Avatar: The Last Airbender, the Complete Book 2 Collection (non-Japanese animation, TV series)

Synopsis:

Early on in the season, Aang learns that he cannot fight the Fire Nation solely in the Avatar state - as powerful as the Avatar state is, if he dies while he's in it, the Avatar reincarnation cycle will be broken. So, Aang, Katara, Sokka, Momo, and Appa continue to travel, searching for an Earthbending master willing and able to teach Aang Earthbending.

Aang finds this new mentor in Toph. Toph is such an incredible Earthbender that, although she is blind, she is able to see via her Earthbending (she has to have her bare feet on earth, and she can only actually "see" things that are touching the ground).

Aang and the rest of his group learn that a solar eclipse will occur soon. Just as a lunar eclipse weakened Waterbenders in the first season, a solar eclipse will weaken Firebenders. With help, Aang stands a good chance at beating Firelord Ozai and the Fire Nation. Unfortunately, help turns out to be hard to get. First Appa is stolen, forcing the group to try and find him on foot. Then, when the group tries to get an audience with the Earth King at Ba Sing Se, they find themselves blocked by bureaucracy and corruption.

Meanwhile, Princess Azula, Prince Zuko's ruthless sister, is trying to capture (or maybe just kill) Aang. Zuko is also still on Aang's trail, but his Uncle Iroh has started rubbing off on him, and while in Ba Sing Se he begins to reevaluate his life and the kind of future he wants for himself.

Review:

It's been a while since I last saw season 1, so there are details I've forgotten and I can't really say for sure whether season 2 is better than season 1...but I suspect it is. Things become less black-and-white in this season. The Fire Nation may still be the primary enemy (although I'm sure that in the final season Aang and his group will remember that the Fire Nation is just one of the four nations and not actually an enemy, they're not quite to that point yet), but the Earth Kingdom is shown to have its own issues.

Family Complex (manga) by Mikiyo Tsuda

Synopsis:

This one-shot focuses on each of the members of the almost entirely beautiful Sakamoto family.

• Akira (the youngest son - 14 years old) - He's the only member of the family who's not incredibly beautiful, so (and here's where the title comes from) he's got a bit of a complex about his family. He hates it when he's out in public with his family and everyone fawns all over his family members. It makes him feel like he doesn't belong.
• Harumi (the oldest son - 17 years old) - He doesn't have friends - he has servants. And he hates it. He wants nothing more than to go out and have fun with friends like a normal high school student, but he can't do that when all his classmates put him on a pedestal and call him Sakamoto-sama. The only person he's really close to is his little brother, Akira.
• Natsuru (oldest daughter - 16 years old) - Natsuru is a tomboy who even looks like a very pretty boy. She doesn't fit in with other girls, because they all fawn over her and fight over her like she's a boy, and she doesn't really fit in with the boys, either. When she was younger, Harumi used to tell her that she should be more girlie, but she wasn't sure if she could do it or if it would even make a difference in how others treated her.
• Fuyuki (the youngest child in the family, and youngest daughter - 10 years old) - She looks like a beautiful doll. Although she gets along well with her family members, she never knows what to say to those outside her family. Because she agonizes so much over the meaning of what others have said to her and what she should say to them in return, she ends up not speaking at all. Most of her classmates think she's weird and too quiet - pretty, but not much besides that.
• Hidetoshi (father), Nanami (mother) - During the chapters about the kids, both of these characters are 41 years old. Hidetoshi looks like he could be another older brother in the family, and baby-faced Nanami looks potentially younger than Natsuru. A short story later in the volume shows the two of them as they were 20 years ago. Nanami hated looking young and cute and wanted to be more womanly, while Hidetoshi hated looking beautiful and wanted to look more manly. They meet during a women's apparel contest Nanami organized, which Hidetoshi's friend entered him in without telling him.

There are also a few pages that show the various Sakamoto kids after the events in the chapters that focused on them.

Review:

Mikiyo Tsuda (and her BL pseudonym, Taishi Zaou) is my guilty pleasure. Her stories aren't exactly deep and moving. Her characters and situations may only have the most tenuous of connections to reality. However, I love her sense of humor and the way she draws her characters so much that it doesn't matter.

Arsene Lupin (e-book) by Edgar Jepson and Maurice Leblanc

This is another Project Gutenberg book.

