Wing Chun (live action movie), via Netflix

Wing Chun is a Chinese martial arts (wire-fu) movie that features both comedy and romance.

Synopsis:

Wing Chun is a female martial arts expert who chooses to dress as a man. A scholar (I think) visits her, hoping to convince her to work for him as a bodyguard/protector. However, since she's probably expensive, he figures he'll convince her to marry him and then just pay her in food. No, he's not very bright.

Meanwhile, a woman named Charmy arrives at the village, desperately looking for something that will cure her sick husband. Every man who sees her is drawn to her beauty, but, even so, no one is willing to help her. After her husband dies, she is forced to sell herself to pay for his funeral. Wing Chun and her aunt (whose name I can't remember, so I'll call her Aunt) want to help her, so Aunt convinces the scholar to pay up, I think by hinting that this might put him in Wing Chun's good graces.

Aunt is delighted with Charmy, whose beauty and traditional femininity attracts all kinds of men to their tofu shop. Leung Pok To arrives in town, hears of Charmy, and assumes she's Wing Chun, the childhood friend of his that he's determined to marry. He mistakes Wing Chun for a man and believes her to be Charmy's lover. Then there's the added complication of some bandits, one of whom is determined to steal Charmy away and marry her, the other of whom wants to beat Wing Chun in a fight to prove that he can "tame" her and then marry her.

Review:

I would never have put this in my Netflix queue if it hadn't been for a comment on CarrieS's review of Tai Chi Zero. Even then, I almost quit maybe 10 minutes into it. Something about the colors screamed “old movie” (it was produced in 1994), it looked super cheap, and I was having trouble dealing with the Chinese dialogue. I have no idea how emotions are conveyed in a tonal language like Chinese, and only being able to tell emotions by people's facial expressions took some adjusting.

Bunny Drop (anime TV series), via Crunchyroll

Bunny Drop (aka Usagi Drop) is an 11-episode slice-of-life series. It's based on a manga series but ends before the manga does. This detail is important, because quite a few people, including me, were horrified by the manga's ending. I've only read spoilers, not the actual manga (yet), but, in my opinion, it takes the nice, sweet family relationship developing between Daikichi and Rin and spits on it.

I watched most of this series via Crunchyroll's website, because I had to get it finished before March and the website currently works more smoothly than the Crunchyroll app on my TV. Buffering problems, ahoy.

Synopsis:

When Daikichi, a 30-year-old single man, goes to his grandfather's funeral, he learns that his grandfather left behind a 6-year-old love child named Rin. Rin's mother ran off after Daikichi's grandfather died, so the remaining family is trying to decide what to do with her. Realizing that everyone sees Rin as a problem to get rid of, rather than as a family member and little girl in need of care, Daikichi offers to take her.

Daikichi soon learns that there's a lot to taking care of a little girl that he didn't even think of. Since he works full-time, he has to get her enrolled in some kind of nursery school. Rin is pretty good at taking care of herself, but she still needs someone to buy her food and clothing, make sure she doesn't hurt herself in the kitchen, and take care of her when she's sick. When she develops a bed-wetting problem, Daikichi realizes that she's also still trying to process her grief over his grandfather's (her father's) death and her fear that others in her life could die at any moment.

Mostly, this series is about learning what it means to be a parent. At the same time, Daikichi tries to navigate life as a single dad (including potential romance!) and track down Rin's mother.

Review:

It seems like Crunchyroll only just added this show to their lineup, and suddenly they announced it was going to be removed. I bumped it to the top of my queue right away – I love sweet slice-of-life stories.

Hiiro no Kakera, Seasons 1 and 2 (anime TV series), via Crunchyroll

Hiiro no Kakera is a 26-episode fantasy and romance series. It's based on an otome game.

By the way, a few days after posting about my problems with streaming CR on my TV, I got an email from their tech support, stating that the problem lies in the servers I'm streaming with and the service they're being provided by their ISP. They assured me they're working to solve the problem, as it affects users streaming on all non-computer devices (Roku box, Playstation 3, Xbox, Panasonic TVs with Viera Connect, etc.). It's now been about two months since I contacted tech support, and the problem still hasn't been fixed, which is just mind-boggling to me. I'll continue to bring the problem up on this blog as long as it exists. When it has finally been fixed, if that ever happens during the course of my membership (8 more months left!), I'll mention that too.

