REVIEW: Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees (nonfiction book) by Thor Hanson

Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review: 

Hanson starts this book off with an author's note that basically says "while honeybees are mentioned here, they were not my focus." Since honeybees are so often the first kind of bee people think about when they think about bees, I appreciated Hanson's broader look.

Hanson starts by looking at what we know about how bees evolved and what the earliest bees were like. Then he looks at bees and their relationship with flowers, bees and their relationship with us, and bee conservation efforts. Throughout all that, there are mentions of Hanson and his son watching and trying to attract local bees near their home, Hanson taking a course on catching, pinning, and identifying various bee species, and more.

As with Hanson's book on feathers, I occasionally found myself wishing this book included color photos. The lack of color photos wasn't a deal-breaker though - this was still an excellent read. I particularly enjoyed learning more about the ways in which bees are used in agriculture, and about efforts to encourage the return of native bees and hopefully reduce agriculture's reliance on having to bring in rented hives (which then have to deal with the stress of being transported and the nutritional issues brought about by having access to limited types of plants). 

REVIEW: Birds of the Photo Ark (nonfiction book) text by Noah Strycker, photographs by Joel Sartore

Birds of the Photo Ark is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Text-wise, there's not much here. This is primarily a photo book, so it's a quick read.

The photographs were gorgeous. Many of them were of the entire bird, but several were portraits or close-ups of particular features, such as feet or particularly striking feathers. Photographs included captions that identified the species depicted, their IUCN status, and, since these were all captive birds, pages at the end mentioned where the particular birds were located. 

One thing I wished the captions had included was information, when possible, about the sex of the birds in the photographs. The only captions that included this information were the ones in the "Gender" section at the beginning of the "Next Generation" chapter.

There's a short section at the end in which Joel Sartore, the photographer, explained the process of photographing the birds. I'm always a fan of "process" sections in books like these, even if they're brief.

REVIEW: Bible Adventures (nonfiction book) by Gabe Durham

Bible Adventures is Boss Fight Books' seventh book, each of which focuses on a particular video game. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This book wasn't initially on my personal list of Boss Fight Books to read - I was more focused on games I'd played or games that interested me but that I knew I wasn't going to play. However, at some point while reading reviews, I came across some positive mentions of this book and decided to give it a shot. I'm glad I did.

Durham looks at Color Dreams (a game development company), Wisdom Tree (Color Dreams' Christian games offshoot), the various people involved, and the games they made. I'd never heard of any of these companies or games, but it was interesting to read about how aspects of early Nintendo history I'd read about in other books resulted in the creation of Color Dreams, which developed and published unlicensed games for the Nintendo Entertainment System. Although most of the people involved in Color Dreams were either atheists or agnostics, Wisdom Tree was born from business savvy - Christian games were an untapped market with zero competition, and Christian stores turned out to be the perfect place to sell unlicensed Nintendo games. Although the developers themselves mostly weren't Christians, the company hired salespeople who were.

REVIEW: We Love to Entertain (book) by Sarah Strohmeyer

We Love to Entertain may look like a domestic thriller, but it'd probably be more accurate to call it suspense fiction. At times, it also almost feels like a cozy mystery. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is told from a couple different POVs, with some blog posts sprinkled throughout. The blog posts are by the couple at the center of this book, while the POVs are Erika and her mother, Kim. 

Holly and Robert are contestants on a reality show competition about house flipping. While working on their competition entry, an eco-conscious home makeover in a small Vermont town, they fell in love and are planning on getting married close to the end of the competition. It's the kind of stuff publicity dreams are made of. Erika is their assistant, a local pariah who desperately wants to make up for it by doing well in this job. Erika's intense loyalty to Holly and Robert is helped along by her unrequited (?) crush on Robert. It gives her a little thrill, knowing that Robert asks her help for things he doesn't always tell Holly about.

Something's had Robert on edge for a while, but the wedding goes without a hitch. That evening, though, Robert shows up at Erika's place out of the blue, asking to temporarily trade his Tesla for her much cheaper car, so that he and Holly can take a sudden honeymoon trip. Erika isn't great at saying no to Robert, something she soon has reason to regret, as Robert and Holly become suddenly unreachable during the important last days of the competition.

Meanwhile, Kim, Erika's mother and the town clerk, is experiencing some guilt over the way Holly and Robert got the house in the first place, and she's determined to set things right, even it means she's forced to resign. 

REVIEW: Banned Book (picture book) by Jonah Winter, illustrated by Gary Kelley

Banned Book could technically be considered a dystopian fiction picture book, since the censorship group is fictional and the situation doesn't take place anywhere in particular. I bought it new.

Review:

A book about book banning, filled with censorship bars. The number of censorship bars increases until, gradually, even the reasons for censorship are censored.

As a children's book, I'm not sure how well this would work, and I expect it would be difficult to figure out how to read it aloud. Plus, there'd be the issue of explaining it if there wasn't some sort of active censorship case going on at the child's school.

