At last I read the last Harta of 2024!
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Too many times I lost my notes halfway through writing so I now also switched to putting my stuff into notion (thanks for the idea, rodan!) until I have a better idea on how I can paste my notes in here after I finished writing them. 
I haven’t put down as many notes this time because I was busy traveling, so I just noted down a few things.
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My notes on Harta 121 from February!
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I just kinda kept reading, and I especially liked this one - Harta 122
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Issue #89
My first proper update in ages!! (Like, almost a year. 
)
Now in chronological order!
新連載 FOOLPROOF by 久方 標
You had me at “every once in a while a goldfish comes out of the tap”. I love the little storybook inserts, and the whole concept is exactly weird, dark and whimsical enough to be just right for me. Sometimes the drawings are a little hard to “read”, but the giant kirin more than makes up for it, for me. Looking forward to reading more.
I am shocked, SHOCKED, that I didn’t take any screenshots of this one.
And next up is Youkouso Ningen! Yay!
ようこそにんげん
Short, but sweet. The humor in this series is so wacky, and to me pretty hilarious. The only part I didn’t really get was when Mimizu-san said maybe the back of his head melted off? And Negishi was eating something in the corner of the panel? Not sure what that’s about.
読切 記憶の窓辺 作者 後藤ユナリ
Interesting. Sweet. This take on memory removal seems actually a little more “realistic” than some I have seen. The fact that it takes a while to be effective, and can be undone if one is reminded strongly enough just seems more like the way it would actually work to me. I like how it explored grief. Writing it out makes it feel a little trite, and I dunno maybe it was, but I appreciated it anyway.
猫のまにまに by 宇島 葉
Hehehe. Love the cat drawings in this series. And I like that they pulled off the switcheroo.
Also shocked that I didn’t screenshot anything in this one. How can that possibly be true? …
Just vibing my way through here … Thinking the time to go back and reread/catch up on 真柴姉弟は顔が固い may be nigh … But not today.
Ooh, クプルムの花嫁! This is one I bought physicals of for comfier nighttime reading, because it’s reliably pretty relaxing and felt like I would appreciate it more on paper. Issue 88 marked the beginning of volume three, but volume 88 was a pretty tumultuous era for me, and I never got volume 3 down off the shelf. (Did I read that chapter on the computer? Truly no idea.) So anyway, I get to enjoy a brand new volume three now, and it is very pretty. But also, I will probably save this for nighttime reading, so … skip!
Ooh, Nacchan! I forgot that Nacchan the series had already started and is on the third chapter. Okay, this will be my next on-the-computer read.
ナッちゃんはテンションで水深が変わる 中原 ふみ
The illustration style is not my favorite, but the characters and the various sea-creature shenanigans are just so cute.
★ 読切 桃と道行き 田沼 朝 ★
Loved it. I like how things weren’t spelled out, and I was surprised and delighted by this: (BEWARE SPOILER!)
Also love how the older brother says guddobai when he leaves 
And ani and other guy’s yaritori is cute and funny 
あかねさす柘榴の都 by 福浪 優子 (ふくなみ ゆこ)
Had to stop so many times to take screenshots! Just a short chapter, but sweet, and Natsuki was cooking a very interesting dish! (fried eggplant drizzled with molasses, but honey also works)
あいつの螺子は緩んでいる ２
Ooh, pretty sure I recognize this art style. I’m excited.
Wahhh, cute. I want to look into this mangaka more.
FUNFUNCUT
So cute! I started reading this mainly because I thought it was going to be only ten pages (cause they said “short” on the title page, but I think that’s referring to the length of serialization, unlike the shortshorts, which are really short.) I was not feeling in the mood for anything, but I ended up getting sucked in and read the whole thing in one go, doing an extra … 30 minutes maybe? of stationary cycling in order to do so. (I really needed a good long workout today and really wasn’t in the mood for one, so thank you Harta!)
I will go back and take screenshots and maybe have more thoughts later.
