Shinrei Tantei Yakumo

Ongoing Manga

Brief Summary: A girl comes to look for the help of a detective when her friend falls into a coma after a "test of courage" in which she meets a ghost.

He actually looks a bit girly in this cover, no? ;p But somehow I liked it quite a lot for a while, plus the story is all right. The drawing is nice and pretty and the two protags have a lot of chemistry though they are not romantically involved as yet in the first volume.

The guy takes the lead in the mystery solving but the girl is sharp and an able side kick (most of the time). At first, the girl is skeptical but later realises that the guy knows more than meets the eye as he is able to preceive and communicate with spirits/ghosts, including the female protag's dead twin sister.

My Rating:
Art: B
Story: B
Recommended? The storyline is quite engaging so far although it isn't really exceptional.

King of the Lamp, Tenshi Ja Nai and Ultimate Venus

King of the Lamp

Manga: Complete at one volume

Brief Summary: Five oneshots in one volume, with three on the same premise of a genie helping girls find love. The fourth and fifth ones have light supernatural themes building up to a romance.

Got this as I liked Ultimate Venus and I like the mangaka's drawings overall, for its clean and neat appeal. However, as mentioned below, once again the characters look exactly like her previous ones. For one of the stories, you would not be wrong to think the female protag was the one in Ultimate Venus and wonder if it was an extra/side story of sorts to that.

The first three are rather typical boy meets girl or vice versa and girl falls for him, tries to get his attention/affection. So fortunate there is a genie around the corner that is actually a womanising king that has been given the punishment of helping at least 1000 girls fulfil their love requests. Rather simple stories.

The fourth one seemed a bit different from any that I've read from her so far and it was the most interesting to me, although the ending was again predictable and came a bit too abruptly (mainly cos it's a oneshot I suppose so it couldn't be helped).

The fifth one, as I've also read on ANN, wasn't that good. I agree. It seemed a bit strange and fluffy. It was one of her earlier works.

This volume is a bit more "racy" (is that the word?) than the other series she's done (although nothing explicit). Think she was targetting a bit older readers (teens as opposed to tweens , although in this day and age...). I think I must add that a friend of mine who read this was a bit taken aback by it despite reading (and liking) Ultimate Venus. I would say it's not near smut but as mentioned, there are some intimate scenes. I must say that I wouldn't argue with my friend that we both hope it doesn't teach teenagers that it's a shame not to lose "it" and that sex equates to love, or that one needs to use sex to gain love from the man. Unfortunately, it might. And that's the worry.

My Rating:
Story: C
Art: B-

Recommended? An ok read, but nothing really out of the ordinary and each story is rather too short. A stronger linking background story (the part about the genie) would be have good for the first three stories. As it is the first three are rather disjointed and can be read in any order.

Tenshi Ja Nai

Manga: Completed at 8 Volumes.

Brief Summary: A guy pretends to be a girl and attends an all girl's school because he is in showbiz as a girl. A new student discovers his secret and...(you know where this is going)

This one is a break in the usual routine, being the opposite of the usual girl disguises as guy and gets into an all boys’ school (think Hana Kimi, Ouran High School Host Club and Girl Got Game). Instead, very strangely, it’s a boy that dresses and acts like a girl. Of course that provides the comedy and of course someone finds out early on. The whole premise thereafter becomes rather clichéd again but there are a few original twists and turns.

For one thing, I do appreciate that the girl is not so dotty, immature and ditzy as some others (really tired of the girl struggling with making chocolate for the boy – enough already, thankfully no such thing in this one). She usually has her head screwed on tight and doesn’t loose it to “love”. However, do feel she’s more like the guy in this series sometimes, as the guy is now a “girl”.

There is a bit of reverse harem as well, with at least three guys falling for the girl. There’s even a teacher-student element thrown in, together with blackmail and other side themes. There’s also a serious love rival with no big faults but I shall not give that away.

