Manga Review: Ai Ore! Love Me, Volume 1, by Mayu Shinjo

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5

Publisher: VIZ Media (Shojo Beat)

Volumes: (8 volumes, maybe? I'm not sure? There are two different series listed, and I think they're both getting released under the same title?)
Buy it here: Amazon.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Reads R to L (Japanese Style) T+ audience. Mizuki is the female “prince” of her all-girls school and the lead guitarist in an all-girl rock band. Akira is the male “princess” of his all-boys school and wants to join her band. Love may be on his mind, but romance is difficult when everyone keeps mistaking Mizuki for a boy and Akira for a girl!

When the lead singer of Blaue Rosen announces she is moving overseas, Akira does all he can to convince Mizuki and her bandmates to let him join. But will a resistant Mizuki allow him into her band, much less her heart?

Review:

I haven’t read anything else by Shinjo that I remember all that clearly; I think I read the first volume of Sensual Phrase several years ago, and I think I’ve glimpsed through another of her series. I never really had enough interest to invest in any of her manga, though. Mostly, they seemed dramatic and clichéd, but not something that I really wouldn't like, but I never got around to actually reading any of it. With VIZ releasing this recently, I decided to give it a shot, although I didn’t have very high hopes for it.

Saying that, I was actually a bit surprised with how much I enjoyed this volume. The premise didn’t really get me too interested, what with gender-bender not being one of my favorite topics, and I hadn’t heard too many great things about it.

First of all, I’m going to talk about the whole gender-bender thing. I haven’t read a lot of series with this topic, save for Hana-Kimi (a series that I really like), and this one sounded just alright. And, mostly, it is just alright. It’s real point seems to be to cause all the students at their schools, an all-boys’ and an all-girls’ repectively, to fawn over them. There are fan clubs at both schools for the main characters, and it doesn’t seem to matter to them that they’re falling for someone of the same sex, which seems like a very large number of people at one place to be gay? But maybe they’re not really, just for those specific people? Whatever.

My biggest problem with this, was how the girls in the band looked. Akira, the boy that looks girly, actually looks like a small boy with feminine features, which didn’t bother me. The five girls that look like boys’, though, completely look like boys except for, maybe, one scene in the whole volume. The bath scene is the only time they really look like girls. The rest of the time, it just looked like Shinjo had drawn boys and claimed they were girls, which bothered me. Still bothers me.

Aside from that, though, I actually enjoyed this volume. It was dramatic, maybe a little over the top, but I didn’t mind that. Some people probably do, but I like the smutty, dramatic manga. Which is what this is. There isn’t really any outright nudity, but there are several intense scenes. Mizuki, the main girl character, gets embarrassed much too easily and is pretty weak, but I can kind of accept that. Later that might change, though, if she doesn't get even a little more tough. Akira is a bit possessive and forceful, but I don’t mind too much at this point.

There was one scene, and maybe another one at the end of volume, that included some forcing into sex, maybe and I’m pretty sure what would be called rape, that I didn’t like. I didn’t like who was involved or how they could be so okay with doing it, like it was a perfectly okay thing, and I’m hoping something comes of that in the next volume. Because it doesn't matter what your reasoning is: rape is not okay.

So while I did like this volume, it had its faults, and I hope the next one, which I am kind of looking forward to, is better.

Novel Review: Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

Genre: YA Contemporary Romance
Rating (Out of 5): ~4.5

Publisher: Penguin (Speak)

Spoilers: No/Very minor.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris - until she meets Etienne St. Clair: perfect, Parisian (and English and American, which makes for a swoon-worthy accent), and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home. As winter melts into spring, will a year of romantic near - misses end with the French kiss Anna - and readers - have long awaited?

Something Specific:
That I Loved:

• "And then my mother does something that, even after all of the paperwork and plane tickets and presentations, I don't see coming. Something that would've happened in a year anyway, once I left for college, but that no matter how many days or months or years I've yearned for it, I am still not prepared for when it actually happens.
                "My mother leaves. I am alone."  (Paperback, pg. 8) (This is a passage that I really loved when I first read the book; that really stood out to me, especially because I found that I could relate, that a similar goodbye had happened to me around the same time I read it.)

Review:

I really enjoyed this book. I’ve had it for a while, have wanted to read it for even longer, and had even planned to read it for the last couple months, but for some reason never got around to actually doing it. When packing books to bring with me on vacation, I was pretty set on bringing this one with me, and I’m glad. Sadly, I planned to put it off till later on the trip, but ended up reading it rather fast instead. And I’m really glad that I finally got to it. It really shouldn’t have taken me so long.

I’d heard a lot of good things about this, including from several authors that I like, and it sounded like my type of book. It has big focus on romance, even if it’s the kind that is pushed off for a long time, it’s funny, with a type of humor I enjoy, the characters were well done, the romance was put together really well and had a good pace to it. This book is filled with things I like.

Anna, the main character, is forced to move to France to go to a boarding school, where she ends up meeting St. Clair and his friends, who she quickly forms a friendship with. She’s upset about leaving her best friend back home, and her mother and brother, and is mad at her rich, predictable-romance writing father who sent her there. It takes her a little while to get used to everything, but she does, especially with the help of St. Clair.

