Natsume’s Book of Friends 8

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By Yuki Midorikawa. Released in Japan as “Natsume Yuujinchou” by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine LaLa. Released in North America by Viz.

This is one of those shoujo manga that keeps getting better as it goes along. Midorikawa is finding what her strengths and weaknesses are, and thus as Natsume grows so does the series. I’ve gotten to the point where I can’t wait for each new release.

The early volumes had Natsume almost entirely interacting with yokai and those humans who interact with yokai every day. Which is nice and all, but he is still trying to be a normal kid as well. That’s why I was pleased to see this volume focused so much on his relationships with both his classmates and his adapted family. Tanuma and Taki do interact with yokai, but at a level far lower than that of Natsume. As a result, their worry for him is far more oriented in the human world. Natsume’s this awkward teen who tries to take on too much, and they aren’t sure that he’d let them know if something was too difficult a burden.

The culture festival was excellent, and shows that Natsume can also open up to classmates who have no supernatural powers whatsoever. It’s also a good example of what I was just talking about, which is Natsume having to realize that he can’t do everything all by himself, and that it’s OK to rely on others sometimes. “Life is full of new challenges,” he notes at the end of the chapter. Indeed, the next two chapters seem to follow on directly from this, as he tries to deepen his friendship with Tanuma while attempting to deal with a broken Yokai mirror. There’s no explicit BL in this series, but those who like to be fans of it will find plenty of evidence in this volume for the two of them having unresolved sexual tension.

(On a related note, Taki looks totally hot cross-dressing as a guy, and I fully support an OT3 between the three of them.)

The last main chapter of the book talks about Natsume’s relationship with his adopted parents, and we see flashbacks to where they met. Given that Natsume is so desperate to keep his yokai powers hidden from them in order to avoid having them worry (or, it’s unstated, to avoid creeping them out), this is another welcome look into Natsume’s life. Seeing the younger boy that he was, we realize how far he’s come in just a few short volumes. And a lot of it seems to be due to the love he gets from the Fujiwaras, who really do care about him as they would their own child. Seeing Natsume break down at the end was quite touching.

As you would expect from a volume dealing Natsume’s relationships with his friends and family, the yokai content is not as high as prior volumes. Though the yokai in the chapters with the Fujiwaras makes up for this by being extra creepy with a side of horrific. You’re quite pleased when Nyanko-sensei “deals” with it (and it’s always nice to see Nyanko-sensei in full-blown huge mode). There’s also a cute mini-story featuring Chobi, the odd moustachioed yokai we’ve seen as comic relief in a few volumes. It’s cute to see, and also serves to show how much the yokai are learning from Matsume.

Between this and Nura, Viz has sort of been on a yokai kick lately. (Any hopes for Gegege no Kitaro?) But the joy of reading this title is not for the yokai, though they’re very well done as well. It’s seeing an awkward, reclusive young boy come out of his shell and begin to show the love and affection to his friends and family that he hasn’t been able to do before. It’s a terrific series.

K-On! Volume 3

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By Kakifly. Released in Japan by Houbunsha, serialized in the magazine Manga Time Kirara. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Time, believe it or not, keeps marching on for our girls, as they enter their senior year in this volume. Of course, trying to think about their future plans is just a little bit too hard right now, so they continue to do what they do best – drink tea, glomp each other, do boke/tsukkomi routines, and occasionally play music.

By now Azusa is fully absorbed into the cast mix, and there’s no new people introduced here. The amusement comes from watching the girls behave the way we want them to, and occasionally subvert our expectations. (In fact, I noticed that’s how Ritsu tends to work a lot of the time – she’s crafty enough to know how folks will react to her doing something, and takes advantage of it. Thus when it doesn’t go the way she planned, she’s more upset than usual.) This is typified by one of the earlier stories, where the cast decide to try to help Mio get over her stage fright by working at a maid cafe so she can open up more. Naturally, though, being terrified of performing is one of Mio’s ‘cute’ points, so it’s doomed to failure.

I also really enjoyed the chapter devoted to Mugi and Ritsu. Mugi usually gets the short end of the stick when it comes to developed appearances – in fact, the moment Azusa arrived, she started to do more and be seen more than our yuri-loving keyboaardist. So seeing her go around town with Ritsu was nice, and shows us a more serious side. Even if it’s played for laughs, it’s quite clear that Mugi is desperate for interaction with other girls her own age, and that much of her own obsession with the girls hugging and occasional yuri fantasies are due more to her completely sheltered upbringing. To Mugi, Mio hitting Ritsu all the time is a sign that they’re the closest of friends. To Ritsu, it just hurts. And Mugi gets the perfect capper here as well, saying something so oblivious that it actually provokes the aforementioned ‘friendship hit’. This was probably my favorite part of the book.

Although the final story comes close, where we see how Mio and Ritsu met, and the story of their unlikely friendship. This was a special chapter, so manages to break out of the 4-koma format, and it’s better for it, feeling a lot more relaxed and nostalgic. Mio and Ritsu as children are much the same as they are now, but we start to see how Ritsu can get Mio out of her shell, and how Mio is a better person for it. Though Mio may not see it that way…

Again, Yen’s translation is mostly excellent. Azu-meow continues to niggle at me. There’s also a class trip to Kyoto, which brings us to the dreaded Kyoto dialect translation. This is next to impossible to convey without jarring somewhat, especially if the gag is to show it being said by someone that would not normally use such a dialect, such as Mugi. That said, the choice of ‘urban New York’ and seeing Yui and Mugi swearing… feels really off to me. I think I’d have preferred the usual southern drawl instead.

Some noise was made in this volume about thinking about the future, and we see Yui struggling with a future career. But that’s all for Volume 4. For now, there’s tea and cakes, and sometimes music. And there’s cute 4-koma silliness. K-on! is not winning any awards, but it remains a light, fun, breezy read, and has some loveable cast members.