And then you must have the fangirls (I really wonder after reading all these whether Jap girls are really in any way like this - it’s really too exaggerated!). The guy, as a girl, also has a whole host of them. And fanboys too, obviously. So these cause the girl protagonist grief.

My Rating:
Story: B
Art: B-

Recommended? Interesting for the twist in concept, with many different other side stories thrown in. Not particularly wow, but readable.

Similar: All those others I mentioned above regarding the girl-boy disguises. Actually, it also reminds me of her new work, Ultimate Venus. The characters have you going deja vu!

Also someone mentioned Maria Holic was similar but there are more shojo ai overtones in that one (am not quite sure it is going to be "romance" boy girl style)

Ultimate Venus

Brief Summary: Orphaned girl gets adopted by super rich grandma.

The storyline is quite interesting, but still it is pretty much a Cinderella story where the poor girl realises she is actually a "princess" (I mean in the sense she is now super rich). There is some mystery behind the relationship between her mother and the grandmother that is still waiting to be hatched. There is also some ominous happenings when she's at school that is linked to her being the candidate to inheriting her grandma's companies (and thus wealth).

And then there are the bishi boys/men. There are two main contenders - the guy who is assigned to look after her bodyguard style and a classmate. Later there is another one but I won't give his role away. Their motivations are made a bit more clear in volumes 2 and 3, but the story is still quite slow going. Now after reading volume three, it's starting to develop into a reverse harem. :)

The girl follows the usual shojo school girl character somewhat - rather naive and ditzy, getting easily agitated. On the other hand, at least she's not too clumsy or stupid.

I must say that the characters look too similar to Tenshi Ja Nai, which was written by the same mangaka. Actually, in her extra story in vol 3, the characters look the same as the ones in the main story itself.

All in all, it sounds promising and hope the development gets better and not head down the hill of a routine shojo plot....even husband read it! ;p heeheh

My Rating:
Story: B
Art: B, the characters look alike mostly, and the drawing is clean but the scenes and characters are not very elaborately drawn or detailed. There is just enough to make the panes look pretty mostly.
Recommended? Sounds interesting so far.

More info:
Bakaupdates

Coelacanth

Ongoing Manga

Brief Summary: A girl on her way home is saved from being caught in an explosion at her apartment complex when she is knocked down and injured by a boy in blood covered clothes riding a bike. This boy drops what looks like a toy fish scale, which the girl picks up and keeps. Ten years later, she meets a man who happens to have the toy fish, in which the scale fits perfectly. She is attracted to him but as he may have an association with the explosion that happened ten years ago, it may be a dangerous liaison as his intentions could be sinister...

The title of this series attracted me. Wouldn't you agree that it's not every day you get one named after a "living fossil" of sorts (very interesting deep sea fish)? :) Intrigued before starting the first page, but the mystery and ambiguous summary actually attracted me as well.

As with the mangaka's other stories, the emphasis is on the mystery (or rather mysteries as there is more than one happening at the same time), which makes it intriguing because it is not a typical shojo love-romance story (but neither is it an action packed dectective thriller). In the story, the girl is not particularly interested in acting as a P.I./detective but she wants to find out more about the boy who "saved" her in the past. So yeah, in a way, it veers towards romance, but there is a darker element as there is uncertainty about the boy's motives.

There are quite a few elements that one glued to the story, wanting to find out the whys that it poses, including why the girl seems to have some strange delusions. Characterisation is not that strong, but the girl seems independent and clear headed enough.

My Rating
Story: B
Art: B
Recommended? Interesting and unique so far.

Fantastic Detective Labyrinth

Ongoing anime and manga

Brief Summary: At the start of the story, 30 years have passed since a huge earthquake destroyed Tokyo. Only a few people remain in the old city and crime is rampant, some of which are unsolvable by the police and are termed phantom cases. Enter the young detective, seemingly rich cute and innocent little Mayuki, who manages to solve the crimes the police cannot.

