Adachi and Shimamura, Vol. 99.9

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By Hitoma Iruma and raemz. Released in Japan by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Molly Lee. Adapted by Emlyn Dornemann.

So, the rumor is that the author of this series started panicking and worrying that they would die before it was finished, and so they came up with several volumes that would feel like a final volume. That said, there is not a more final final volume than this one. and yes, I know that we still have Volume 12 and a second Short Story collection to go, but thematically, this ties absolutely everything into a nice neat bow. Unlike the SS volume, which featured 3-4 page microstories as well as one long one, this has 4 longer stories and a wraparound plot which were written for the Blu-Ray release of the anime. Generally speaking, Blu-Ray ‘extras’ tend to be a bit more involved than your typical throwaway bookstore giveaways, and it shows. This not only manages to have a lot of typical Adachi and Shimamura style shenanigans, it gets quite sad and tear-jerking at times. Be prepared to be with Adachi and Shimamura to the very end of their lives.

A brief content warning: this volume contains more Yashiro than any other volume to date, and with good reason. The wraparound story has A young woman in the very far future, on an post-apocalyptic world, being slowly led by Yashiro to her destined soulmate. Along with that, we see 1) Shimamura visiting Hino at her mansion; 2) Adachi inviting Shimamura to a hot spring, supposedly so they can finally have their first time together; 3) A Shimamura in her late eighties, with all of her family, all her friends, and her lover now dead, finding solace in playing an RPG her sister once played with, you guessed it, Yashiro; 4) The resolution of the future world, with Yashiro, her mission now done, heading out to find other Adachis and Shimamuras and reunite them; and 5) Shimamura dying, and going where she knows she needs to go.

As you may have gathered, this volume gets a lot darker than I was really guessing. The far future story is more heartwarming than anything else, and the Hino story was fairly pointless except for us to see her as an adult (sorry Nagafuji fans, she’s not in it). The hot spring story, and this is hardly a spoiler, does not end with sex. But it’s the story of Shimamura in her dotage that hit the hardest. The chapter with her looking back on everyone who left her behind is quite touching, especially as she’s haunted by her lover, who shows up to be a Greek chorus. Then there’s the last chapter, which is both a tearjerker and also a bit eerie, as Yashiro shows up to lead Shimamura to the afterlife… which has her grandparents, and her beloved dog, but that’s not where she needs to be. You know where she needs to be? Remember Adachi’s idea of heaven from the previous SS book? Yup. Shimamura is now in Adachi’s heaven, with no one else but them. Never let it be said this series is not defined by the lovable headcases that are its leads.

Possibly this worked well for me because I am overly sentimental, but I found it one of the best in this series. I’m not sure I want the 12th volume, but we’ll see if it can be more than “slice of life”, which this volume was.

Dinners with My Darling: How the Former Monster King Ate Her Way to Happiness, Vol. 2

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By Mugi Mameta and Nagisa Hanazome. Released in Japan as “Aisanai to Iwaremashite mo – Moto Maou no Hakushaku Reijou wa Kimajime Gunjin ni Ezuke wo Sarete Shiawase ni naru” by M Novels f. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by JC.

There are times throughout this second book (and indeed the first one as well) when you can kind of feel everything about to go off the rails. Abigail is a lot, and not only does the cast have trouble trying to control her, so does the author. Perhaps we did not need quite so many scenes of her yelling ‘coitus’, especially as the writing has not quite mastered the difference between “Abigail sounds like someone who has grown up isolated and also is more monster than human a lot of the time’ and ‘Abigail sounds and acts like a 6-year-old”. Where the book does succeed, though, is the divide between genres. The rest of the cast are in a tense political thriller, and also investigating a corrupt domain that abused our main character horribly. Oh, and killer monsters are everywhere. Abigail, however, is in a cooking manga.