Synopsis:

Tamaki is a high school student who travels to the small village where her grandmother lives, to stay with her for a while. Things don't go as well as Tamaki hoped: she spots a weird-looking round white creature with stick arms and legs, gets attacked by monsters, and is saved by a good-looking-but-cranky guy with magical abilities.

The guy who saved her is Takuma, one of the five guardians of the Tamayori princess. The old Tamayori princess was Tamaki's grandmother. Tamaki is shocked to learn that she's the new Tamayori princess. Her job is to protect the Onikirimaru seals and prevent Onikirimaru, a sword, from releasing its dark power upon the world. The five guardians are supposed to aid her. They are:

• Takuma: A serious and tough-looking guy who enjoys doing crossword puzzles.
• Mahiro: An upperclassman who seems to know an awful lot about Onikirimaru and the Tamayori princess but won't say why he knows so much. He's self-conscious about his short height and resents being a guardian, because it prevents him from following his dream of traveling the world.
• Yuuichi: Another upperclassman. He has a tendency to fall asleep at any time.
• Suguru: The leader of the guardians, and the eldest. He's polite and reliable and enjoys making tea.
• Shinji: He appears later on in the series. He has a strong desire to prove that he's a useful guardian, and he seems to have a history with Mitsuru, a girl who works at the Tamayori shrine.

Logos is a group that opposes them and wishes to steal the Artifacts and claim Onikirimaru for themselves. If Tamaki and her guardians can't stop them, Onikirimaru may bring about the end of the world.

Review:

I started watching this series for the same reason I've watched shows like Uraboku, Hakuoki, and Brave 10 – the art style attracted me, and I looked forward to watching a cast composed mostly of gorgeous guys. I knew going into it that it was based on an otome game. To my knowledge, I've only ever seen one other anime (Hakuoki) based on an otome game and it kind of sucked. Its pacing was excruciatingly slow, and its heroine was a useless moron who turned the men around her into wet washcloths. The best thing about the show was its artwork. Would Hiiro no Kakera be better? I certainly hoped so.

I'm so very behind...

I seem to have some kind of reader's block at the moment, and I also haven't been getting through TV series as quickly. Somehow, this hasn't stopped me from building up a nice list of things I've finished and need to review. Here's what you can (hopefully) expect me to be publishing full posts about soon.

• Hiiro no Kakera (anime TV series) - An ordinary high school girl learns that she's not so ordinary after all - she's actually the Tamayori princess. Also, she has five gorgeous guardians. Of course. Too bad they suck at their jobs. This series took me ages to get through, and not just because Crunchyroll is still having buffering issues. Even so, it's still better than, say, Hakuoki or Brave 10. The series' otome game origins are incredibly obvious if you watch past the closing credits of each of the episodes. Now I kind of wish I could play the game.
• Hogfather (live action TV mini-series) - This is based on the book by Terry Pratchett. It has several of my favorite things: Susan, the Assassin's Guild, and Death. This adaptation was, as far as I could tell, PSA-free. After experiencing Going Postal's heavy-handed anti-smoking message, I was thankful of this. However, for some reason Hogfather didn't grab me as much as Going Postal did.
• Bunny Drop (anime TV series) - I watched this via Crunchyroll and, once again, cursed their buffering issues - what kind of business lets a tech support problem go on for 2+ months? Anyway, this series is about a single, 30-year-old man named Daikichi who goes to his grandfather's funeral and learns that his grandfather left behind a 6-year-old love child. No one in the family wants to take her in, so Daikichi says he'll do it. During the course of the series, Daikichi gradually adjusts his life so that he can be a better caretaker for Rin. He gets her signed up for school, tries to help her with her grief and fears about death, takes care of her when she's sick, etc. He also tries to find out more about Rin's mother and begins to fall for the divorced mother of one of Rin's friends. It's a wonderful series, and I highly recommend it to fans of sweet and relaxing slice-of-life stories. Unfortunately, the spoilers I've read of the end of the manga tainted my viewing experience. Thank goodness the anime ends before the manga does.
• Boys Over Flowers (live action TV series) - I watched the first episode via Crunchyroll, couldn't stand the buffering issues anymore, and switched to Netflix for the rest. I spent a lot of this series yelling at the characters, and I do not think Jan Di ended up with the best guy. Yi Jung and Ga Eul's romance alternately made me squee and want to punch Yi Jung. And there were so many musical montages, omg. I've seen this show recommended over and over again whenever anyone asks for K-drama contemporary-set romance reccs. It did have some really great moments, but, overall, I still prefer Coffee Prince.
• Tribes (e-book) by Carmen Webster Buxton - Carmen Webster Buxton looks to be a good go-to author for me when I need a "complex and interesting sci fi culture" fix. This book takes place on a planet where the tribe you're born into is everything, and your tribe is determined by the tribe of whichever of your parents is the same sex as you. Those who have no tribe become someone's slave. The story is composed of two main threads. One follows Hob, a sex slave who has run away. He's taken in by Jahnsi and her family, who try to protect him. The other follows LuAnne Mingo, whose goal is to find the long-lost nephew of a very powerful client of hers. I loved the cultural stuff, and I was on the edge of my seat, waiting to see what would happen when the characters in the two story threads finally crossed paths. The ending and the romantic aspects didn't make me quite as happy, though. More details when I finally write a full post.

