In a review of Spy Classroom: A Glint In Monika’s Eye, Sean Gaffney said, “Generally speaking a large chunk of fiction, especially fiction written for drama and starring teenagers, revolves around one major problem: the entire plot would not happen if only the characters would communicate with each other.”

To which I replied to the universe at large as I began reading Cheerful Amnesia, Volume 2, “Not just teenagers.”

In Volume 1, we met Arisa, a woman newly aware after amnesia and her long-time love Mari, who is struggling with this new, oddly clueless girlfriend. In Volume 2 of Cheerful Amnesia, by Tamamushi Oku (also creator of I Don’t Know Which Is Love), the struggle continues, getting ever stupider and needing more and more imagining ridiculous complications by all parties to make it make any sense.

Dear readers, it never makes any sense.

It’s so senseless in fact that I considered just stopping midway this volume, as two adult women who share a home and a bed and mealtimes and all non-working hours of the day who just *cannot* find time to discuss their relationship after one of them had amnesia, was impossible to accept. It did prompt me to promise my wife of 41 years that if ever either of us had amnesia to just start from the beginning and not be like Mari.

Arisa I can kind of, almost forgive. In some ways she is a child again, relearning some things about life. There is no excuse for Mari, though. Imagining insane complicated nonsense instead of just asking “what are you doing?” is not funny. It’s deranged.

What is meant to be comedic but I found intolerable, was that they both want each other. They already live together and are lovers. There was literally nothing standing in their way, except a tortured plot device that screamed for help from every panel.

Thankfully, before this volume ended they have a fucking conversation. But they still don’t have sex. How hilarious. Will a conversation be enough to save the story? I guess we’ll find out as a copy of Volume 3 has landed on my doorstep and awaits reading. ^_^;

Ratings:

Art – 7 Noticably better than the first volume
Story – Maybe it will be better next volume
Characters – They are adults who need to grow up already
Service – Nudity should not be gasp-making, but amnesia, so it is
Yuri – 9

Overall – 7

If pointlessly unresolved sexual tension as comedy is your thing, then this series ought to tickle you pink. Jen McKeon’s translation does good work with Arisa’s endless cheerful cluelessness and Mari’s unshakable ability to guess wrong about mostly everything. Chiho Christie’s letter manages to retouch as often as possible, and uses a lot of bold, as Arisa….heavy sigh…shouts…almost every other page.

Fingers crossed that next volume moves forward a bit.

This Monster Wants To Eat Me, Volume 1 is a tale that is creepy and dark and yet somehow full of kindness, set in a seaside town on Seto Inland Sea in Japan.

It is one of the best manga series I am currently reading.

Hinako has some event in her past that has kept her from participating fully in life. Her best friend Miko is relentlessly cheerful and kind, but when Hinako encounters a girl who is decidedly not human, her quiet, featureless life begins to change.

Shiori is not, as she notes, a human, but as a human she is bewitchingly beautiful. She is also quite deadly, when she protects Hinako from threats around her. Most notably, Shiori is interested in eating Hinako…just not yet. What Shiori does not realize is that Hinako would welcome death as a respite from a life burdened with extraordinary loss.

The tone here is the kind of crawling psychological horror I quite like. There is violence here and we are meant to be frightened by it, and I’ll CW this series for suicidal ideation, but both are presented more as a overwhelming sense, than as an action. This book offers chills up the spine, rather than jump scares and gross violence. With it’s seaside setting it’s almost Lovecraftian in tone, without, y’know, the racism and xenophobia.

Caleb Cook offers up an amazing bit of translation work here, he second this week after yesterday’s rave review. You can almost hear the the soft sigh of the ocean in Shiori’s voice and the yap of Miko’s effervescent jollity. Bianca Pistillo’s lettering is in Yen house style – so, subtitling the sound effects rather than retouching – but there are places where her touch is quite subtle, such as the moment when the word “uncomfortable” is lettered in a way that feels off-balance and, yes, uncomfortable.

I reviewed this volume in Japanese in 2021 – every volume since has been amazing. I’m completely hooked. I have been begging Yen to license this series, so you can imagine how happy I am that they have and that you can read it, as well!

Ratings:

Art – 8 Intriguing and dark
Story – 8 Intriguing and dark in different ways
Characters – 7  There are depths we have yet to see (didn’t want to say “intriguing and dark” again, but…)
Service – Blood. Violence. Monsters From the Deep. Secrets.
Yuri – Miko is possessive, Shiori is infuriating, Hinako is infatuated

Overall – 8

This Monster Wants to Eat Me is a creepy-shivers up your spine story about a girl who didn’t die and all the supernatural creatures who either want her dead…or want her alive. This book is hitting shelves in June, so grab it now for a perfect beach read – presuming you like your beaches populated with deadly threats and supernatural creatures.