However, as an art piece about censorship, I thought this was effective. I bought it new, and it arrived wrapped in plastic, with a black paper strip over the title. Combine that with the actual content of the book, and the whole thing was pretty on point.

REVIEW: Super Chill: A Year of Living Anxiously (graphic novel) by Adam Ellis

Super Chill is a collection of humorous comics. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This reminded me of Sarah Andersen's Adulthood is a Myth stuff - a lot of the same worries/anxieties. 

The laugh that took me most by surprise was the "Am I happy now?" comic in which Ellis burst into flames in the sun. 

There was one comic that was designed to be more autobiographical than funny, a bit about Ellis leaving his job at Buzzfeed.

Overall, this was enjoyable. 

REVIEW: Oops! Rabbit (picture book) by Jo Ham

Oops! Rabbit is a humorous children's picture book. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Most of this book is composed of a set of "Rabbit on" pages, followed by "Oops!" pages in which the scenario goes wrong, and then a set of "Rabbit off" pages (the disaster's aftermath).

This was a very simple read, with only one surprise moment at the end. I did really like the design aspect, with the clean, sharp silhouette artwork and occasional use of pink - the art was a large part of what drew me to this.

REVIEW: Creepy Crayon! (picture book) words by Aaron Reynolds, pictures by Peter Brown

Creepy Crayon! is a children's horror comedy picture book. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Jasper is bad at math and spelling, and only good at art. Then he finds a perfect and pointy purple crayon, and suddenly he's getting straight A's in everything! It's great. Until the crayon even tries to interfere with his artwork.

I loved the over-the-top ominousness of the grayscale artwork, in which the only color was the purple used for the crayon-created lines. 

This was set up a lot like a horror movie, complete with the main character having a nightmare, waking up, and discovering that the crayon has made it real somehow.

Even as an adult, I thought this was fun and amusingly dramatic. 

REVIEW: Tiny T. Rex and the Impossible Hug (picture book) by Jonathan Stutzman, illustrated by Jay Fleck

Tiny T. Rex and the Impossible Hug is a children's picture book. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Tiny's friend Pointy feels sad, so Tiny wants to figure out how to hug his friend despite having such tiny arms. He goes to several family members for advice and even has a training montage.

I was drawn to this one by Tiny's incredibly cute design. Pointy (a stegosaurus) was also pretty cute.

I loved the dry humor in this. At one point, Tiny's mother tells him some uplifting stuff, and his response is hilariously practical: "I cannot hug with my heart."

If there was one thing that vaguely bugged me about this, it was that Tiny never once asked Pointy what was wrong. Still, the story was amusing, and Tiny's efforts were at least appreciated by his friend. 

REVIEW: Let Me In Your Window: Horror Stories (graphic novel) by Adam Ellis

Let Me In Your Window is a collection of short horror comics. I bought my volume new.

Review:

This is a collection of ten short horror comics. As I usually do with anthologies, I'll tackle each story separately.

"Little Kingdom"

There's a little island some people moved to in order to start a sort of commune, except that when they had children, something was wrong with them. The kids are gray and strange and never develop speech. The POV character makes a documentary about it, and it's an instant hit. Unable to make anything that popular again, the documentary filmmaker decides to do a sequel. Unfortunately, the situation has changed since the first documentary was made, and things rapidly go wrong.

REVIEW: Dewdrop (graphic novel) by K. O'Neill

Dewdrop is either a fantasy graphic novel or a fantasy children's picture book (or both?). I bought my copy new.

Review:

Everyone is preparing for the upcoming Sports Fair...and starting to feel a little discouraged. Dewdrop the axolotl uses his cheerleading skills to boost everyone's mood and get them to focus on relaxing and just doing the best they personally can.

Man, I'm such a cynical adult. This was maybe a bit too chirpy and simple for me. That said, I'm not the target audience. I suspect that children would probably enjoy Dewdrop's energy and positive approach to life. Cynical old me did think that the character designs were super cute. 

The volume ends with a nice environmental message and some facts about the four different animals (axolotl, yellow-bellied slider, newt, and minnow) featured throughout the story. 

REVIEW: Space Battle Lunchtime, Vol. 3: A Dish Best Served Cold (graphic novel, vol. 3) by Natalie Riess

Space Battle Lunchtime is a science fiction graphic novel. I bought this volume used.

Review:

Peony has been hired to cater a party held by a semi-deity space empress. Great news! Unfortunately, while she's handling the desserts, her former Space Battle Lunchtime rival, Melonhead, is handling the meal. But they're both professionals. Surely they can handle one party without problems?

Then the space empress falls over dead while eating one of Peony's desserts...and for some reason Neptunia is the one instantly considered a suspect by the empress's guard (who happens to be Neptunia's sister). Peony somehow has to find the true culprit in order to prove her girlfriend's innocence and save her catering business.

REVIEW: Mooncop (graphic novel) by Tom Gauld

Mooncop is a science fiction graphic novel. I bought my copy used.