(Woops. I did neither of those things. But maybe someone reading behind me will comment, and I’ll be inspired to reread it when that happens!)
シャッター街のさくら姫 by 宮本 怜美 (みやもと れいみ)
This manga raises questions about capitalism for me. Like, even if their livelihoods didn’t depend on it, wouldn’t Sakurada want all those people to come to their afternoon cafe event? How would this scenario be different if money wasn’t involved? I wonder about this because capitalism is something I wonder about a lot, but also, although this manga is definitely about a business feud between the underdogs and the … overdogs(?) there’s also a lot of themes around community … will continue to mull it over.
Yatagarasuhai
Skimmed Yatagarasuhai, figuring I’ll come back to them maybe, or maybe not, we’ll see. But for now I want to focus on the main serials and yomikiris.
That concludes this issue!! Thanks for reading! Hopefully I’ll be back with more soon. 
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ようこそにんげん
I think it’s just a joke about how she was carrying him!
No problem, thank you!!
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Harta #80
this is a HA volume
🍵 general club chat
Oh dear it’s been more than 2 months since my last volume finished! I got derailed reading my first novel in Japanese and then studying for a professional exam. I keep a little note for each series on my tablet with a short summary of each chapter and that came in handy to remember what was going on in the more complex series.
In the back of my mind, I’ve been wanting to get back here to join in more fun. Issue 80 is also where our club 先輩 @rodan started and somehow passing this volume and reviewing their origin post feels significant 
specials
No debuts but a colouring book
one-shots
🧧 百徳の幸
ドジっ子神様の奮闘劇
The struggles of a clumsy goddess
She’s trying to reward a virtuous man who wants nothing, but finally figures out he would like to be part of the moment he moves someone with his writing.
It was OK and of course that’s a great sentiment, but it felt a lot more predictable than most stuff in Harta so I just couldn’t help but wonder if I was missing something at the end. Being a visual ending and that not being my strength. What does she write, I’m assuming she left him a thank you letter about the moment in the book that moved her?
👞 落とし物日和
A very short sketch, haven’t seen one that short. I like the idea of capturing a special moment that concisely. I was glad to see the discussion sparked by yukitanuki’s post. That helped my understanding and really made this shine
👽 やさしい異星人
This definitely was good katakana practice!
But omg what did I just read?! 
great surprise in such a short story
continuing series
In the order I started following them with the magazine
🧟 生き残った6人によると / What 6 Survivors Told
I was a bit meh on this one because it was obvious they wouldn’t get rescued, but then at the end I enjoyed that surprise - I wasn’t expecting that. I can’t tell if it damaged the mall entrance. Also wondering if this pandemic is so infectious why don’t our heroes have it?
🥿 アンリの靴 / Anri, a Shoemaker
The pacing of this one was not helped by my reading pause. I had to go back to remember she was making a type of shoes she’s not confident about and that’s why she’s not doing all the steps herself. Poor girl, going solo in this business seems tough. Too bad the experienced cutter wasn’t interested in mentoring her. He obviously knew she lacked experience and not letting her stay and learn something from him seemed a bit harsh. But yeah, sometimes you do just have to hear from the old guard that the only way to get experience is to get your hands dirty
🌙 夜の名前を呼んで / Call the Name of the Night
Poor rodan, this would be a really weird one to start off the series. I was surprised at how much darker this felt than the few preceding chapters
👖 昴とスーさん / The Strange Life of Subaru
It seems Subaru knows he’s on his 3rd childhood due to his flashbacks, but as far as I can tell Subaru and Mio haven’t yet told each other what they know. Interesting take, and adds depth to Subaru processing his emotions. I want an irl friend like Nishio, great hug 
I interpreted that as her giving Nishio a heads up that he may need to mentally prepare himself for the situation that arose in this chapter. So while Nishio is hugging Subaru, he thinks back to that conversation. In the flashback sequence - I think Mio realised that Subaru doesn’t want to burden her with his problem and guesses that one day he’ll turn to Nishio for support (my guess). So she got Nishio’s number from Subaru with the pretext that she wanted to congratulate him personally on his wedding and opening his shop (she opens with that). After that formality, when Nishio says to Mio 頼って下さい, and she says that is comforting, I interpreted the next panels as her basically saying that Subaru might visit him (and also need such supportive words). And Nishio did use exactly those words he said to Mio to Subaru
