan reveals himself to be the serial killer known as the Boston Butcher. Sloane, in the hope that he'll help her get out of the cage, reluctantly reveals that she's the serial killer known as the Orb Weaver. Both of them exclusively target other serial killers. 

It's pretty much love at first sight for Rowan, who finds himself desperate for an excuse to keep Sloane from slipping out of his life and disappearing forever. He's the one who proposes that they play a game. Every year at around the same time, they'll both travel to a location picked by Sloane's brother Lachlan, who'll use his connections as a contract killer to find likely serial killers for them to target. The first person to find and kill the killer wins.

They both enjoy the companionship as well as the game, finally getting to meet someone else on the same wavelength. Rowan has lots of friends, but the only people who know him as he really is are his brothers. Sloane only has one close friend. As Sloane and Rowan get to know each other, they both find themselves wanting more but are reluctant to admit it. Rowan is afraid of scaring Sloane off, knowing that she's shy, skittish, and doesn't trust easily. Sloane is attracted to Rowan but has no idea how to do relationships.