Warm Bodies (live action movie) - at the movie theater

I went to see this last weekend, as part of my "no more medication!" celebration. The celebration also included pie and book shopping.

Anyway, Warm Bodies is basically a post-apocalyptic romance with zombies. I haven't read the book yet, although it's on my TBR list.

Synopsis:

For a zombie, R (all he can remember of his name is the first letter) is pretty introspective. He dislikes the sameness of his existence and seeks out and collects things that make him feel more alive. This includes vinyl records, various objects that interest him, and...brains. When they eat brains, zombies like R can see and feel the lives and emotions of those whose brains they eat.

A (small? sizable? I'm not really sure) group of humans lives in a walled-off community overseen by the father of a young woman named Julie. Although the community seems to be doing fairly well, there are certain things they can only get from outside their walls. Volunteers, like Julie and her boyfriend, are responsible for getting those things.

During a supply run, Julie's group is attacked by a group of zombies that includes R. R is instantly dazzled by Julie but is forced to take a break from admiring her Rambo-like shooting skills to attack and eat her boyfriend. R then approaches Julie, who is convinced she's about to die, and smears a bit of zombie blood on her face to make the other zombies think she's one of them. Then he takes her to his home.

Julie, who doesn't know R ate her boyfriend, gradually realized that, yes, R really is trying to keep her safe. R gets to know her better by secretly eating pieces of her boyfriend's brain, and the two begin and unconventional friendship/romance. However, Julie is still a living person, and she really wants to go back home. R, whose feelings for Julie have changed him and made him feel more alive than he has in a long time, eventually realizes he'll have to either help her do what she wants or watch her get killed by his fellow zombies.

Review: 

When I first started watching this movie, it didn't seem like it could possibly end happily. R was a zombie, Julie was a living girl, and R was eating Julie's boyfriend's brains. Maybe at some point Julie would willingly allow herself to be turned into a zombie? Or maybe I needed to prepare myself for a tragic ending?

My Girlfriend's a Geek (book, vol. 1) by Pentabu

I'm pretty sure My Girlfriend's a Geek began as a blog, with the posts collected into a two-volume light novel set. The English translation was published by Yen Press and is listed by them as being for "older teens." The story has also been adapted into a 5-volume manga series - I own, but haven't yet read, the first two volumes and hope to review them someday.

Synopsis:

A 21-year old college student writes about life with his girlfriend, a fujoshi (female fan of yaoi/BL or, more broadly, a female otaku, according to the book's glossary), in his blog, which becomes hugely popular. This book collects those blog entries.

The writer of the blog is never named, although his girlfriend often refers to him as "Sebas" or even "Uke-Sebas" (which is just...yeah...poor guy). I'll refer to him as "Pentabu" to make things easier on myself. His girlfriend is always referred to as Y-ko.

Most of the blog consists of the usual events in a dating couple's life - meeting up with friends, spending holidays together, meeting parents (Pentabu meets Y-ko's parents at one point), and just hanging out. Things are a little different for Pentabu and Y-ko, though, because of Y-ko's interests. To most people, Y-ko seems like a perfectly normal, respectable young woman. With Pentabu and her friends, however, Y-ko lets her interests have free rein, reveling in her love of anime, computer games, BL and shoujo manga, cosplay, and her favorite character pairings (she's a particular fan of Roy x Ed). Pentabu's feelings on this are often a combination of embarrassment, humor, and fascination, since she seems determined to pull him into her world.

