Library Love, Part 4

Support manga, support your library!

Here’s what I’ve been reading:

Eden: It’s an Endless World, Volumes 6-8 by Hiroki Endo. This seems to have become a completely different story from where the series began. It is still interesting, with great writing, but I do find I miss the heavier and more integral science fiction and post-apocalyptic elements. I also hope some of the earlier characters, like Kenji, make a reappearance. Elijah is becoming a very complex character—he makes mistakes and pays for them; Endo does not take it easy on his characters. The art is still great, especially in action sequences, although the body proportions seem a bit off on occasion.

Godchild, Volumes 3-5 by Kaori Yuki. I’m starting to like Cain much better than I did previously, but he can still be a whiny brat at times. The story is getting kinda dark and heavy and is much less episodic than when the series first began. I still don’t understand Cain’s father’s motivations or the purpose of his secret organization Delilah—maybe because I didn’t read the previous series. Despite this, the plot is starting to be more coherent. I’m particularly interested in learning more about Cain’s brother Jizabel who gets center stage for a bit in these volumes. Yuki’s artwork is rather gothic and her costume designs in particular are great.

Hana-Kimi: For You in Full Blossom, Volumes 18-19 by Hisaya Nakajo. The Sano family drama has been mostly resolved and the networking track meet has finished up. We get some more dorm vs. dorm craziness (I love when RAs get mad at each other and drag the rest of the school into it), and Nakajo seems to have remembered there’s supposed to be some romantic comedy going on, too. Dr. Umeda makes a couple of appearances which makes me happy since he’s my favorite character and hasn’t been seen much lately. There aren’t many more volumes left in the series, but it doesn’t seem to be heading anywhere in particular anymore.

Kitchen Princess, Volumes 8-10 written by Miyuki Kobayashi and illustrated by Natsumi Ando. Mizuno turned out to be a much better character than I expected and I’m glad. There is a lot of over-the-top melodrama going on in Kitchen Princess, but I enjoyed the series anyway, especially the delicious, delicious food. It’s a cute series, and I’m happy with how things turned out. I particularly liked the ending side-story/epilogue between Mizuno and Akane. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of Fujita’s story, who I adored, but oh well. Apparently Kitchen Princess won the Kodansha Manga Award for a children’s series in 2006, which I wasn’t aware of while I was reading it but I think the series deserves it.