On a lighter note, I’m amused at previous me choosing trousers as the emoji for this 
I think the idea was he’s growing back into his old trousers - it was such a distinctive look in volume 1
🧜♀️ アビスアジュールの罪人 / Deep Sea Rebel
I was expecting a kidnapping, so Ryuu getting booked for meeting a human was a surprise. Also because I was guessing that was prohibited and wondering if that would be Jo’s thing! Jo’s reaction was pretty extreme, I’m guessing she must have a backstory with humans to explain why she leaves Ryuu with so much anger. I remember wondering in the first chapter, when she looks around at the water surface, if Jo was allowed up there…
Agree with others this world’s architecture and atmosphere is so fun to explore
I love that Jo is luminescent at will
🛎️ ホテル・メッツァペウラへようこそ / Welcome to Hotel Metsapeura
It’s endearing how Kusta teaches Jun about Finnish cooking
I hope they get more guests soon
⚾️ ことり文書 / Kotori Report
Pretty light, I’m wondering where this will go once the scene is set. I can’t tell when or where this is meant to be taking place.
For any other series not listed here, if/when I catch up on it later, I’ll link notes from my post on the issue of that manga’s first digital appearance (e.g., Harta 75 or Harta 76)
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🧧 百徳の幸
(probably goes without saying but as usual I enjoyed reading the comments, and enjoyed rereading the short story to answer the question!)
Yes, pretty much! I would say from watching period movies that what is shown is a letter addressed to him (the author) that he unfolds and reads (a long vertical folded paper with the adressee’s name on the front conveying it’s a letter in a period setting). We can only infer what the letter says, but it’s presumably along the lines of “I liked your book bro 
” thus fulfilling 豆福’s duty to brighten his day in a small way.
P.S. not that it especially matters, but just since there’s textual evidence, I would point out that I believe little 豆福 is meant to be gendered male, as he uses the personal pronoun 儂, and when he transforms into a child he apparently gave the name 豆助 which is just 豆 with a typical male name suffix attached after it, like I dunno “Beanathan” or something if it were localized to English. Also it’s a little hard to tell but I think his design in god-form is meant to have a long mustache
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🧧 百徳の幸
glad you enjoyed it again! I’m so glad to be back reading Harta. And cracking open 81 is so fun 
yay! thanks, sometimes it’s nice to know that my assumptions (at least that one) are on mark
now the gender on the other hand… I can’t figure out anymore what threw me off. For some reason, there was something that made me think of the little character as female, and that stuck so hard I didn’t question it. I thought it was really weird there was a mustache 
, and now I’m laughing pretty hard that whatever got me thinking goddess made me blow threw all the other contextual clues you mentioned.
Thanks for mentioning that in detail. I got what you meant, it wasn’t about pointing out the gender as an important feature. It’s part of language learning, and I don’t always pay attention to these clues since they come up differently than in English so it’s nice you mentioned them. 儂 really should have made me question my first assumption, but I’m not good at getting the male suffixes like you pointed out, thanks
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April’s Harta!
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May’s Harta!
ハルタ １２４号
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Grabbed all the issues currently on sale. Trying to pick up manga partway through is always a struggle though so I’ll have to see how I go with it, but this should be nice for when I just want something to read without too much thinking
Started on volume 75 during my lunch break and was reading the first full chapter (the one about archery). I don’t know anything about characters but the art was cool and I could at least follow the immediate story of the chapter (with the character missing a crucial shot and beating herself up over it)
I will be skipping any Dungeon Meshi chapters that come up as that’s on my list to read and I have some volumes of that to be getting through at some point
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Harta #75
soggyの登場 !!