Review:

I'll start this review off by listing a few questions you should ask yourself prior to deciding whether to read this book:

• Do you consider yourself to be a fan of anime and manga?
• Do you have at least some idea of what these things are, and what their appeal is? - Gundam, Neon Genesis Evangelion, shoujo and BL manga, maid cafes, cosplay, and slash pairings
• Are you okay with reading a book consisting of a bunch of blog entries?

If you answered “no” to any of these questions, except possibly the second one, you should probably give this book a pass. A good chunk of it will go over your head if you don't have at least a basic understanding of anime and manga fandom. Although the explanations included in some of the blog posts help, and the glossary at the end is decent, those things won't do you much good if you've never seen examples of shoujo and BL manga and anime, and don't know what Gundam is. For example, while the glossary explains that Hagaren is an abbreviation of Hagane no Renkinjutsushi, the Japanese title of Fullmetal Alchemist, it does not explain that “Roy x Ed” refers to a fan-invented romantic/sexual pairing between two characters in the series. And Pentabu's embarrassment about Y-ko storing her shoujo and BL manga at his place is best understood if you've seen examples of them.

And I should mention that, if you've never seen Neon Genesis Evangelion and plan to do so at some point, you might want to save reading this book until afterward. In one blog post, Pentabu watches some of the show with Y-ko and one of her friends, who shamelessly spoil all kinds of story and character details. I've only seen a little of the show and thankfully don't plan on watching more, or I might have found the spoilers to be more upsetting. Oh, and there are also a few Fushigi Yuugi spoilers.

Now that I've gotten all the warnings out of the way, it's time for my review.

Almost done, a vacation (?), computer games, and Crunchyroll problems

I don't think I'll manage to finish a review post this weekend, but I still wanted to post something. So, enjoy some random stuff.

I think I only ever wrote once, back in September, about the medication I'd be taking. I'm now just days away from being finished! Although the first 12 weeks turned out to be the hardest, I'm still very happy I'm almost done. I did my last injection a couple days ago, and I'll be completely done with the rest of it after Friday. Then I've just got blood tests for a year or so, which will hopefully all come back perfect.

All the doctor stuff put my original vacation plans on hold, but now that the end is in sight, I can start planning. At some point I'll have to commit to a travel date and buy the plane tickets, the very thought of which gives me butterflies in my stomach. This will be my first time planning a trip to Germany myself.

Now for some stuff more related to this blog: computer games and online TV. One of the reasons I've had less to write reviews about lately is because computer games have been taking up time I would otherwise have devoted to reading or TV-watching. The long holiday break got me hooked on Steam again. I discovered a couple "visual novel"-style games (Analogue: A Hate Story and Magical Diary), enjoyed the cuteness of Botanicula, became briefly addicted to Little Inferno and its somewhat dark humor, and have just started to dig into Quantum Conundrum, a Portal-like game that so far seems better in some ways (the puzzles are more difficult and involved) and worse in others (I already hate some of the platformer aspects). Oh, and for hours of fairly mindless fun, I have Gyromancer (imagine a cross between Bejeweled and Pokemon, only considerably less cute) and Triple Town (ninja bears!).

For online TV, I still have Netflix and Crunchyroll. I'm "meh" about Netflix's selection, although it helps that I'm incredibly behind on live action TV. Its pathetic selection of anime would bother me less if I weren't currently having problems with Crunchyroll. Although I still love Crunchyroll's catalog of titles and am relieved that Crunchyroll still works via my computer, it has developed hideously bad buffering problems via my TV. The problems started while I was watching Kimi ni Todoke, although I didn't actually get into contact with Crunchyroll's tech support until late December.

For those of you considering signing up for a Crunchyroll membership, a word of warning: their tech support is terrible if you have a problem that cannot be solved by one of their all-purpose fixes. My opinion of them tanked when they ignored my questions about the status of the problem. I don't even know if they've figured out what the problem is or if they're still working on it. My suspicion is that they know exactly what's wrong and can't, or won't, devote the money and/or time necessary to fix it. I only just recently renewed a year-long membership (conveniently, just before the buffering problems started), or I'd probably already have dropped them and given FUNimation a try. Here's hoping Crunchyroll gets its act together and remembers that surpassing 100,000 Premium subscribers is only a feat worth crowing about if they can actually retain all those subscribers. In the meantime, the number of Crunchyroll shows I'll be reviewing will probably drop - given a choice between watching stuff on my TV versus watching stuff on my computer, TV wins almost every time.