Review:

This takes place on a moon base with a population in the single digits. A lunar cop goes about his day, waking up, getting a donut and coffee, driving around, and taking care of the few things that need him. His crime-solving rate is 100% because there are no crimes, and as more people leave the colony, there's even less for him to do.

This was mostly about loneliness, with a dash of dark work humor of the "useless jobs with useless metrics" sort. That said, even with things generally changing for the worse, with no actual end in sight, the story's main character somehow found things to appreciate.

Brief, kind of sad, and weirdly gentle? I'm not quite sure what to think about this graphic novel. 

REVIEW: Katamari Damacy (nonfiction book) by L.E. Hall

Katamari Damacy is nonfiction, volume 17 from Boss Fight Books. I bought my copy new.

Review:

If you look at Boss Fight Books' website in the paperback bundles section, you'll see that this book is listed as being in the "Historical Bundle" and the "Creator Access Bundle." Through research and interviews with people like Keita Takahashi (the creator of the Katamari Damacy franchise and the director of the first two games) and others, this book takes an in-depth look at how Katamari Damacy came to be created and how it was subsequently received by players and critics. 

I didn't actually bother looking at info about this book before starting to read it, so all I knew was that it was very different from my favorite Boss Fight Books entry so far, Mike Drucker's Silent Hill 2. Where that book included Drucker's personal reactions and interpretations of the game as well as info more generally about the game itself, Katamari Damacy was much less focused on the personal and, at times, came across as being somewhat drier because of this.

REVIEW: Shark: The Illustrated Biography (nonfiction book) by Daniel C. Abel & Sophie A. Maycock, illustrations by Adam Hook

Shark: The Illustrated Biography is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This book looks at what sharks are, how they evolved, and what their lives are like (reproduction, juvenile vs. adult life, dietary needs, etc.), and efforts at shark conservation.

Early on, the authors said they'd focus primarily on four species - the Great White Shark, Smallspotted Catshark, Sandbar Shark, and Spiny Dogfish - although I will admit that I eventually forgot that these four species were supposed to be the focus of their specific examples, because so many examples were mentioned throughout. 

REVIEW: That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America (nonfiction book) by Amanda Jones

That Librarian is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

When I have a big new task ahead of me or a topic that's weighing heavily on my mind for whatever reason, my instinct is often to read about it. That's how I ended up coming across this book. I wanted to read more about recent efforts at book banning and challenging in US libraries. What I really wanted was something focused on academic libraries, but one thing I immediately noticed was that most of what I was finding was focused on school and public libraries. 

Anyway, in this book, Amanda Jones writes about attending a public hearing about "book content" at her local public library in 2022. As a concerned citizen and librarian, she spoke in support of library collections that meet the needs of all members of her local community and warned against the harm that censorship could cause. Her whole speech is included in the last chapter of the book.

Although Jones wasn't the only one who spoke out, Citizens for a New Louisiana used this as an opportunity to target and defame her, saying that she was fighting to keep sexually erotic and pornographic materials in the children's section of the library, despite none of that ever coming up in her speech. Jones writes about the emotional impact of having members of her small community who she'd known and previously been friendly with turn on her and believe everything that was written. Then there was the pain of those who tried not to get involved, out of fear that they themselves might become targets, and those who privately supported her but couldn't bring themselves to do so publicly.

She also writes about her efforts to sue those who harassed and defamed her, about book banning efforts in Louisiana in particular and the US in general, and the work that she's done to try to support other librarians going through similar situations.

REVIEW: Revenge of the Librarians (graphic novel) by Tom Gauld

Revenge of the Librarians is more a collection of comics than a graphic novel. I got my volume from the library.

Review: 

The comics in this collection are about reading, authorship, libraries, and books. As usual, I enjoyed some more than others. 

I had fun with the "[blank] generator" style comics, like the "eccentric family generator for novelists" and the "thriller concept generator." I also got a kick out of some of the comics that poked fun at particular series/books, as well as the ones about writing in general. I winced a bit at some of the ones about personal book collections and book buying habits (guilty as charged, for just about all of them).

All in all, this was an enjoyable collection. 

REVIEW: Chernobyl's Wild Kingdom: Life in the Dead Zone (nonfiction book) by Rebecca L. Johnson

Chernobyl's Wild Kingdom is YA nonfiction. I bought my copy used.

Review:

This gives an overview of the Chernobyl disaster and its effect on the area and people, before getting into research on animals in the Exclusion Zone. Particular attention is paid to Robert Baker and Ronald Chesser and their study of bank voles, and Timothy Mousseau and Anders Pape Møller and their studies of swallows and insects.

I really wished this had been longer and more detailed. It was both a fascinating and frustrating look at animals in the Exclusion Zone. Baker and Chesser's conclusions were very different from Mousseau and Møller's (I got the impression the author agreed more with Mousseau and Møller's conclusions than Baker and Chesser's), and I was left with a lot of questions. Quite possibly there genuinely weren't any answers, but that didn't stop me from wanting a few other scientists' opinions and maybe a chapter set up like a moderated discussion between the different camps. 