Hello Harta club people! 
I’m one of you now. I bought about 30 backissues in the sale (that should keep me busy for a while, right?) and since the best time to read something is immediately after you buy it, I decided to get started!! I’m too impatient to hide all my thoughts in a document until I’m done reading, so I’ll add to this as I go along.
Thoughts so far:
Well, the bunny girl cover is a little unfortunate. Giving the thread a quick skim, seems like there are various ways that people are tackling Harta by jumping around different series and so on. Well, I do everything the most straightforward and time consuming way, so I’m going to start from the very beginning!
あおぞら弓道部 Aozora Kyudo Club
There are only a few chapters left of this series but I actually found it fun to jump in and didn’t have trouble following the stakes! It’s kind of interesting to jump into a story and see how much the characters make sense. I’ve also never had to read those ‘previously on’ establishing sentences at the beginning of a manga chapter before, their use makes so much more sense now. In this chapter, we’re in the middle of an archery competition and I enjoyed seeing what was going on with the characters. The art is really pretty and I’m interested to read the rest of the chapters (will they score big in the individual competition??). It would be quite a long series to read all of the backlog for, though.
クプラムの花嫁 Cuprum’s Bride
Ok was lacking a little context for this one but as I kept reading it started to make sense. Romancey-type manga with ‘opposites attract’ type characters where one is a coppersmith and the other is a gyaru. Seemed cute enough. Would like for the female character to get something to do but I guess it’s only the second chapter.
ヤギと羊の王冠 Yagi and the Sheep’s Crown
Didn’t vibe with this one (or really get what the comic was going for) but at least there was a cat.
東京城址女子高生 Tokyo Castle Girl’s High School Students
TIL that there’s a Statue of Liberty in Tokyo. This chapter was really cute! I liked the banter between the friends mixed with the historical focus about castles. It’s neat to read these hyper-specific manga haha. I liked this, too bad it ends in a few issues.
アンリの靴 Anri the Shoemaker
I’ve hit the first popular series! At least, popular on the Wanikani forums haha. To be honest, I don’t normally read this kind of slice of life wholesome-type manga. But, y’know, one chapter at a time is fine 
Anri is cute, I was hoping we would get some shoe-making scenes but this chapter was more about feelings.
夕凪に舞え、僕のリボン Dance in the Evening Calm, My Ribbon
Well, this was an exercise in contextless reading Being thrown in at the pivotal moment of a drama. The characters were also all speaking in an accent so that also made figuring out what was going on more tough Hope that kid gets to go to school I guess!
ライカの星 Laika's Star
So I’ll admit I was a little worried about this one because based on it being about Laika I thought it might be a tragic animal story and I don’t read tragic animal stories. 
But wow, I was not expecting it to be about space-dwelling dogs out for revenge on Planet Earth! I enjoyed the quirky art and I’m interested to see where this one goes.
金曜日はアトリエで Friday's Atelier
Hmmmm, something about creating/designing a makeup bag? This manga didn’t really grab me, but I don’t really know the characters yet I guess.
ヒナまつり Hinamatsuri
Made a good faith effort to read this chapter but this series is almost over and it was immediately post-timeskip like ‘where are all our beloved characters now??’ As a no-context reader who does not know any of those beloved characters, had to give up hahaha.
姫と忍 The Princess and the Ninja (one-shot)
First one-shot! I liked this! The art was so imaginative, and the character of the princess that kept somehow getting into scrapes was cute. I had a little trouble around what the rice/cotton machine thingy was exactly, but I’m not sure if I care to go back and reread it to puzzle it out.
青いホルスの瞳 The Blue Eye of Horus
Alright I adopted a slightly light on lookups strategy for this one since I don’t think I’ll go back and read it to catch up. Ancient Egyptian flavor manga if that’s your thing!