Well, that's about it. I'm part of the way through a few books and a couple TV shows. I only have one thing ready to be reviewed, but the review is giving me trouble. Oh, and I might celebrate my last days of horrible medication with a new tablet, if I'm ever able to make myself part with the money. The Google Nexus is very tempting.

Locks of Love: A Modern Gay Fairy Tale (e-short story) by Jordan Castillo Price

Locks of Love is a m/m retelling of the Rapunzel story. This second edition is published by JCP Books. The author's site lists its word count as 10,200, which came out to 31 pages on my Nook, 37 if you count the author's note at the end. I don't usually buy works that short, but I've read and loved several of Jordan Castillo Price's works. I figured Locks of Love would probably be worth it.

Synopsis:

This story is set in a contemporary-feeling world in which everyone has some sort of "gift." Sometimes it's something useful, sometimes it's not. Hal's gift is the ability to talk to doors. He can convince just about any door to open without a key. Although being a thief would probably have been a more lucrative profession, Hal opted to become a locksmith instead.

After finishing a job in a nasty part of town, Hal is about to leave when he spots a gorgeous guy with auburn hair in a window. The guy, Micha, asks for his help escaping. Hal is skeptical and suspects some kind of scam or trap, but when Micha tells him to come back at midnight, he does. After seeing a scary-looking biker climb up to Micha's window, Hal tries to get to Micha's room by more conventional means, only to discover that his room isn't reachable by any doors. With his gift effectively useless, Hal will have to figure out some other way to save Micha.

Review:

Even knowing this story was written by JCP and was therefore probably good, I still hesitated to buy it. Several reviews stated that it was too short. Since that's a common complaint I have about short stories and novellas, it was a good bet I'd feel the same. Still, when a sale came around, I bought it.

Strobe Edge (manga, vol. 1) story & art by Io Sakisaka

Strobe Edge features a mix of romance and comedy. I got it via interlibrary loan.

This post contains SPOILERS. Read at your own risk.

Synopsis:

Ninako has never been in love, so when everyone around her tells her she loves Daiki, because she's been friends with him for ages and because he clearly likes her back, she believes them. She wonders about all of this, though, because she's strangely reluctant to take the next step and be Daiki's girlfriend.

Then she meets Ren during her train ride home. He has always felt so far away from her, like a pop idol you can see and sigh over, but never touch. It turns out that he's actually a really nice guy, if quiet and maybe kind of shy. After he accidentally causes Ninako to drop her phone and her cell phone charm breaks, he goes out of his way to find another one he thinks she might like and gives it to her as a present. As Ninako witnesses more of his acts of kindness, she begins to fall in love with him, although she doesn't recognize what those feelings are, at first.

Meanwhile, Daiki notices Ninako's budding feelings for Ren before she does, and he's not happy. In an attempt to nip things in the bud, he tells Ninako something about Ren she doesn't know: he's dating Daiki's sister, a gorgeous model. Things start to get a little out of control when Daiki finally confesses his feelings and everyone around Ninako assumes they're dating, but Ninako knows what she has to do. Even if her feelings aren't reciprocated, she can't change them, and dating Daiki under those conditions wouldn't be right.

Review:

I had problems getting into this manga. Ninako seemed nice, and I loved the bit where she told Ren “If somebody does something for me, I appreciate it, no matter what it is” when he thought he'd given her a cell phone charm that wasn't to her taste. However, she also seemed dumb as a rock, and way too easily manipulated. I get that Sakisaka was trying to show readers that she had no experience with love and had no idea what that emotion felt like, but it was like she didn't have a clue about any emotions, not just love. She interprets her reactions to Ren as the beginnings of a cold, rather than as emotional reactions. This was played more seriously than humorously, and all it did was lower my opinion of Ninako's intelligence even further.

The Cadaver Client (e-novella) by Frank Tuttle

The Cadaver Client is a mix of fantasy and mystery. It's published by Samhain Publishing. According to All Romance Ebooks, it's 25,300 words long, which came out to 65 pages on my Nook, if you don't count the 9 pages of excerpts at the end. According to this page, it's the third story in Tuttle's Markhat series, although those first three could be read in pretty much any order.

Synopsis:

In this story, Mama Hog gets Markhat involved in yet another dangerous case. She brings in the seemingly crazy Granny Knot, who is introduced as being a spook doctor (she can see and speak to spirits). Granny Knot turns out to not be as crazy as she acts, even if the case she has brought Markhat is supposedly on behalf of a ghost.