REVIEW: The Eye of the Bedlam Bride (book) by Matt Dinniman

The Eye of the Bedlam Bride is the sixth book in Dinniman's sci-fi LitRPG series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is the first book in the series to start with a "the story thus far" bit, which I heartily approve of. Anyway, this book takes place on the eighth floor, "The Ghosts of Earth." This particular floor is a facsimile of Earth in the weeks before the collapse and the start of Dungeon Crawler World. Regions are populated by what are basically recordings of what actually happened on Earth. Biological entities, like humans and animals, can't be interacted with. However, crawlers are able to interact with non-biological items and objects.

The floor is divided into three phases. In the first phase, crawler parties must find and plant flags on a living entity when they are at less than 5% health in order to transform them into something called a T'Ghee totem. In phase 2, the Squad Leader in each party will use a deck populated with T'Ghee totems and other cards to fight for floor exit keys. Phase 3 is a surprise.

REVIEW: The Mantis (book) by Kotaro Isaka, translated by Sam Malissa

The Mantis is the third book in Kotaro Isaka's Assassins series. I suppose you could call it a blend of crime fiction and black humor. 

Review:

Kabuto is a highly skilled assassin who has wanted to retire ever since the birth of his son. Unfortunately for him, his handler, the Doctor, isn't about to let him go, nudging him towards high-risk jobs while hinting at the dire consequences should he decide not to follow through. Kabuto's wife and son, meanwhile, have no idea that he isn't just an ordinary worker at an office supply company.

Kabuto may be fearless while on the job, but around his wife it's another matter. His entire being is attuned to her mood. The one thing he wants to avoid is upsetting her, to the point that even his son has noticed how meek and submissive he is around her. At the same time, it's not that he dislikes being married to her. He does, however, find himself wishing to be properly understood, and so his few friends tend to be much like him, fathers with similar concerns and temperaments.

The book follows Kabuto as he lives his life and tries to figure out how to retire while also debating whether it would even be right/fair for someone like him to be free to live a peaceful life.

REVIEW: Manga for Success: Leading Meeting and Teams (nonfiction book) by Masumi Tani, artwork by Enmo Takenawa

Leading Meetings and Teams is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

As is the case with all the "Manga for Success" volumes, this alternates textual sections with manga sections depicting the concepts in the text in action. In this volume, the manga scenario is that Shigeo is a young employee who's been sent from a construction materials manufacturer to one of the local agencies of the manufacturer. He's supposed to get opinions from them about developing new building materials. Unfortunately, no one has much to say - they're focused on their own current projects and concerns.

While on a train, Shigeo meets Mayumi, a facilitation instructor. She gives him advice on how to run more effective meetings. She recommends he use a whiteboard and put the desired topics and outputs down on it. The board allows him to record what people in the meeting are saying, checking his understanding of their comments, and overall help people feel heard. She gives him several general tips on conversation/meeting facilitation, and he starts to make actual progress in his work. 

REVIEW: Woe: A Housecat's Story of Despair (graphic novel) by Lucy Knisley

Woe: A Housecat's Story of Despair is Knisley's collection of humorous (mostly) cartoons about her cat. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This full-color collection focuses on Knisley's fluffy orange cat, Linney. The vast majority of these comics are humorous, but be warned that this does go, a little, into Linney's eventual death. It was pictured as peaceful, and Linney was herself throughout, but it still made my chest tight. My own cat is about 15 years old, so...yeah. I could see myself rereading this at some point in the future (hopefully still several years from now) and sobbing my eyes out.

I loved the way Knisley drew Linney. Linney's facial expressions and the way her overall shape morphed were perfect - she had a ton of personality to her as she interacted with Knisley, her family, and Flora the dog. 

REVIEW: The 99% Invisible City: A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design (nonfiction book) by Roman Mars and Kurt Kohlstedt

The 99% Invisible City is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This book looks at the design of aspects of cities that most people likely never think much about: manhole covers, traffic lights, signage, public drinking fountains, and more. The various essays often focus on specific intriguing examples from cities around the world (although heavily featuring San Francisco and Los Angeles, likely due to Roman Mars' location).

I came across this book while looking for accessible works on cities, architecture, infrastructure, and design. It was steeply discounted, so I figured "why not?" I didn't learn until later that it was based on a podcast, although I've now marked that down as something I need to listen to sometime.

The essay format of this made it easy to read a bit at a time, making it perfect for my evening reading routine. Overall, this was fascinating and enjoyable. If there was one thing I could change, it would be the illustrations. There were times when actual photographs would have been more helpful. At the very least some of the illustrations could have more clearly featured whatever it was the essays were focusing on - sometimes I couldn't tell what part I was supposed to be looking at.