煙と蜜 Smoke and Honey
Mmmmm, ahhh, yes, the noble and honorable Japanese military, and how wonderful and heartwarming that he is so dedicated to his child bride 
Will skip this one in the future (unless I keep reading it out of morbid curiosity)
Skips
はなやっこ
I don’t really get into yonkoma… skip!
不死の猟犬
Honestly this looked super wordy and it’s ending soon so that’s another skip.
極東事変
Another war manga, I didn’t really have the energy for reading this so… I skipped.
九国のジュウシ
Well, this one was more at my reading level but I had no idea what was going on really because I lacked all story context. Historical shonen I guess? It did crack me up how young looking the bald dad was.
紙一重りんちゃん
Hmmm… strange!
峠鬼 This one was kind of hard so I’m skipping for now and may come back to it later from the beginning because it got a shoutout as a series worth checking out in rodan’s wrapup post.
昴とスーさん Subaru and Su-san
Okay so Subaru is a woman (?) that passes as a child for… some reason? Could not tell what the point of this manga was supposed to be, is it a romance?
Dungeon Meshi- Skip because I’ll read this later from the beginning.
トネリコ
Cute but the other oneshot was cuter 
It did make me want toast with egg though.
ミギとダリ Migi and Dali
Just me and my closet doppleganger. Strange!
Oh wow, that’s sad to hear! 
This seemed like a really unique series.
ふろラン Furo Run
Running manga! This might be a strange criticism, but… something about the art made it look like they were not going very fast, despite all the clouds coming out of their mouths and speed lines Just me?
瑠璃の宝石 Introduction to Mineralogy
The fanservice is a bit unfortunate but I had read everyone’s comments about it already so I was prepared. It seemed dangerous for them to be exploring like random abandoned mines, my mind kept wandering and imagining them falling down a mineshaft then suffocating on gas or something. But I guess it’s not that kind of manga.
福引き怨霊生活 Life of the Vengeful Lottery Ghost
This one was intriguing! Still found it a bit hard to figure out the context, since it’s about halfway through a short series. The art style kind of reminded me of vintage manga at times.
紅椿 Red Tsubaki
This seemed cool but it’s also getting transferred soon.
Edit: I read everyone else’s comments and apparently this is one of the super horny series Well, I’ll make sure not to open the next chapters at work.
北北西に曇と往け The North-North-West Clouds Move
The mystery drew me in and I wanted to know what happens next! Too bad this one is getting transferred soon too.
れきよみ Getting transferred next volume, skip!
乙嫁語り A Bride's Story
Dang, another interesting looking one that’s getting transferred! I liked that it was historical but not hard to read
鉄機のダン Skip!
ハクメイとミコチ I may try this series later. I don’t really vibe with the art style and it seems a little too cozy for me, so I didn’t read this chapter.
catch-up corner for manga i’m reading outside the issue format
catch-up corner
Here’s the list of series I’m interested in after reading this issue!
| To Read-Finished | Harta End | Collected Vols |
|---|---|---|
| Aozora Kyudo Club | Ends 80 | 4 |
| Tokyo Castle Girl High School Students | Ends 81 | 4 |
| Dungeon Meshi | Ends 107 | 14 |
| To-Read- Maybe | ||
| The Blue Eye of Horus | Ends 83 | 9 |
| A Bride’s Story | Transfer 80- ongoing | Lots |
| To Read- Catch up | Vols before 75 | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Subaru and Su-san | 4 |  |
| Cuprum’s Bride | 1 chapter- free to read in Eng |  |
| Primal Gods in Ancient Times | 3 |
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I dunno, I met someone via that Harta series rundown post I did who collects all the physical issues, including all the Fellows! supplements that preceded the main magazine run, so I think they have you beat on the straightforward and time consuming front!
But seriously, welcome! And I hope you enjoy.
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True, by that metric all us digital-only people starting from issue #75 are filthy casuals. True fans should start from paper issue #1 and catch up to Dungeon Meshi in its original magazine form.