I tried to avoid spoilers, but it still may be possible to guess certain things about the book based on what I've written here. However, as I say in my review, I guessed a few things very early on and still enjoyed the story. Arsene Lupin is just plain fun.

Synopsis:

I'll start by listing the characters.

• Arsene Lupin - The gentleman thief.
• M. Gournay-Martin - A millionaire. Sometime in the past, Arsene Lupin sent him a letter telling him that he planned to steal several of the paintings in his collection, as well as the coronet of the Princesse de Lamballe. Lupin took the paintings, as promised, but did not manage to get the coronet.
• Germaine - The millionaire's snooty daughter. She's about to marry the Duke of Charmerace.
• Sonia - A servant in the millionaire's household. She's lovely and delicate and puts up with Germaine without complaint. She's secretly in love with the Duke.
• Duke of Charmerace - About to marry Germaine, although he seems to like Sonia more than he does his fiancee. He became engaged to Germaine seven years ago and, shortly after that, left to go to the South Pole. He was only supposed to be gone for 3 years and ended up being gone for 7.
• Chief-Inspector Guerchard - A great detective who is obsessed with catching Arsene Lupin.

At the beginning of the book, Sonia is preparing Germaine and the Duke's wedding invitations. When Lupin informs M. Gournay-Martin, via a letter, that he plans to steal more of his paintings and finally get the coronet, the millionaire panics. It's not entirely clear, at first, whether the letter is really from Lupin or just from someone pretending to be Lupin. It doesn't matter - M. Gournay-Martin wants the police, particularly Guerchard, to help protect his collection. If the police cannot keep the items from being stolen, Guerchard may be the only one who can help get everything back.

Review:

Maurice Leblanc's Arsene Lupin books are my favorite Project Gutenberg find. This is the second Lupin book I've read, and, although I don't think it was as good as The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar (which is actually a collection of short stories, rather than a novel), it was still a lot of fun. Well, except for the gripes I have about the ending. And Sonia. But more about that later.

Sleight of Hand (e-novella) by Katrina Strauss

Sleight of Hand is a short erotic paranormal m/m romance story. Both All Romance and Samhain Publishing include it in their steampunk categories as well, which is a decision I'm not entirely sure I agree with.

On my Nook, Sleight of Hand is under 50 pages, if you don't count the excerpt from Barbara Sheridan and Anne Cain's Lost Souls that is included at the end. According to All Romance, it is 17,403 words. Considering the page/word count, the $2.50 price tag is kind of high (I wish Samhain charged less for short works). For me, it turned out to be money well spent.

Synopsis:

Edwin, his sister Alma, and their mother are journeying by train to Alma's fiance, a man who is much older than her but makes up for it by having quite a bit of money. Since Edwin has always been fragile, Alma realizes that this is probably the best option for her and her family's future, but Edwin doesn't like it. Still, he has to admit that he's not quite well. For one thing, he has dreams of some kind of fiery disaster, dreams that keep him from ever getting a good night's sleep. For another, as much as he tries to squelch his feelings, Edwin has always found himself more attracted to other men than to women.

While on the train, Edwin meets a man who may be able to help him: Marco Satori, a handsome and mysterious magician.

Review:

I was browsing a review blog when I came across Sleight of Hand's cover art, which caused my “ooh, pretty” reaction to kick in. I read the review and was intrigued. I was a little concerned by the bit in Samhain Publishing's “warning” that mentioned “dubious consent,” but I decided to take my chances. I'm glad I did.

The Hunger Games (book) by Suzanne Collins

Synopsis:

Sometime in the future, everyone in Panem, located in what used to be North America, lives at the Capitol or in Districts 1 through 12. Every year, one boy and one girl are chosen from each district to be tributes at the Hunger Games. The Hunger Games, which were started after some past rebellion and are meant to discourage future rebellion, require that each tribute try to kill the other tributes until only one is left. The remaining tribute gets to live out his or her life in comfort, although each year he or she must coach the district's newest tributes. Each district is forced to watch the tributes kill each other, and viewers at the Capitol sponsor their favorite tributes (sponsors can send their tributes useful gifts, like food or medicine) and bet on who will win.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss lives in one of the worst districts, District 12. Just getting enough food on her family's table requires that she enter herself for more and more chances to be part of the Hunger Games. The illegal poaching she does with Gale (sort of a friend, if Katniss can be said to have friends) helps somewhat, but it's not always enough.