I do seem to have a soft spot for detective/crime/mystery type stories, although for episodic ones like this I really focus on the background linking storyline as well. This one is pretty interesting and I tried to check out the full story on it on wiki but there just wasn't much. Surprised that even the episode guides haven't been filled out. Usually fans are more diligent! :) Or, maybe there just aren't that many fans of this?

The characters are cute and well, they are school kids so I guess characterization doesn't get too complicated; however, it's the same thing for the adults as well - there isn't much background on their motivations or personalities. Maybe we'll get to that later. For the children, the twin brothers are very easy to tell apart, something I realised from the beginning as they are quite different. Perhaps that was intentional or else we'd be lost half the time. The main character is cute (shotacon?) and the center of many females' affections. There seems to be a bit of fanservice going on here, with at least two of the women's breasts bigger than reasonable. None of the characters are particularly irritating, which is good. :) The main character is really overly saccharine sometimes until one feels it's unbelieveable and unrealistic. Very girly too for a boy, and I've read some commenters say the voice talent was so obviously a lady.

The one thing that kept cropping up in my mind is that it had some pretty similar elements to Kuroshitsuji - there is the young boy (with blue eyes no less), the cool looking able butler, and the "bumbling" maid, etc. But of course, that one is a darker and I would say the boy there is a lot more cool.

My Rating:
Story: B
Art: B
Recommended? Interesting so far and rather well done.

Similar to:
Has been compared to Matantei Loki Ragnarok, as there is also a young boy who is the detective.

I also see similarities between this and Kuroshitsuji.

Full House Kiss

Ongoing Manga
Author: Yuwa Shiori

This is the somewhat common formula of having the girl become an orphan and coming to stay with some handsome guy (or guys in this case) due to some dire consequences (I think we've read one or two like this?). The only thing that stands out is that there is some underlying mystery concerning the deaths of her parents and the disappearance of her sister.

The guys are all different and the girl is so far not that silly but she is not that smart either.

Strangely this is based on/related to ? some game which I've never seen before but the description I read on wiki was quite funny and strange (and a bit ambiguous).

My Rating:
Story: B-
Art: B-
Recommended: Interesting, but besides the mystery it's also quite typical.
Similar to: I saw quite a few comments that this is very similar to Fruits Basket, but I've not read that so I can't say. I haven't really gone through Wallflower but in essence there is a similarity, though I would say the emphasis for that one is really quite different.

More info:
Bakaupdates

Dazzle

Manga ongoing.
Anime 10 episodes complete.

I started watching this one after someone mentioned the clothes or them looking good I think it was. The anime is actually somewhat confusing and distorted so it may not be good to be too interested in the details, cos everything is rather abrupt. I kept thinking I had missed an epi when one guy suddenly joins the group (I’m still wondering if I did…).

I think the girl is drawn very pretty in the anime but lacks oomph in the manga. Maybe it’s cos her startling blue eyes aren’t portrayed in manga. The guy looks younger and better in the manga though. The manga is more comprehensive and easier to understand and the story sequence is rather different from the anime, which I read someone opinioning as very messy and mixed up (and I thought I was the only one). Someone also said the effects and execution weren’t good but to me it was ok.

This doesn’t seem to be a very popular manga and I’m not sure why. Perhaps the stories are disjointed (but then so are many others) and the motivations of the characters aren’t quite apparent. The storyline does get a whole lot complicated, with cloning, possible murder, etc. etc. It's like a murder/thriller/sci-fi/goth/angst all mixed up in one ball. Just wondering where all this is going when I read in vol 9 (I think it was) that the mangaka said this would be around for a long long time....oh dear, I don't think I've the patience for it already!!

My Rating:
Story: C - strange, convoluted, difficult dialogue, boring bits
Art: C+
Recommended? Not too sure. It's not really that interesting at some parts. Very oddly put together.

Descendents of Darkness

Manga:
Anime: Finished

Well, it's not all shoujo and hearts and flowers. :) This one sure isn't at least. Preoccupation with death and the afterlife is more like it, added to a cops and robbers and detective series kind of feel.

Apparently, as a friend says, this series is very popular amongst women. :)