Thank you! I’m already having a lot of fun, I can see this as being a good way to read manga I wouldn’t normally. Especially since it’s just one chapter at a time, there’s a difference between reading one chapter of a manga I wouldn’t normally read when I know after that I’ll be reading something else, and choosing to open up a whole collected volume and read it.
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Welcome to the club @VikingSchism and @soggyboy ! It’s fun seeing an influx of new people to the club. Everyone jumps in differently and that’s part of what I like.
That is so much easier a few issues in there will be a few series you’re following from scratch plus the one shots.
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Reserving this place for my Volume 75 thoughts
One thing I really want to note about the magazine in general is that I really appreciate that the digital editions have a decent resolution. I’ve previously tried reading Ultra Jump from the issues on Bookwalker and the quality of the image was bad. Was hard to make out furigana, while that’s not so much of an issue here.
青武高校あおぞら弓道部 第22話
Gave some thoughts above but just reread it and yeah, the artwork is really nice in this one. And the immediate story of 日比野 messing up a vital shot and beating herself up for it was compelling enough to pull me through. The little summary at the start was also useful to get me up to speed on what’s happening immediately. I might have to take a look at getting the volumes of this to read it in full.
クプルムの花嫁 第2話
This one seems to be a slice of life about a newlywed/to-be-wed couple. Not sure on the exacts of how they came to be engaged etc, but seems like they were childhood friends. I think the most interesting part to me was the little section on 槌起銅器. Wasn’t too interesting to me otherwise, but I’m not huge on slice of life in general unless there’s a really interesting premise to keep me engaged.
Feeling like I might get a lot of mileage out of this image during my reading
ヤギと羊の王冠 その2
So I guess this a manga about beer. I’m not quite sure what the premise fully is, though. Like what would the next chapter be about? Is it just about the rivalry between the two breweries? I just don’t know if I can see this having legs, feels like it would get tiresome quite quickly. There being a cat gets it bonus points
Edit: I looked into it and it seems like it’s a Romeo and Juliet type story about two rival breweries and a boy and girl from them. So I guess this chapter is just showing the grudge between them? With that extra context it makes a little more sense I suppose
東京城址女子校生 第19話
Ok I loved this one - I enjoy history so finding out about お台場 and why it’s called that was really cool, and the characters were fun. They each had a distinctive personality and had some fun banter together (particularly enjoyed the joke about 菜々 looking like a foreign tourist). Also liked the artstyle a lot, very appealing character design and the environments looked great. I absolutely want to go and read the rest of this now off the strength of this one chapter alone.
アンリの靴 第3話
This one had me tearing up, the take on death was surprisingly mature - though I guess this is in a seinen magazine so I shouldn’t be so surprised. But yeah, was not expecting something so heavy from a manga about shoe-making (sidenote: if I had a penny for every manga about shoemaking I’ve seen I’d have two pennies, which isn’t a lot but it’s weird it happened twice). But the end also made sure to introduce a bit of levity and I’m glad it didn’t end on a downer. Also bonus points for an adorable kitty. Definitely one to watch going forwards!
夕凪にまえ、僕のリボン 第13話
This one I definitely felt the lack of prior context more strongly. There’s some drama going on - and if I understand correctly it’s that the boy - 倫太郎 - wants to go to a middle school in Osaka, but money problems. He lives at home with his sister and single father (there doesn’t seem to be a mother in the picture), but lately his dad has been staying out on long fishing trips, causing his sister to worry that something has happened at sea. Also 倫太郎 does rhythmic gymnastics and this is related for his reason for wanting to go to Osaka. It seems like they live in the Hiroshima area maybe? The じゃ and じゃんけんs give me that impression, but I’ll admit I’m not a dialect expert. It wasn’t too bad to follow once I’d figured out that けん is basically equivalent to から. Oddly compelling drama, but I’d probably get more out of it if I’d been following the previous chapters
ライカの星 第1話
Laika and an army of dogs plotting to take revenge on humans. Interesting premise. First chapter was alright, though did feel a little short maybe. I’ll be interested to see where this goes because first impressions are positive. I especially enjoyed Laika’s right-hand-dog who is a lot more laid-back and just wants to live in peace on the dog’s world
金曜日はアトリエで 第9話
Wasn’t huge on this one - seems like the manga is about an artist, and in this chapter he’s been tasked with creating a design for a makeup pouch. Not exactly sure what the relationship between the painter and the woman is, but he gets her to go and ask her friends and then he makes a design. Didn’t feel like there was much point to it really.