When the time comes for the Hunger Games lottery, Katniss is relieved when her name is once again not drawn - but that relief doesn't last long. Despite only having one entry in the lottery, Prim, Katniss' sister, is chosen to be part of the Hunger Games. Knowing that Prim couldn't possibly survive, and unable to bear the thought, Katniss volunteers to take her place. Then the male tribute chosen turns out to be Peeta. Katniss doesn't know Peeta well, but she remembers him as the boy who gave her bread when she and her family were starving. She doesn't want to have to kill him, but she doesn't want to die, either.

Review:

This book took me a lot longer to read than it should have. I read the first three quarters or so very quickly, carried on by a need to know what was going to happen, who was going to survive, and how they were going to manage it. The closer I got to the end, however, the harder it was for me to continue reading. I spent some time thinking about why this was, and I think I now have the answer, although Hunger Games fans may “boo” me for it: I started to hate Katniss.

Ash (book) by Malinda Lo

During Pride Week, Dear Author had a post recommending YA fiction, and this was one of the recommended books. I still intend to read Boy Meets Boy, but I decided to read Ash first because 1) the cover is gorgeous and 2) I was thrilled by the idea of f/f fiction that did not end depressingly and did not read like porn.

One thing, though: don't go into this expecting the romance to be present right away. Ash and Kaisa don't start to spend a lot of time with each other until halfway through the book. This book isn't so much romance as it is fantasy.

Synopsis:

Shortly after his wife's unexpected death, Ash's father remarries. His new wife does not appear to like Ash very much, and Ash's new stepsisters are not particularly friendly, but Ash doesn't experience the full brunt of their dislike until after her father dies. Ash's stepmother turns her into the family's servant (practically the family's slave), claiming that this is only just, considering that the family is hurting financially because Ash's father's business had been doing badly.

The death of Ash's mother put her into such despair that she used to visit her mother's grave every night, despite warnings from others that she shouldn't, because she might attract fairies. After Ash's father dies, she drifts further away from the world of mortals, emotionally, and begins a strange and probably unhealthy friendship with a fairy named Sidhean. Although Ash wouldn't mind it if Sidhean stole her away from the world of mortals entirely, for some reason he doesn't.

Then Ash meets Kaisa, the King's Huntress, and things begin to change. She finds herself longing for Kaisa's company to the point where she doesn't even notice how long it's been since she last spent time with Sidhean. Kaisa seems equally interested in Ash - she tells Ash her favorite fairy story, teaches her how to ride, and doesn't seem to mind that Ash is only a servant.

Ash begins to recognize that what she feels for Kaisa is love, but if she is to stay with Kaisa, she must somehow figure out how to break free of her stepmother's control and the hold Sidhean still has upon her.

Review:

This is really a lovely story. Fairy stories are not only a big part of the book, the book itself reads like a fairy tale. It is loosely based on the story of Cinderella, but Lo doesn't feel the need to include every last detail of the basic story, so the result is something that feels very natural and new.

Kimi ni Todoke: From Me to You (manga, vol. 3) by Karuho Shiina

Synopsis:

Sawako is invited to hang out with friends for the first time in her life. She eats ramen with Yano and Yoshida at Ryu's family's ramen place. When Yano realizes that Sawako probably has a crush on Kazehaya, she encourages Sawako to call Kazehaya and invite him to join them. Then, when he arrives, Yano messes with him a bit. It's an overall cute, fun gathering.

Next, the school is gearing up for its sports festival. Kazehaya has been assigned to be part of the sports festival committee, which means he'll be spending a lot of time with Kurumi, a girl who appears cute and nice on the surface but who seems to be manipulating others into pairing her and Kazehaya up. When she notices that Kazehaya likes Sawako, she declares herself one of Sawako's friends, with the intention of manipulating Sawako into giving up on Kazehaya and helping her end up with him instead.

Other than the whole Kurumi situation, things are going well in Sawako's life (and Sawako, by the way, doesn't even realize that Kurumi is trouble waiting to happen). Yano and Yoshida are trying to get Sawako to be more relaxed with her fellow students. They start by encouraging her to call her friends by their first names. Yano is Ayane, Yoshida is Chizu, and then there's Tomo and Ekko. Yano, who I will call Ayane from now on, continues to try to encourage the budding romance between Kazehaya and Sawako. She tells Sawako to try calling Kazehaya by his first name, Shota. Of course, Sawako tries, but she can't manage it. Kazehaya also can't manage to call Sawako by her first name (he calls her Kuronuma), which later causes Sawako to become upset, because he seems to be able to refer to Kurumi by her first name.