The ghost says his name is Sellway. Before he died, he was a soldier and, for whatever reason, he found himself unable to go home to his wife and child. Now that he's dead, he feels guilty about that. He amassed a fortune in the years before his death, and he'd like Markhat to deliver it to his wife and child. Markhat agrees to take on the case, which turns out to be twistier than he expects.

Review:

The Cadaver Client was more of what I enjoyed in The Mister Trophy and Dead Man's Rain. Markhat (who I realized still doesn't have a first name) was, as usual, snarky, smart, and in possession of a strong sense of justice, and the mystery itself was interesting. Unfortunately, some of the things I disliked about Dead Man's Rain were also present in this story.

Lady Mechatronic and the Steampunked Pirates (e-short story) by Arabella Wyatt

Lady Mechatronic and the Steampunked Pirates is a mix of historical adventure and science fiction. I suppose I should call it steampunk, but that doesn't quite seem to fit - to me, characters developing new abilities via science fiction-y methods does not necessarily equal steampunk. Anyway, the story is 18,442 words long, which came out to 44 pages on my Nook. It's published by Devine Destinies.

I suppose I should give a spoiler warning, except even the publisher's description spoils the whole story.

Synopsis:

When Admiral Johnson announces his plan to start his own slave trade in the Caribbean, Captain Hartwell and the more loyal members of Hartwell's crew try to stand against him. Unfortunately, they are outnumbered, and so their best option becomes escape. After a fireball misses the ship and hits the ocean, Hartwell and his crew see an opportunity to escape. When they notice what appears to be a person floating in the ocean, Hartwell rushes to rescue them. The person turns out to be a silver skeleton, which Hartwell somehow instantly recognizes as belonging to a beautiful woman. Her flesh and organs reform before everyone's eyes, leaving Hartwell with a naked silver woman in his arms.

Hartwell's sister, Susanna, helps the woman, who calls herself Mechatronic, find clothes. It is quickly apparent that Mechatronic has amazing abilities, but Hartwell has other things to worry about. His new crew is too small, and his new ship is ancient and falling apart. He hopes to at least pick up more crew members at an abandoned pirate town. Unfortunately, several of Admiral Johnson's men catch up to them there. It's at that point that Hartwell and several of his crew learn that, in the process of rescuing Mechatronic, they were changed on a fundamental level and now have strange new abilities.

Review:

This story and I did not start off on the best footing, although I tried not to let that affect my opinion of it. When I first purchased it, All Romance Ebooks listed its word count as 184,420. Although I had never read anything by Wyatt before and had no experience with Devine Destinies, the book's description made it sound like a fun, fast-paced adventure, and $3.99 seemed like a nice price to pay for something of that length. You can imagine my shock when I opened up the file on my Nook and saw that it was only 44 pages. I contacted ARe, which tried and failed to get in touch with Devine Destinies and finally just corrected the word count on their product page using the info from the Devine Destinies site.

Midnight Riot (book) by Ben Aaronovitch

Midnight Riot is the first book in Aaronovitch's Peter Grant series. I'd call it urban fantasy.

Janine's review of this book over at Dear Author was what first brought it to my attention. I eventually checked it out via interlibrary loan.

Synopsis:

Probationary Constable Peter Grant is keeping watch at the scene of a murder when he meets a ghost who happens to be the sole witness to the crime. Peter is shocked and a little freaked out, but he does his job and questions the witness, which is how he learns that the murderer has a super-human ability to change his face and knock people's heads clean off.

Soon, Peter comes to the attention of Detective Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale, the one and only member of a special branch of London's Metropolitan Police. Nightingale's job is to make sure that magic and magical beings don't cause so much trouble that ordinary humans start to notice them, and Peter is his new apprentice. They spend the book dealing with two primary issues: a bunch of murders, and a territorial dispute between Mother and Father Thames. Although the murders are all committed by different people, they each have magic and sudden, inexplicable violence in common. And also, the murderer's face always falls off afterwards.

Review:

This is one of those cases where my enjoyment of the main character's voice eclipsed my issues with the story. I loved Peter Grant. He had a dry, snarky, and often self-deprecating sense of humor, even when describing his work, London, or his childhood. When Nightingale took him on and started teaching him magic, he didn't begin to morph into a Gary Sue – his training involved lots and lots of repetition and practice, and he didn't become a magical whiz just in time for the final showdown with the killer. His strength lay in his ability to deal with people, including the not-quite-human sorts, and his interest in information of all sorts. I have no idea how much of it was true, but I loved all the little London details.