REVIEW: Ghoulia: Making New Friends Can Be Scary (book) by Barbara Cantini, translated by Anna Golding

Ghoulia: Making New Friends Can Be Scary is a children's fantasy book. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Ghoulia is a lonely little zombie girl who loves the color purple, playing dress up, and spending time with her dog, Tragedy. What she really wants, however, is to play with the village kids. Her aunt has forbidden her from being seen by others, afraid that they'll be chased from their home. Then Ghoulia finds out about Halloween and comes up with the perfect plan to spend time with the village kids and maybe even make some friends, without her aunt finding out or anybody learning that she's a zombie.

I loved the artwork - great Addams family and Tim Burton vibes. Tragedy instantly made me think of The Nightmare Before Christmas' Zero, even though their designs were pretty different. 

This was very much a "friendly zombie" sort of book - there was no mention of zombies eating brains, and the only difference it seemed to make was that Ghoulia looked different and could detach her body parts and then sew them back together.

I really enjoyed this, even though it felt like the ending came way too easily. It's a children's book, though, so I just accepted it.

Extras:

Instructions to help kids dress up like Ghoulia (or, more accurately, to help their parents help them), recipes for "Ghoulia's Purple Punch" and "Uncle Misfortune's Mud Mix," and four pages of "one of these pictures is different" activities.

REVIEW: Persephone: Hades' Torment (graphic novel) by Allison Shaw

Persephone: Hades' Torment is a graphic novel retelling of the Hades and Persephone story. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Apollo is trying to convince Eros to shoot Persephone with one of his arrows for him, but Hades accidentally ends up shot instead and falls for Persephone. Hades tries to find his way out of the inevitable, thinking that he and Persephone wouldn't work well together, but then he and Persephone end up meeting.

This was one of those times where I was drawn in by the cover art and ended up regretting it. There really wasn't much content here. Also, this was simultaneously both horny and weirdly chaste. There are two on-page sex scenes, but not much is actually shown (breasts, a flash of nipples). One of them is unexpectedly a threesome, though, which threw me a bit. Like, there wasn't much lead up, no prior introduction of this character, it just happened.

There were parts of the Eros and Psyche, Daphne and Apollo, and other stories - basic Greek mythology stuff. Hades spent approximately two seconds pining. I liked those two seconds, but then I got the rest of this. Meh.

REVIEW: Becoming RBG: Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Journey to Justice (nonfiction graphic novel) by Debbie Levy, illustrated by Whitney Gardner

Becoming RBG is a biographical graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This looks at Ruth Bader Ginsburg's life and career. I realized, as I was reading it, that there was a lot I didn't know about her and the important cases she was involved in.

The artwork did what it needed to do but didn't wow me. Text boxes were occasionally hard to follow and broken up a bit oddly. The informational content, however, was great, and the format made it all quickly and easily digestible.

After reading this, though, her friendship with Antonin Scalia still didn't make much sense to me. Also, I wondered when she found the time to sleep. Her version of work-life balance involved staying up after her husband and kids went to sleep to get work done.

All in all, this was a good read that made me wish RBG were still around. 

REVIEW: The Moon Over the Mountain (short story) by Atsushi Nakajima, art by Nekosuke, translated by Asa Yoneda

The Moon Over the Mountain is a fantasy/magical realism Japanese story (or I misunderstood and it's symbolic or something). I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is the story of Li Zheng of Longxi, a young civil servant who quits service because he feels he has more to offer the world as a poet. He never becomes famous, however, and eventually leaves his wife, children, and everything else behind, disappearing. Later, his old friend, government inspector Yuan Can of Chenjun, encounters a beast that almost attacks him but races away at the last second. Then Yuan Can hears the voice of his old friend, who tells him that he has become a terrifying beast, a tiger. He had Yuan Can record some of his poetry and asks him to tell his wife and children that he is dead, and to care for them in some way. He admits that his combination of narcissism, fear of failure, and lack of desire to put in strenuous work is what has transformed him into a beast.

REVIEW: The Handmaid's Tale: The Graphic Novel (graphic novel) by Margaret Atwood, art & adaptation by Renee Nault

The Handmaid's Tale: The Graphic Novel is an adaptation of the dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood. I bought my copy new.

Review:

It's been a while since I read The Handmaid's Tale, but this seemed to be a pretty faithful adaptation of the book. The only part I could recall truly being left out was the bit from the book about the cat being abandoned. Oh, and I don't recall the graphic novel portion with the Japanese tourists walking around through Gilead society being in the book, but it's quite possible that happened and it just didn't stick with me in the midst of everything else.

The artwork worked well for the story (although not really for me personally) and made effective use of color. A couple parts were a little hard to follow, but for the most part flashbacks vs. scenes set in the present were made clear by differences in clothing.

All in all, I thought this was a good adaptation. 

REVIEW: The Skull: A Tyrolean Folktale (book) by Jon Klassen

The Skull is a children's book based on a Tyrolean folktale. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Otilla has run away (her reasons for doing so are never stated - she doesn't speak about her past) and is cold and exhausted when she comes across a big abandoned old house. A talking skull agrees to let her in if she'll carry him, since rolling around is difficult. The skull gives her a tour of the place and then, in the evening, admits to her that a headless skeleton comes every night to try to take him and will surely come tonight. Otilla promises to help him, and so she does, very thoroughly.