Review:

Okay, first, I have to admit that I was not able to stick to my personal rule of only reading the next volume after I'd written a post about the volume I just finished reading. I recently finished volume 6 and probably would have read more if I owned volume 7. The good news is that this means I already know how all the Kurumi stuff ends. The bad news is that it's going to take a little extra willpower on my part to write posts about volumes 4 to 6.

The Lark and the Wren (e-book) by Mercedes Lackey

This book is part of the Baen Free Book Library. I downloaded it because I could not find my paper copy of the book, and because I wanted to see what I could expect from Baen's e-books, in terms of formatting and general readability. Just based on this one book, I'm not sure I'd want to pay even Baen's admittedly cheap prices for their e-books, unless e-format was my only option. This particular book can be bought cheaply online or at a used bookstore, and in the paper version hyphens and dashes would actually look different, there wouldn't be the occasional paragraph that was either combined with another paragraph or broken apart in mid-sentence, and visual cues indicating scene/POV changes would always be present. The problems aren't actually that major (the only consistent and pervasive problem is that the hyphens and dashes look the same), but they're a bit annoying when I know that the paper version looks fine and that there are e-books out there with absolutely no formatting issues.

Synopsis:

This book is set in a fantasy world that is very much like Europe sometime in the past.

Rune has spent her entire young life working at a small inn. When work slows down and customers request it, she can do what she loves - play her fiddle. After the inn's owner's kind wife dies, however, Rune gets fewer opportunities to play, and townsfolk start treating her worse. When her mother begins jockeying to become the inn's owner's next wife, Rune wonders what will become of her.

A dare prompts her to go and play for the Skull Hill Ghost, who rewards her for her music with more silver than she's ever seen in her life. Since her life at the inn appears to be little more than a dead end, Rune decides to take her silver and make a new life for herself. Her goal is to become a Guild Bard, but first she'll need to find teachers who can help her fill in the gaps in her musical training.

What Rune thinks she wants to do with her life may not actually be what's best for her, however. Eventually, she learns about the Free Bards and even finds love among them. As one of the Free Bards, she meets a young man with a gift for music. The young man could make an excellent Free Bard, but he won't survive long enough to do anything if Rune and her companions can't figure out how to protect him from the assassins that are after him.

Review:

If you think my synopsis seems a little “all over the place,” that's because the book itself kind of is. The Free Bard stuff doesn't even come up until maybe halfway through, although Lackey at least doesn't drop it in totally out of the blue, since readers will probably have noticed and wondered about all the musicians in Rune's life who seemed to mysteriously know who she was and what instrument she played. The stuff with the young musician who's being hunted by assassins doesn't come up until nearly the end. Surprisingly, he's not the setup for a second book – the entire thing is resolved, nicely and happily, by the end of this book.

Mercedes Lackey used to be one of my absolute favorite authors. I read everything by her that I could find. Then one day I read one of her newer Eric Banyon books and started to get annoyed by how black-and-white it seemed like her stories had become (although the last straw for me was really when Lackey wrote a thinly-veiled version of herself into her Valdemar books, but that's a story for another post). The good people were almost saintly, while the bad people were very, very bad. The good people might do things that supposed pillars of the community didn't like, but the idea was that those “pillars of the community” were wrong and weren't good in the ways that really counted.

I remembered loving this book when I first read it. I still enjoyed it, but I realized that the black-and-white worldview that I thought was brand new in Lackey's books must have always been there. What changed wasn't necessarily Lackey's writing. What changed was me.

Kimi ni Todoke: From Me to You (manga, vol. 2) by Karuho Shiina

I think I managed to keep the spoilers to a minimum.

Synopsis:

Persistent rumors are flying around. Supposedly Yano went out with a hundred guys in middle school, supposedly Yoshida was a major delinquent in middle school, and supposedly Sawako is the one who started and spread all these rumors. Yano and Yoshida refuse to believe this at first, but then Sawako's behavior causes them to doubt her.

