By Ryohgo Narita and Suzuhito Yasuda. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Stephen Paul.

Lately these days when I’m reading light novels I come at it from a different perspective than most North American readers, in that I really am reading it in this format first. I haven’t seen the anime for, say, The Irregular at Magic High School or Strike the Blood, so my opinions tend not to be swayed in advance beyond shamelessly spoiling myself on TV Tropes. But DRRR!! is different – I’ve seen the anime multiple times, and also read Yen’s manga (though the novels have finally passed the manga series timeline-wise), and therefore know where the books are going to go, even if I may be surprised by a narrative quirk or inner monologue. This also allows me to enthuse about characters I love finally showing up, even if it is somewhat baffling as to why I love them.

Case in point: Vorona, one of the two Russians who arrive in this book as professional goons-for-hire. I love Vorona. She’s in my top 5 favorite DRRR!! characters. That said, you’d be hard pressed to see why here, as she’s merely a quirky villain. She speaks in a clipped, soundbite way that not only works very well for a Russian who’s learned Japanese, but also contrasts with all the other Russians speaking Japanese around her, who speak it much more fluently. She’s a repository of useless information, which she doles out to her goofy and somewhat dim partner Slon – be it why cows eating grass makes them fat or why the number 13 is unlucky. And, like the rest of the cast in this series, she’s a little bit broken on the inside, finding her thrills in killing and finding progressively stronger people to fight against. She thinks she’s found someone interesting in this volume with Celty, who is seemingly easily killed only to show up later. Book 6 onward will show more of why I love her.

Knowing the anime can also be a drawback as well, of course. Mikado is written here to be a hopelessly naive dupe, in over his head and trusting Izaya of all people, even thinking to himself that he’s “really a nice guy”, which is so untrue you wonder how on earth Mikado can even survive day-to-day. But as the astute fan knows there’s far more going on in Mikado than just naivete. Aoba can sense it, I think – he sees Mikado grinning as he’s being blackmailed towards the end of the book – but he pretty much thinks he can use Mikado as the public face for his own machinations. This is definitely the first book in a two-book arc, and we’ll learn later on it’s not as simple as that.

As ever with a Narita volume, there’s too much going on here to talk about everything in a review. I didn’t mention Shizuo’s subplot, as Izaya seems determined to irritate him as much as possible, be it sending a young yakuza princess to kill him or framing him for murder. It’s a great plot, and gives us the best interstitial art of the entire series, as Shizuo tries to convince Akane he’s not a bad guy by winking and sticking his tongue out. And Anri’s involved as well, as she also falls under Vorona’s large category of ‘strong monsters that I can try to kill’. And there’s Chikage, the gang leader lothario who’s determined to destroy all the men in the Dollars gang – but don’t hurt the women or you’ll be in trouble. The big downside is, of course, this is all setup. It’s those early episodes of the season that no one liked as they were all preparation for a payoff. Stay tuned for the payoff in Vol. 6.

By Ryohgo Narita and Suzuhito Yasuda. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On.

Narita’s books, be it Baccano!, DRRR!!, or what have you, all enjoy being endlessly re-readable. Not only do you get the single-volume habit of various disparate and seemingly unconnected plots all crashing together at the end, which certainly happens here, but you also see this as part of a series whole, as he also teases out future major plot and characters that don’t pay off here but will several books down the line. I’ve called DRRR!! a nerd series, and it’s not just because Erika and Walker talk a lot about anime and manga types (their discussion of whether Celty is a tsundere or not is one of the highlights of the book). It’s because his series cry out for Tumblr analysis and bullet points explaining what’s going on and how it affects things down the road.

As an example, this volume is very good about taking the metatext and making it textual. In addition to the analysis of Celty’s character and how it applies to a seemingly ‘real life’ person, we meet Izaya’s twin younger sisters, Mairu and Kururi, who are not as loathsome as him but do seem to be just as difficult to stop. They’re polar opposite twins, as per the TV Tropes article, but Izaya helpfully tells us they deliberately engineer this in order to balance each other out, the better to be one person in two bodies (which is what they think they are). This isn’t the sort of exposition you expect to be casually laid out in the book itself. Things get even weirder when, at the end of the volume, Izaya has to meet with an even higher level of manipulator to find out about events he wasn’t around for (most of them, in fact). We don’t learn all that much about him, but what we do get seems to imply that Izaya is literally meeting the book’s omniscient narrator.