ヒナまつり 第99話
Coming into this seeing it was basically an epilogue was kind of interesting. With my lack of other context it basically just reads like a chapter about someone who has just started university and is seeing where all their friends have ended up. It wasn’t really too confusing at least.
姫と忍び
This was cute and the artwork was gorgeous. The spread with the princess offering the rice to the monster was beautiful, as well as the one with the interior of the castle. I feel bad for the poor princess - even if she’s clumsy the villagers do isolate her. The shinobi was fun too - coming to steal from the castle only to immediately get swept up in the princess’ task, and him coming back at the end was sweet.
碧いホルスの瞳 第35話
Not sure exactly what was going on. Something about the pharoh’s (who is a woman) daughter dying and then she let the guy who was arrested in relation to it go? Seemed kind of interesting maybe. Would probably need to catch up on this since it feels like it’s a more plot focused one
煙と蜜 第17話
Yeah no idea what’s going on in this one. Military stuff. And then the commander dude went home. Not a super exciting chapter or one that has me interested in reading more particularly.
はなやっこ 第22回
This was ok. Some mildly funny jokes, but nothing that had me chuckling particularly. 4-koma are something I need to try more of.
死なずの猟犬 第5話
Looks like we’re entering this super late into the story. At first glance I kind of assumed this would be a sports manga or something, but imagine my surprise when they get to talking about secret societies and organisations and the extinction of humanity against AI. I have no context for most of what was going on, but I’ll admit I was oddly compelled by it. Most of the chapter taking place in the bathhouse with two naked sweaty men was a choice, kind of have to respect it. My recent experience with Ace Attorney was definitely paying off with some of the terminology in here which was nice
極東事変 第10話
This one definitely felt like it suffered from a lack of context on who these people are and what is going on. I mainly got that there’s a mad general who’s trying to stage a coup because he wants Japan to have a military and not be under foreign powers, and he takes a government official hostage to get them to join him. Then people are trying to stop that.
It was nice to get a bit of action in there though.
九国のジュウシ 第10話
Seems like the young lord wants to be respected and liked but has to ask a lower class(?) person for help, and feels like he’s the real hero. I enjoyed this, once I got something of a grasp on the names being thrown around at the start. Did feel quite compressed though, maybe would’ve been nice to see more of the actual battle. Also that sword trainer guy reminds me of the funny faces from those elf/human comics that are overdrawn for comedic effect
紙一重りんちゃん 第10回
Going to be real, I did not see much of a point to this one. Not falling for the AI propaganda.
峠鬼 - skipped as I intend to read the full series
昴とスーさん 第24話
Sweet little story. I gathered that Subaru was reverted into a child and was going to meet someone she’d been close to when she was an adult. That meeting was well done, with her feeling awkward about telling him at first.
ダンジョン飯 - skipped as intend to read the full series
トネリコ
This was sweet. I liked that this honed in on the liminal feeling of that time between midnight and dawn. Nice little oneshot
ミギとダリ 第30話
Oh I get it, they’re called ミギ and ダリ because it’s a play on 右 and 左 since they’re very different. I have no idea why there’s two identical people but one is evil and turns the other guy into a bat rooster thing but it was a wild ride anyway. Having no context on this manga I thought 秘鳥 had actually jumped out the window so it was a twist that there were two of them. But that then established some understandable stakes. Also got to learn fun terms like 双曲線 and 反比例 from this.