Sawako is, at first, unaware that anything is going on. Then she starts to notice that Yano and Yoshida are unhappy. When she finally learns about the rumors, she blames herself for their unhappiness and worries that, even if she can clear up the misunderstanding that she believed caused the rumors, her presence will only continue to bring them more unhappiness. She also worries that she will cause Kazehaya to become unpopular.

Miserable, Sawako is unsure of what to do. She was alone prior to meeting Kazehaya, Yano, and Yoshida, so she thought she could just go back to being alone, but she misses them too badly. At the same time, being with them seems selfish, since she thinks her presence will only cause them problems.

Meanwhile, Kazehaya has noticed the change in Sawako's behavior and is worried about her. Yano and Yoshida are miserable, too. Deep down, they feel that Sawako can't possibly be the one who started the rumors, but they haven't even been able to solidly confirm that Sawako really does like them.

Review:

Whereas Kiyo Fujiwara's Wild Ones continues to get a "so so" response from me, this series is solidly in the "absolutely love this" end of the scale for me.

This volume made me cry. I don't mean "It made me tear up." I don't mean "It put a lump in my throat" (although it did do that, too). No, I mean I had to actually wipe the tears away so I could keep reading. A while back, there was a blog I read called The Otaku Librarian (which sadly has not had any new posts in ages). It had a post on female friendships in anime and manga, which in turn linked to an Anime News Network post on female friendships in anime and manga. This manga, or at the very least this volume, would have been perfect for those discussions.

This entire volume is about the friendship between Sawako, Yano, and Yoshida. Shiina could have chosen to just spend a chapter on their friendship and then gone back to the romance slowly developing between Kazehaya and Sawako, but she didn't. Which I think is just awesome, and something you're still more likely to see in shounen manga than shoujo. Kazehaya is there, but (proving how great he is and how worthy he is of eventually ending up with someone as sweet as Sawako), although he frets a little about not getting to spend more time with Sawako, he purposefully stands aside so that Yano and Yoshida can be the ones to come to Sawako's rescue and so that Sawako can have more girl time with her new friends. Kazehaya was there for Sawako, but he was more there as the only person her age who was willing to talk to her, listen to her, and give her advice, rather than as her love interest (although there was that bit early on where she was fascinated by his forehead).

Wild Ones (manga, vol. 3) by Kiyo Fujiwara

There are a few spoilers in this post, but I don't think they're too major.

Synopsis:

This volume starts off silly and perhaps a little creepily, with a panty thief storyline. A couple of the yakuza guys find sexy underwear lying on the floor in the house and immediately assume they are Sachie's. Rather than give them to her or pretend they didn't see them and somehow arrange for her to find them, the guys pick them up and then have to find a way to get them back into her underwear drawer. Meanwhile, a panty thief is on the loose, but who would be so stupid as to break into a yakuza household?

In the next part of the volume, Sachie wins two free tickets to a hot spring, but in the end everyone goes with her because she can't possibly ask only one person to go. While there, Rakuto has a period of emotional instability after he overhears Sachie's grandfather saying, "I want Sachie to be with an honest, good man. Not yakuza like us..." Then Sachie is kidnapped by a man from Rakuto's (and Sachie's mother's!) past. On the kidnapper's orders, Rakuto must get to Sachie in time, all on his own.

In the final part of the volume, Sachie decides to cheer for Rakuto at one of his kendo matches and asks him if he'd like her to give him anything. He asks for a bento box. Unfortunately, the bento box she puts together gets a bit messed up after an encounter with a rude little boy, but Rakuto happily accepts and eats it anyway. The rude little boy, Koh, turns out to be the spoiled, lonely son of an important yakuza guest of Sachie's grandfather's. Sachie and Rakuto do their best to treat Koh more nicely than he deserves, but when Sachie tries to help him out and he knocks a bunch of food to the floor, she can't take it anymore. Surprisingly, Koh's indulgent father is impressed by Sachie's behavior towards his son...so much so that he asks her to be Koh's bride.

Review:

The panty thief thing was not a strong beginning for this volume. It had its funny moments (I loved the image of Sachie's grandfather freaking out over needing to get girls' underwear, and it's worth a giggle to see the usually perfect Rakuto get embarrassed), but a lot of it just emphasized how...not very bright...the people in Sachie's grandfather's gang are. It makes me wonder if they're maybe the poorest yakuza in all of Japan - I can't imagine most of them are successful at anything more than being thugs. And yet, they can somehow scrape together the money to send everyone to a hot spring in the next part of the volume.