The Vor Game (e-book) by Lois McMaster Bujold

The Vor Game is military science fiction, part of Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga. It's included in the Young Miles omnibus published by Baen Books. The Vor Game was approximately 267 pages long on my Nook.

Synopsis:

Miles, newly graduated from the Academy, is brilliant, but he has one teenie tiny problem: he's not a very good subordinate. Miles desperately wants ship duty, and he's told he'll get it...if he can manage to spend 6 months on Kyril Island as the new Meteorology Officer, keep out of trouble, and properly follow all orders given to him. Miles doesn't know a thing about meteorology, but that turns out to be the least of his problems, and it's not long before he joins a mutiny. He had good reasons for his actions, but still, it wasn't exactly what he'd been sent there to do. Count Vorkosigan, Miles' father, and Simon Illyan, Chief of Barrayaran Imperial Security, come up with another job for Miles, something perhaps more suitable for him, and give him one order: do as Captain Ungari tells you.

It doesn't take long for things to go wrong. Miles finds himself separated from Ungari, imprisoned multiple times, cycling between three different identities (Miles Vorkosigan, small-time arms dealer Victor Rotha, and Admiral Naismith), and desperately trying to rescue Emperor Gregor Vorbarra from a clever and seductive woman named Cavilo.

Review:

Although I took a break while reading this in order to gorge on movies and TV, I really did enjoy it at least as much as The Warrior's Apprentice. Miles was a bit more grown-up in this one, and had a better idea of just how much trouble he could get himself into.

Miss Minoes (live action movie), via Netflix

Miss Minoes is a Dutch comedy/fantasy based on a children's novel by Annie M.G. Schmidt. I learned about it via Smart Bitches, Trashy Books.

Synopsis:

Tibbe is a shy reporter who's been given an ultimatum by his boss - either turn in an article containing actual news tomorrow, or get a new job. Luckily for Tibbe, he meets Miss Minoes, a cat who has transformed into a young woman who retains various feline behaviors, like a desire to play with dangling things and eat mice. Miss Minoes collects news from the various neighborhood cats and reports it to Tibbe in return for fish and a place to stay. It's a good arrangement for the both of them, until Miss Minoes begins reporting things Tibbe can't quite bring himself to believe: that Ellemeet, the town's benefactor and president of the Pet Lover's Society, knocked over a fish stand, is abusive towards cats, and may be doing other nefarious things.

Eventually, though, Tibbe starts to believe what Miss Minoes has been telling him. Getting the rest of the town to believe him is another matter entirely, but Miss Minoes, the other cats, and Bibi, a young girl who likes to visit Tibbe and Miss Minoes, have an idea.

Review:

SB Sarah liked this a bit more than I did, which is not to say I thought it was a bad movie. It had a “children's movie” simplicity to it that didn't always sit well with my adult brain, but Miss Minoes was charming enough that I still enjoyed the movie overall.

Un-Go (anime TV series), via Crunchyroll

Un-Go is an 11-episode mystery series with supernatural and sci-fi elements.

Synopsis:

This series takes place in a futuristic Japan that has recently survived a major war and several terrorist attacks. Many people are still adjusting to their post-war positions - things they did that seemed right and just during the war are suddenly deemed wrong and/or illegal.

The series looks at the investigations of Shinjurou, known as the "Defeated Detective." Every time he solves a mystery, Rinroku Kaishou swoops in with another solution - except, as it turns out, Shinjurou is pretty good at solving crimes, and Kaishou is equally as good at tidying things up so that influential people won't face any blame or embarrassment.

Shinjurou has a partner/boss named Inga. Usually, Inga appears to be a playful young boy/girl (Crunchyroll's subtitling says that this version of Inga is a boy, although I don't know if that was a translator decision or not). At times, however, Inga transforms into a sexy woman. In that form, Inga can ask a person one question, and that person must answer truthfully.

A good portion of the series is composed of 1- or 2-episode mysteries. Shinjurou observes things, asks questions, investigates, and, when the time comes, he tells Inga who to talk to and what question to ask. Usually, one or more members of the police follows Shinjurou around, so they can swoop in and cover up anything he discovers that might be politically embarrassing.

Review:

My synopsis is terrible – it makes this series seem much more boring than it is. My biggest complaint about Un-Go is that it's too short to properly explore the world and characters packed into it.