I love Jon Klassen's artwork. There's something haunting about his characters' eyes. That, plus the skull on the cover, made me want to read this.

This is a very moody, intriguing little story. In keeping with the folktale aspect, we never learn about Otilla's past, how the lord of the house died, and how the skull ended up in such a position (the skull, and presumably the skeleton, were originally the bones of the lord of the house). 

In his author's note, Klassen talks about coming across a book with this folktale in it, and how it morphed in his memory to become this book. 

REVIEW: Department of Mind-Blowing Theories: Science Cartoons (graphic novel) by Tom Gauld

Department of Mind-Blowing Theories is a collection of comics. I bought my copy new.

Review:

A collection of humorous science-themed comics. This was fun, although as far as science-y humor goes, I prefer xkcd. Even that tends to work better for me in brief spurts online than in book form, though.

As is usually the case with these collections, some comics worked better for me than others. There's a Nobel Prize-related comic that was amusing in ways probably not originally intended, but these are the times we live in now.

I also really liked the artwork overall. There's something satisfying about the clean linework and simple shapes. 

REVIEW: We'll Prescribe You a Cat (book) by Syou Ishida, translated by E. Madison Shimoda

We'll Prescribe You a Cat is magical realism. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is divided into sections by cat: Bee, then Margot, then Koyuki, then Tank and Tangerine, and finally Mimita. Each cat section is focused on a particular human who is dealing with issues at work or at home and who has heard through a friend of a friend of a friend that the Nakagyo Kokoro Clinic for the Soul is wonderfully helpful. Each person assumes this is a psychiatric clinic, and each is told by the doctor that the clinic isn't actually accepting new patients but that an exception will be made for them. The doctor then proceeds to prescribe them a cat that will somehow help them. The cat is handed over by a beautiful, icy, and somewhat disapproving nurse. Patients are given care instructions for the cats that resemble medication instructions and are told to come back to the clinic after a set amount of time to return their cat.

The patients featured include a salesman dealing with an abusive boss, a fifty-something year-old man annoyed by a cheerful new female colleague, a mother who has a habit of dismissing her child's troubles as unworthy of attention, a perfectionist handbag designer dealing with issues at both home and work, and a geika (Kyoto version of geisha) mourning the disappearance of her previous cat.

REVIEW: Space Battle Lunchtime (graphic novel, vol. 2) by Natalie Riess

Space Battle Lunchtime combines science fiction, humor, and f/f romance. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

Chef Melonhead has arranged for Peony to be kidnapped for the show Cannibal Coliseum. All that's left behind is a note saying that she'd resigned from Space Battle Lunchtime. Thankfully, Neptunia suspects it's a trick, particularly since Melonhead has conveniently presented themselves as an easy replacement contestant for Peony.

Lil' Magicorn practically stole the show. All that murderous, happy sparkle was fun to watch in action, even if only briefly. 

Although there's at least one more volume after this that I know of, the way this one ends makes for a decent, if a bit rushed, stopping point. The only thing I could have used more of was more dashing Neptunia/romantic moments.

All in all, a fun read.

Extras:

Three pages of bonus comics, a recipe for chocolate cupcakes, bonus illustrations, and a two-page look at Riess' coloring process.

REVIEW: The Poisoned House (book) by Michael Ford

The Poisoned House is a YA historical horror/mystery. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is one of the many works I've read, finished, and then failed to review in a timely manner. On the plus side, I actually took notes right after finishing this one. On the minus side, those notes don't tell me much besides a few basics and how things wrapped up.

I honestly did not recall reading this. Even my notes didn't do much to jog my memory, so take this review with a grain of salt.

This is set sometime in the 1850s. Fourteen-year-old Abigail is a servant at Greave Hall. She's treated terribly by the housekeeper, Mrs. Cotton, who also happens to be the sister-in-law of the widowed Lord Greave. Strange things start to happen that prompt Abi to think her mother is haunting Greave Hall, and she begins looking into the truth behind her mother's death.

I didn't look into this much before starting it, so it took me by surprise that this was YA (and probably the younger end of YA, at that). Overall, this was okay - it obviously didn't make much of an impression on my memory. The ghost story aspects of this barely warranted a mention in my notes, although the mystery, at least, was reasonably interesting, and I wasn't expecting how things turned out. 

Milkyway Hitchhiking (manhwa, vol. 2) by Sirial, translated by HyeYoung Im

Milkyway Hitchhiking is an episodic manhwa (Korean graphic novel) that's hard to assign to any one genre, since it changes a bit from one story to the next.

Review:

I can't believe it's been over 10 years since I read volume 1. Anyway, like the first volume, this is a collection of short stories (episodic chapters?) loosely tied together by the presence of Milkway the cat, who seems to exist in multiple times and worlds.