So, in the next part, Sachie and Rakuto once again teeter just on the edge of acknowledging that they would like to be a couple. Once again, Fujiwara tries to turn status into a good romantic obstacle (Rakuto is just another member of the gang and Sachie's servant, and Sachie is the boss's daughter), and once again it doesn't quite fly with me. Fujiwara hasn't revealed much about Sachie's mother's relationship with her former caretaker yet, but I'm not entirely sure their situation was like Rakuto and Sachie's, so Fujiwara's attempt to link the situations of the two pairs of characters seemed like a bit of a stretch. All this part and its few revelations did was make me wonder who Sachie's father is, since it didn't look like her father was her mother's caretaker - I'm thinking any feelings he had for Sachie's mother were one-sided, although it did seem as though she at least felt affection for him.

This post is brought to you by the color red

Looking at the cover art used in my last few posts, I seem to be going through a "red" period. I'm toying with the idea of purposefully having periods where I concentrate on reviewing works with cover/container art that is primarily of a single color. Unfortunately, I figure as soon as I decided on something like this, I'd want to do anything but read or watch things with that color. Plus, there are interlibrary loan items and library checkouts to consider.

I may still try out the color thing, but, even if I don't, I thought it might be fun to list everything I could find in my collection that looked predominantly red to me, or where the red really stood out. It turned out to be a longer list than I expected. I've organized the list according to whether something is animation, live action, manga, or books, but that's it. I thought about organizing it all alphabetically, too, but there turned out to be so much to list that I abandoned that idea. That's also why there are no links.

So, what's red in your collection? Any thoughts about color-themed posting?

Wild Ones (manga, vol. 2) by Kiyo Fujiwara

The synopsis is a bit spoilery, so beware.

Synopsis:

Sachie, Rakuto, and the rest of the yakuza gang go to the beach, where Sachie attracts the attention of a hot young cook at a food stand. Rakuto intervenes, and Sachie of course does not understand why. This little love triangle isn't anywhere near over, however, as Rakuto and Sachie later learn that the hot young cook, Azuma, is actually the grandson of the guy at whose inn they're staying. The grandfather, a friend of Sachie's grandfather, asks that they take care of Azuma for him while he's being hospitalized.

Now Rakuto has to deal with a romantic rival living right underfoot. In fact, they have to share a room. Sachie continues to be completely oblivious to the sparks flying between the two of them, but even she starts to wonder if Rakuto might really have feelings for her after he tells her, "Just let me be by your side. No one else but me by your side..."

When the student council at Sachie's school hosts a 3-day camping trip for everyone, regardless of what grade they're in, Sachie finds herself a little jealous of how popular Rakuto is with all the girls, and a little depressed/hurt that he can't spend time with her because he's so busy with his duties as student council president. There's a tradition in which people give their name tag to the person they'd like to dance with on the last night of the camping trip, and Sachie would like to give hers to Rakuto, but he's too busy to accept it...so she gives it to Azuma instead. Rakuto is hurt, and Sachie is miserable, but things work out in the end (for Sachie and Rakuto, anyway).

Next up is a school festival storyline, in which Sachie's class decides to do a netherworld cafe. Meanwhile, Rakuto is trying to fend off the president of the Film Club, who'd like to do another Rakuto-themed movie in order to drum up funding for her club. When Rakuto refuses to let himself be fangirl bait again (last year's film had him wearing glasses, standing in the rain, and starring in a shower scene), the Film Club president gets the bright idea to try to follow him around every second of the day and get whatever footage she can. She gets more than she bargained for when she catches Sachie in tough girl yakuza mode, going up against a guy who was taking surreptitious panty shots with his cell phone. The film becomes hugely popular at the school festival, and Sachie is horrified at the thought that she has inadvertently outed herself and Rakuto. Thankfully, some quick thinking on Rakuto's part saves the day.