This is not to say the book does not function as a normal book as well. There’s a lot going on, as always, but if you pay enough attention it’s easy to follow and have fun (indeed, the narrative helpfully spells out the difficult bits, like the fact that all the money Celty lost ends up returning to her by the end of the volume). There’s car chases and fights, Shizuo throws people across the city and hits them so hard they need reconstructive surgery. We meet Aoba Kuronuma, who is a new high school student who is clearly there to manipulate Mikado for evil ends, but at the same time he himself is thrown off by the higher-levels weirdness of the Orihara Twins. (Speaking of the Twins, those who disliked Namie’s creepy incest subtext in previous books won’t be happy to see Mairu and Kururi making out here – again, they deliberately invoke tropes, even distasteful ones.) My favorite subplot was probably that of Shizuo’s brother, who runs into the cutest serial killer you’ll ever see, and helps her redefine what it means to be a monster.

Speaking of said killer, I mentioned how DRRR’s novels tie into each other and reward re-reading, and the same can be said for “The Naritaverse” as a whole. Nebula, the evil corporation we’ll see in Baccano!, is still the evil corporation 70 years later in DRRR!!. We hear about a couple of thieves who liked to dress in costumes, clearly Isaac and Miria. And while Ruri’s ‘monstrous’ nature is kept deliberately vague, anyone who reads Narita’s unlicensed series Vamp! will have figured it out already. DRRR!! is a nerd series that rewards overanalysis, and also a lot of fun and action packed. It ends with everyone in the cast having food with friends and loved ones, except Izaya, who is alone and unloved. Needless to say, this pisses him off and he will no doubt be far more active in future books. Can’t wait.

By Ryohgo Narita and Suzuhito Yasuda. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On.

Anyone who reads any of Narita’s two main series, Baccano! and Durarara!!, knows how much he likes his gangs and gangsters. Be it yakuza, mafia, camorra, or just kids wearing colors and yelling about territory, it’s a huge theme in his books. And with the teenage gangs he does a very good job showing off how much the desire for control and power is motivated by simple fear, and how easy it can be to let situations spiral out of control. We learned at the end of the last volume about who Masaomi Kida really is, but this third volume shows us that, of the three teens who have been our protagonists so far, he may be the weakest… which of course makes his comeback and true strength just that much more satisfying.

I think Narita’s habit of creating a bunch of divergent situations and then arranging them so that they all crash into each other at the end is something that might work better in a novel than in an anime – a lot of people have complained about the episodes of DRRR!! where nothing happens, but of course it’s all just required setup. the book doesn’t really have this problem, and so you enjoy seeing more and more information get revealed as time goes on. Both to the reader AND to the characters – the reader has been aware of the true identities of Mikado, Anri and Masaomi for some time, but it’s not till the climactic battle that each of them sees the truth.

We also meet Saki, Masaomi’s not-quite-girlfriend and the target of much hatred among the fan pairing community, mostly for existing. I like her, while acknowledging that we aren’t supposed to at first. She’s almost Izaya’s thrall, and as with everything Izaya touches, we’re automatically leery of her. Her constant smile is also not helping. It’s only towards the end of the book that we see the other side of her, the one that genuinely did fall in love with Masaomi, and see her crying and showing emotions. Honestly, it’s easier to blame Izaya here, who loves emotionally manipulating people just to see what happens and because it amuses him. He remains the most punchable person in the entire cast, and given this cast also has Namie, Seiji and Mika that’s saying something. Except wait, there’s someone more punchable.

Yes, this is the volume where we meet Shingen, Shinra’s even-more-eccentric-than-the-son father, who immediately establishes himself as an impulsive freak designed to give Celty migraines (except, of course, she does not have a head, but I suspect Shingen gives them to her anyway). As with Shinra, it’s never really clear when he’s decided to turn serious or not – or how much of his goofing was done to deliberately throw Celty off her game. In any case, a word to the wise, he can be teeth-grindingly annoying, and I know a few people who skip past him in the anime.

This is the longest book in the series to date, and the extra words work well. We get someone of the other minor characters fleshed out a bit, such as Kadota, Erika and Walker. The translation is smooth, only faltering a bit when it has to deal with the Japanese prose habit of never identifying who is speaking, so you have to make more contextual judgments than is strictly necessary. And the art is finally starting to mature a bit and be less flat-faced, with a bold, striking cover. If you enjoy DRRR!!, and can put up with Shingen, then this is definitely an excellent purchase.