In the first three stories, a trio of older ladies who are friends have their annual get-together and tell each other cat-related stories from their pasts. The next story is about a boy who misses his frequently traveling artist older brother. After a "convenience store" interlude that features cameo appearances of characters from earlier stories, there's the story of a tribe that has a marriage tradition of sending its young men out into the forest with a special cloth tied around their waists. The first person who finds them and removes the cloth becomes that young man's bride. The next couple chapters are about a cursed brother and sister. Next is the oddly sweet story of a fox being raising a chick...so that he'll eventually have chickens and therefore a steady supply of food. The volume wraps up with the story of a young prince raised to be little more than a weapon and the girl he saves from his father's cruelty.

REVIEW: How Not to Get Eaten by Owlbears: A Survival Guide for the Forgotten Realms (book) by Anne Toole

How Not to Get Eaten by Owlbears is a fictional guide. I bought my copy new.

Review:

I've played D&D a grand total of once. It was fun, although I never fully got the hang of how things worked.

I picked this up because the title sounded fun and I loved the owlbear artwork on the cover. Judging by a wiki I just looked up, the book's contents barely scratch the surface of what a fictional guide for the Forgotten Realms might cover, but hey, a general overview with a few specific tidbits here and there is fine when you're a newbie like me. 

This is written from the POV of Falgriss, a dragonborn ranger who traveled with Volo (who I was also previously unfamiliar with). It includes occasional advice about places to visit (or avoid), local monsters and other things to be aware of, etc. - viewing it as a travel guide of sorts, it's too broad in its content and skimpy on details to be of much use, like buying, say, a brief guidebook to all of Europe. Still, it was an easy read and I enjoyed the humor. I only wish the book's physical size had been larger - the artwork (and some of the text) was smaller than I'd have liked. A larger page-size would have showed off some of the details better. 

REVIEW: The Butcher's Masquerade (book) by Matt Dinniman

The Butcher's Masquerade is the fifth book in Dinniman's Dungeon Crawler Carl LitRPG series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

The surviving crawlers have made it to the sixth floor, "The Hunting Grounds," where they get a 30 hour grace period before hunters who will be trying to kill them are released. After the way the fifth floor wrapped up, a lot of those hunters will specifically want to kill Carl (although one group in particular has brought along some truly horrifying arrows just for Louis). Also, it's time for Carl to fulfill his side of the desperate bargain he made with the producers of Vengeance of the Daughter way back on the third floor.

Another floor means more nonstop action and the introduction of a bunch of new complications to Carl and Donut's already very complicated existence.

REVIEW: Shiver: Selected Stories (manga) by Junji Ito, translated by Jocelyne Allen, "Painter" translated by Naomi Kokubo

Shiver is a collection of 10 short horror manga stories (9, if you consider that one is technically a bonus continuation of another one of the stories in the collection). I bought my copy new.

Review:

As I usually do with anthologies, I'll write about each of the stories in this volume separately. The volume includes an afterword by Junji Ito and author commentary for all of the primary stories.

"Used Record" - Scat music from the afterlife - an old record everyone would kill to have. This was ok but would have been better if we could actually hear the music.

"Shiver" - What's the fear of holes called? Trypophobia? Well, this definitely checks that box. Cursed jade that infects people with holes that let in the wind and give an intense fear of insects. I found this to be one of the stronger stories in the collection, mostly because of the artwork.

"Fashion Model" - Some amateur filmmakers hire a couple models, one of whom is conventionally pretty and one of whom is maybe not even human. I was hoping this one would have more unexpected elements to it, but it was decent enough.

"Hanging Blimp" - People all over Tokyo are being hanged by blimps that look like their own faces. This was kind of creepy, but oddly funny as well. I laughed when the dad was all "Huh, that's horrible. Welp, I've got to go to work now!" Like, dude. Really?

"Marionette Mansion" - A whole family that's being controlled like puppets. This was weird and freaky, especially since I already find dolls to be fairly creepy.

"Painter" - A beautiful woman bewitches a painter. Meh, I wasn't really a fan of this one. It reminded me of Parasite Eve, for some reason. 

"The Long Dream" - Doctors are treating two patients, one a girl who fears death and one a young man who is having longer and longer dreams, to the point that he's becoming something inhuman. The body changes were a bit much, but is it really a Junji Ito story without body horror?

"Honored Ancestors" - There's a girl with amnesia, a boy with a dying father, and a huge monster that turns out to be [redacted]. This was some weird wtfery, which I know is a description that can apply to a lot of Ito's works, but still.

"Greased" - This focuses on a family living over their yakiniku place. Everything is oily and gross, and you can practically feel it oozing out of the pages. This one made my skin crawl. 

Bonus "Fashion Model: Cursed Frame" - A girl with a phobia of anything but full-body photos being taken of her becomes a model and has the bad luck to meet the model from the earlier "Fashion Model" story. Ok, so it's horrible of me, but I found this one to be a little funny. Don't mock the large and intimidatingly toothy model, folks.