Review:

I have to admit, I have a certain fondness for love triangles, depending on how they're done. I like the one Fujiwara introduced in this volume. Sachie probably considers Azuma a friend, but I'm not sure she recognizes that he likes her, and she absolutely doesn't realize that she has sparked a rivalry between him and Rakuto. What I particularly like about Rakuto having someone he feels is a rival for Sachie's love is that it puts cracks in his mask and forces him to show his true emotions more often. He also gets several great moments where he gets to demonstrate that he knows Sachie better than Azuma does - at this point, there's no doubt in my mind that Fujiwara still intends for Sachie to end up with Rakuto. Azuma isn't a true romantic rival so much as a way to stir things up a little.

The Prisoner of Zenda (e-book) by Anthony Hope

It's another Project Gutenberg book! You can download it here.

I decided to read this because I remembered a bit in Kaoru Mori's Emma where Vivi read it and got all excited about it.

Synopsis:

Rudolph knows he is distantly related to the King of Ruritania (there's a whole long story about it - I had trouble keeping everything straight), but it's still a shock when he encounters the King and discovers that they look almost like twins. This turns out to come in handy when the King is drugged right before his coronation. If the King doesn't make it to his coronation, Michael, his villainous half-brother, can claim the throne in his stead, so Rudolph is asked to temporarily impersonate the King.

Michael has the real King kidnapped and kept prisoner in a castle in the small town of Zenda. The few people who know what Michael has done can't call him out without revealing that the man who actually attended the coronation was an impostor. Michael can't say anything about the "King" being a fake, because then he'd have to admit to drugging and kidnapping the real King.

Rudolph is doing his best to try to help rescue the King, but, while pretending to be the King, he falls in love with Princess Flavia, the King's betrothed. Princess Flavia, who had previously not been much interested in the King, now begins to fall in love with him, not realizing that she is falling for his impostor. Michael is in love with Princess Flavia and is not pleased that she favors Rudolph more. And, as if this love polygon weren't complicated enough, Antoinette de Mauban, a woman Rudolph originally met while on the train to Ruritania, is Michael's mistress. She is not at all pleased that Michael loves Princess Flavia more than he does her.

This all comes to a dramatic conclusion in which Ruritania and its King are saved, Michael is defeated, his traitorous henchman Rupert of Hentzau escapes (and gets a sequel), and Princess Flavia and Rudolph must tragically separate for the good of Ruritania.

Review:

At first, I enjoyed this book. I could barely follow all the long paragraphs about the connection between Rudolph and the Ruritanian royal family, and Rudolph himself was a bit too driftless for my taste, but I got excited when more hints of the “impostor” storyline I knew was coming began to turn up. When Rudolph and the King finally met, I settled down for an adventure I was sure was going to be fun.

The problem was, it wasn't as fun as I expected. Rudolph seemed to love rushing into battles, the dashing hero doing his part to avenge fallen comrades and save Ruritania and the King from Black Michael. Unfortunately, all I could think was, “Why is he risking his life? And is the risk even worth it?”

Rudolph is not a Ruritanian. He had barely even met the King before he was suddenly enlisted to become the impostor King. I suppose I could see why he might have initially agreed. At first, all he was really agreeing to was being the King at the coronation – it was a short-term thing, and probably not too difficult. After the King was kidnapped, though, continuing to be the impostor King meant he was risking his life for a country that wasn't really his and for a man he hardly even knew. I'm guessing this was supposed to be admirable, dashing, and heroic. I just thought it was a bit stupid, in large part because I couldn't see why anyone, much less a near stranger, would want to risk their life for this particular king.

Wild Ones (manga, vol. 1) by Kiyo Fujiwara

Synopsis:

All her life, Sachie's mother told her that she didn't have any other family, so imagine her surprise when, soon after her mother's death, a man claiming to be her grandfather arrives and invites her to live with him. She suspects something's up when she notices that he's missing a pinkie, but even that doesn't prepare her for the reality: her grandfather is the head of a yakuza gang.

Sachie's grandfather assigns the princely-looking Rakuto, the member of the gang closest to her in age (he's 16, she's 15), to be her bodyguard. He's a huge flirt, and all the girls at school love him (they have no idea he's a yakuza member), but Sachie can't even begin to guess what he's thinking.

What she doesn't realize is that Rakuto has cared about her since they first met, when they were children. Unfortunately for Rakuto, Sachie is the boss's daughter. He doesn't want to overstep his bounds when Sachie's grandfather has done so much for him. Sachie is the beloved princess of everyone in the gang, not just Rakuto - he can't just monopolize her, and he knows it.