The first half of this book is all smiles, as Gerald and Abigail travel to the sea for fish and souvenirs, try to decide if a whole sheep or a whole cow is a better gift for someone, and finally have their first time, which is offscreen but which Abigail seems to like a whole lot, given how much she uses it as a go-to “calm my husband down” thing later. In the second half, though, they’re both forced to go visit the royal family, and deal with the fourth prince, who is in charge of the old lands that Abigail grew up in. Unfortunately, the officials sent there to take care of things have all disappeared/been murdered, so he really needs Abigail (and Gerald) to head over there to help him figure out why. What they find there is that Abigail’s blase description of her abusive life proves to be more horrifying than what they thought.

As with so many other series that are basically “everything was terrible till the start of the first book, everything is wonderful from that point on”, the best parts tend to be the jagged edges that stick out on occasion. Everyone seems to be trying to kill Abigail, be it hired bandits (who she spots running alongside their carriage) or the citizens of her former land (who try to poison her), and things get to the point where an angry dragon decides to kill every human in the area because they’re just that terrible. The best part of the book, as it’s the most horrifying, is when Abigail decides the solution is to let the dragon kill her and be reborn as a human again and get married 15 years down the road. It has to be explained to her why everyone hates this. Then again, Gerald is no better, as he doesn’t seem to understand why Abigail is upset he ran off to fight and left her behind, to the point where she had to climb to the op of a high tree to fix everything.

This is not in the top tier of Cinderella style genre books, but it’s solid. I’ll read another.

The Invisible Wallflower Marries an Upstart Aristocrat After Getting Dumped for Her Sister!, Vol. 3

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By Makino Maebaru and Murasaki Shido. Released in Japan as “Kon’yaku Haki Sareta “Kūki” na Watashi, Nariagari no Dan’na-sama ni Totsugimashita” by Mag Garden Novels. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by piyo.

The first two volumes of this series were pretty rough, and while I knew this third one would be the finale, I also wondered if we’d have to get through a lot of pain and drama to get to the inevitable wedding photo cover art. As it turns out, not only did the book start with the wedding, but this came a lot closer to the “victory lap” I’ve talked about before than I was expecting. Oh, sure, there’s a murder attempt, a blackmail attempt, and a relatively serious resolution to the matter of Lucas’ parentage. That said, the fact that the parentage was resolved in any way other than “dead deadbeat dad” surprised me. What this mostly was was Lucas and Iris in love, and having to prove over and over they’re in love because everyone is trying to get them to back out of their relationship. Fortunately, they’ve already consummated… oh, right, they’re both innocent virginal dorks. Well, heck.

Lucas and Iris have moved up their wedding, mostly as the third prince has been sending potential fiancee towards Lucas,. trying to get him to call things off. Lucas, of course, refuses. Meanwhile, he and Iris are busy searching for his father, and decide to start by going back to the convent where his mother gave birth to him. This reveals a secret that is not exactly a shock to Lucas, Iris, or the reader – his mother was a noble, and was cast out of her family for being in love with a commoner. What’s more, this is also known to the noble family itself – who are down on their luck right now, and could really use a fresh new pawn to blackmail into doing whatever they say. As for Iris, well, that’s what murder is for. OK, it’s not ENTIRELY a victory lap here.

The outcome of the dangerous evil nobles is not exactly a surprise – in fact, it’s so little of a surprise that we never actually find out how Iris manages to get out of being murdered, she just shows up to rescue Lucas and save the day. That said, as I noted above, I was surprised that we actually had some resolution with Lucas’ long-lost father, who turns out to be hard done by but who also married too young, and the way that Lucas reacts to all of this information coming at once feels very true to life. I will note that this book definitively ends with the third volume, but it may have been a last minute decision – Things are set up so there could be more,. but then we get a quick epilogue explaining they had many children and lived happily ever after. It does have a really killer ending sentence, though, which ties up the theme of Iris’ character nicely.

These two have spent three books trying to stay married, let’s leave them to it. A fun read.