REVIEW: The Anxiety Club: How to Survive Modern Life (nonfiction graphic novel) by Dr. Frederic Fanget and Catherine Meyer, illustrated by Pauline Aubry, translated by Edward Gauvin

The Anxiety Club is a nonfiction graphic novel. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Dr. Fanget looks at anxiety through the lens of three patients, Ismail, Mona, and Francois, each with different types of anxiety. There's some information about the history of the study of anxiety and what we know about the physiological and psychological aspects of anxiety. Then Dr. Fanget goes over the methods he used to treat the three patients introduced at the beginning of the volume, including information that readers might be able to use to help themselves. There's also a short section near the end about pharmaceuticals, although, from the sounds of things, Dr. Fanget preferred other methods of treatment.

The artwork didn't really appeal to me, but there were a few things mentioned in the treatment section that were new to me, or presented in ways I wasn't familiar with. All in all, this was a short, good, and potentially useful read. 

REVIEW: Manga for Success: Business Problem-Solving and Strategy (nonfiction book) by Takayuki Kito and Keisuke Yamabe, artwork by Enmo Takenawa

Business Problem-Solving and Strategy is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

One more volume after this one, and I'll have finished the entire Manga for Success series! This entry was exhausting, but also one I might potentially have to consult again, if my Dean of Libraries was serious about having librarians put together a SWOT analysis of our library. Although one thing I got out of this book is that, with the way we'll be doing it, we're highly unlikely to create a good and/or useful one.

This volume, like the other entries in the Manga for Success series, alternates between textbookish sections and manga sections that illustrate the concepts using a story/example. In the manga sections, Kazumi Matsui is Head of Business Planning for Matsui-ya, a Japanese sweets company, and the daughter of the company's founder. Matsui-ya is in trouble, and Kazumi has been tasked with putting together a business strategy that can save the company and carry it into the future. However, her first attempt at a business strategy was rejected as useless, and now she's enlisting the advice of Takeda, the Business Planning Deputy Manager of Kikutani, a food-making company. Kazumi only spent three months at Kikutani, but she came to deeply respect Takeda's abilities during that time.

The first section of the text, "Analyze the Situation," goes over how to do a SWOT analysis and emphasizes the importance of treating it as more than some blanks you're filling out on a form. The next section, "Forming Strategic Options," goes over how to use the SWOT analysis to lay out strategic options for both a preestablished company (like Matsui-ya) and newly established businesses. After that, it's time to review and select options, and finally translate options into plans and actions.

I have to admit, I got lost more than once while reading this, and, despite the authors' efforts to lay things out in an easy-to-understand way, it was still an overwhelmingly large amount of information. It was still interesting, however, to see some of the behind-the-scenes stuff that likely went into, say, my university's Strategic Plan. It also helped me see some potential issues in the plan's creation and execution.

REVIEW: Prom House (book) by Chelsea Mueller

Prom House is a YA horror/thriller. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Kylie and her friends have rented a gorgeous beach house so they can party as much and as loudly as they'd like after prom. Unfortunately, not long after they start their partying, Kylie and her friend Aubrey discover Cam, Aubrey's boyfriend, dead. Kylie is convinced that he was murdered and that his murderer could still be somewhere nearby. When the cops arrive, however, Cam's body is gone, and Kylie and the others can't convince them that it isn't a prank.

Now the cops are gone, and everybody's stuck in the house as a violent storm hits and takes down a nearby power line. When yet another person in their group winds up dead, it seems more and more likely that whoever killed Cam is still among them. Can they find the killer before whoever it is claims more victims?

REVIEW: The Gate of the Feral Gods (book) by Matt Dinniman

The Gate of the Feral Gods is LitRPG, the fourth book in Dinniman's Dungeon Crawler Carl series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Everybody's on the fifth floor now, "The Bubbles." The remaining crawlers have been divided into groups of about 150 per bubble, with each bubble containing four zones, or quadrants, into which the 150ish crawlers are further divided. Some effort has been made to divvy up crawlers in such a way that all the powerful ones aren't grouped in the same bubble. Crawlers in one quadrant can't enter another quadrant until they've taken the castle located in their quadrant. Also, a bubble won't pop, and its stairs to the sixth floor won't be accessible, until all four castles in the bubble have been taken.

Carl, Donut, and Katia quickly discover that they're likely the most competent and certainly the highest level crawlers in their quadrant, "Air." They're in a relatively small desert location and will somehow have to work with the few other crawlers around them (some of whom are drunk and determined to stay that way) to capture their quadrant's castle, which is held up by balloons way, way high up in the air. If they're lucky, the crawlers in the other three quadrants in their bubble will figure out how to take their own castles. If they're not, Carl, Donut, and Katia will have more work ahead of them after the Air quadrant. They only have 15 days to pop their bubble and get to their stairwells.

This series continues to be lots of fun. In this volume in particular, the story expands beyond "what's the gimmick on this level?" and allows readers more glimpses of the machinations outside the World Dungeon.