In this first volume, Sachie tries to adjust to her strange new life. She invites Rakuto to the movies, gets a bit jealous when Rakuto receives a New Year's card from a person he calls his "first love," and tries to deal with the whole gang when they overdo things a little trying to get her a gift for her birthday.

Review:

I enjoyed this first volume, but there are already signs that the series probably won't be able to sustain itself very well for the 10 volumes I think it lasts. If Sachie weren't so blind, and if Rakuto weren't so averse to speaking about his true feelings, this series could have easily ended in one or two volumes. From what I could tell, Sachie's grandfather probably wouldn't mind if Sachie and Rakuto started dating – in fact, my current theory is that Sachie's grandfather is hoping they'll start dating. The other yakuza members would throw a fit, but they'd eventually be okay with it, too, as long as Sachie made it clear that Rakuto made her happy. There doesn't seem to be any obstacles keeping Rakuto and Sachie apart that they don't create themselves.

Even so, I found this volume appealing. There's not much here that lovers of shoujo romance haven't seen a million times before, except possibly the yakuza stuff that acts as background for everything, but then again the “criminals with hearts of gold” thing has been done before, too. “More of the same” isn't necessarily a bad thing, as long as you enjoy it and don't expect too much. This first volume hit some of the same notes I tend to enjoy in a lot of other shoujo manga.

A Rose is a Rose (e-book) by Jet Mykles

As far as I can tell, this can only be purchased in e-book form.

Synopsis:

Carson is upset when Anthony, his boyfriend, breaks up with him just as he's considering suggesting that they move in together. All his adult life, Carson has been well taken care of by his boyfriends, and Anthony was no exception - during the six months they were together, Anthony helped Carson pay for his food, apartment, clothes, you name it. He also saw to it that Carson got a nice job as the "eye candy" at a burlesque show, even though Carson isn't much of a dancer or singer and doesn't have the ambition or willpower necessary to get better. Carson's primary talent is looking pretty - with the way he dresses and looks, it's not an uncommon occurrence for him to be mistaken for a woman.

Without Anthony, Carson's cushy life crumbles. He doesn't know if he can afford to pay for both his rent and food, and his job at the burlesque begins to go downhill. It would all be completely depressing if it weren't for Eddie, the superintendent of his apartment building. Eddie's a manly kind of guy: bearded, good with tools, likes sports. He's not the kind of man Carson usually goes for, and he's not rich enough to give Carson the kind of lifestyle he's used to, but...he's kind, quiet, and sweet. Even though Carson and Eddie are complete opposites, they make each other happy.

Carson's not sure what to do. He loves Eddie more than he has anyone else he's ever been with, but he also knows he needs to learn to stand on his own two feet. Plus, he feels that a great guy like Eddie could do a lot better than someone like him. When Anthony offers to take him back, will Carson succumb to the temptation to go back to the life he used to have, or will he take a risk and try to aim for something better?

Commentary:

The excerpt I read intrigued me, but as I started reading this book I wondered if I had made a mistake in choosing it. Carson seemed a bit like the male version of that perky blonde rich guys always seem to keep around like pets. I was a little surprised he actually had some idea of how to put together a budget and knew what all his bills were.

Amazingly, Carson turned out to be my favorite thing about this book. Instead of being annoyed that he let things get so bad by allowing himself to be completely taken care of by all his boyfriends, I found myself amazed that he actually recognized that this wasn't the best way for him to live. Nearly everyone in his life traded sex for money and pretty things and saw nothing wrong with doing so. In fact, Carson's mother encouraged him to find someone else who could give him the life he was accustomed to and, when Anthony returned and said he'd take Carson back, Carson's mother and one of his friends were thrilled and naturally assumed he'd go back to him. When Carson tried to talk about love with his mother, she dismissed it as foolish and unnecessary.

My impression of Carson was that he was basically a really nice, vibrant person who made a lot of mistakes and was easily blinded by pretty things. As bad as I felt for him, as his life quickly fell down around his ears, I think he needed for that to happen. Had Eddie been capable of giving him all the expensive gifts he was used to, Carson would probably have slipped into a happy, blind relationship with him, once again oblivious to how helpless he was without someone to take care of him. Since Eddie couldn't do that, since Carson liked being with him anyway, and since Carson's job was quickly becoming a source of unhappiness, Carson couldn't just continue to be blind to his own problems.