ふろラン 第5話
I’m not a runner, but as someone who was very much Not A Runner at school I can related to how 古川 felt doing her marathon run, feeling like everyone else is just so much better. Really the main difference is that she wants to be running, while I didn’t. And felt bad at the end when she didn’t manage to complete the run. Beautiful artwork in this one. Pretty short and readable too. Will definitely be happy to check back in in a few issues time to see how the little arc about 古川 being insecure about whether ゆい really enjoys running with her works out
瑠璃の宝石 第6話
The explanation of fluorescence was nice, I enjoy learning new stuff and this seems like a fun way to do so. It kind of reminded me of bits from Dr Stone from when I was following that manga. Though I could’ve done without the sexualisation of the characters. I’ll probably want to check out the first volume of this for the earlier chapters
福引怨霊生活 その6
This one took a bit to get going, but I definitely felt the moment that 福子 (is that her name?) started just shutting down and feeling tired. Being an introvert I’ve definitely experienced moments like that - for different reasons, but still. The art kind of fluctuated between looking nice and being a bit goofy. But ultimately I did find myself feeling oddly charmed with the low stakes plot of her basically just being teased by a ghost and her kind of just being like “it’s not very nice to do that”.
紅椿 第11話
Is that chapter title a 電車でゴー reference? This one was alright. Did have to laugh a little at the woman turning up at the end and kissing the monster lady they caught earlier so hard she passed out. That character in general screamed “my super cool OC who is so attractive”
北北西に雲と往け その42
Guy who can talk to cars and phones stalks another guy who his wife suspects of cheating. Wasn’t really feeling this, although it’s cool that it’s set in Iceland
レキとヨミ 最終話
Final chapter of this one and as expected it didn’t do anything for me. Well, that’s a lie - I did really dislike that one character who showed up and started sexually assaulting people. That wasn’t cool.
乙嫁語り 第64話
Lovely artwork here, and this chapter was really showing it off with dialogue taking more of a backseat. I didn’t have context on the characters but figured that the main character was a more reserved woman but she slowly warmed up to the sea and that was a nice little arc for the chapter. Maybe this is one to look at previous volumes for.
つきたて！餅子町
Short and sweet. Not too much to say on this one, it’s only a couple of pages long.
鉄磯のダン 最終話
Active disgust reading this one. Glad it’s the final chapter of this particular manga because it was horrible. And there wasn’t even any actual mecha stuff.
ハクメイとミコチ 第74話
From one of the worst in the issue to one of the outright best. The joys of manga magazines. I loved this chapter. Full of that ホノボノ spirit. The two train conductors were precious, especially with them bonding over their mutual interests and trying to make the other happy. Also the talking photorealistic beetle was fun. I did read the first chapter of this a few days back and that was also really good. I think this is one for me to keep an eye on and there’s plenty of volumes to get through before this chapter
End matter
Noticed Ryoko Kui mentioning getting a VR headset to play Half-Life (presumably Alyx). Based.
Did I get my 100 yen’s worth? Yeah absolutely.
Standouts from this issue:
- 青武高校あおぞら弓道部: archery focus was interesting and art was nice
- 東京城址女子校生: I like castles and learning about them is fun
- アンリの靴: was impressed with the maturity this handled the subject matter with and I’m interested to see what else this manga does
- ライカの星: Interesting premise and lovely artwork
- 姫と忍び: Some jawdropping artwork and a sweet story
- トネリコ: A sweet little liminal story
- 瑠璃の宝石: Fun and educational
- ハクメイとミコチ: Heartwarming, and also bonus points for a cool beetle
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I’ve already added the first volume of this and the Tokyo Castle Girls one to my checklist 
Reading more manga just makes more manga to read??
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Ok, my reading time is up for the day, read three more chapters! Exciting! All that manga and I’m a whopping…
20% of the way through the issue
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