I liked Anna. She wasn’t whiny or too insecure or selfish. She wasn’t completely selfless or anything, either, though. She was nice, as nice as she could be, while disagreeing with people and trying to deal with a new place, new language, being away from home, and liking someone who has a girlfriend already. I really liked St. Clair, and her and him together.

Their relationship was really well done, and I was impressed with that. They got to know each other, turned into best friends, even while trying to ignore the flirting and feelings that they obviously had for each other. Neither of them was perfect, and they both knew it; they were perfect for each other, or whatever. A lot of the book was spent with them getting to know each other, and none of it was boring or dragged out; the pace was pretty perfect. There were some parts, of course, where I just wanted them to get together already, and there was so much teasing, but overall it was good.

Along with getting to know St. Clair, we also get to know their friends. All of who had actual personalities, and most of whom I liked. There were several scenes where Anna is just hanging out with some of the others, which I liked; her entire life was not centered on her feelings on St. Clair. She also went home one time in the book, so we got to meet her brother and her best friend, and the guy she maybe likes, and got to hear more about her parents.

The timeline in the book goes through the whole school year, so a lot happened. I’m not going to go into too much detail, though, and let you find those things out yourself (when you read the book, ‘cause you should, if you haven’t already).

The ending was really good. We find out what their plans for later are, and those seem to be very good and should work out really well. We also got to see them as an actual couple, and I found them a bit adorable.

I just really liked everything about this book. The more I think about it, the more I find reasons why I liked it. I was expecting to like it, but was surprised by how much and how well done everything in it was. It was pretty much amazing, has kind of made me fall in love with it, and I want the next one immediately, and don’t plan on waiting too long to get it. I want it that bad.

Novel Review: Love, Stargirl (Stargirl, #2) by Jerry Spinelli

Genre: YA Contemporary

Rating (Out of 5): ~4.5

Publisher: Random House (Alfred A. Knopf)

Spoilers?: Very minor.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Love, Stargirl picks up a year after Stargirl ends and reveals the new life of the beloved character who moved away so suddenly at the end of Stargirl. The novel takes the form of "the world's longest letter," in diary form, going from date to date through a little more than a year's time. In her writing, Stargirl mixes memories of her bittersweet time in Mica, Arizona, with involvements with new people in her life.

In Love, Stargirl, we hear the voice of Stargirl herself as she reflects on time, life, Leo, and—of course—love.

Something Specific:
That I Love:

• "He said, 'Are you looking for me?' and shuffled on without waiting for an answer. I called after him, 'I'm looking for me! Have you seen me?!' but he just kept on moving..." (Paperback, pg. 40) (This is just a particular quote that I really liked, that made sense to me, and made me feel even more things for Stargirl.)
• Stargirl. (Because I love her; she is amazing. I talk more about her in the review. 

Review:

I love Stargirl. I just love her, okay? I want to be her best friend.

I was worried that this one wouldn’t be as good as the first, and that maybe I wouldn’t enjoy Stargirl as much as I did in the first, but I was wrong. I was so very wrong. I liked this one even more than the first, and I really liked the first one.

Love, Stargirl takes place a year after the first book, in Stargirl’s point-of-view. With no Leo. Well, only with the thoughts Stargirl has of Leo. And she thinks of him several times, along with the fact that this book is a letter/journal that Stargirl is writing to Leo.

Stargirl is living in a new place than where we last saw her, and she meets an attention-seeking little girl, Dootsie, who turns into her best friend, and an old lady who won’t leave her house, Betty Lou, and an angry pre-teen, Alvina, and a boy named Perry that catches her interest, and a man named Charlie that visits his wife's grave everyday, and a bunch of other people. But of course there are other people, because Stargirl is the type of person that notices the odd-ones-out, the person that becomes their friend. But throughout all of this, she still thinks of Leo. She’s still upset about Leo, missing him, knowing why they didn’t work and wishing that they had.

This is one of the things that really pulled me over the edge to how much I loved Stargirl: her missing Leo, wondering about him, having only a couple pebbles left in her twenty pebble wagon, was how well it was done. She wasn’t constantly thinking about him, she wasn’t showing her misery to everyone, she didn’t mope and whine. She gave little thoughts every once in a while that showed how much she missed him. She was still trying to live her life, was still doing things, giving only little hints that she wasn’t at her happiest. She was lost, was losing herself, and she knew it and, even while not knowing how to fix it, was trying to get over it, to move on. That just made me love and respect her even more.

And I loved seeing and getting the story of all these other people she meets.

This book was just fantastic and more than I’d even hoped for. There are so many little things that are so big, and that you just have to read to understand. Like the characters; you have to read the book to get the significance of what they mean and who they are and how awesome every one of them is. Which, really, is what you should do: read this book. It is absolutely amazing. Almost, maybe, a 5 star, even.

The ending, though. I don’t know about the ending. I liked what happened with Stargirl and Perry, which I hadn’t expected and wasn’t sure about at first, but then there’s Stargirl and Leo. I really want to know what happens with them later. I guess I’m supposed to assume that they meet again later in their lives, but I have a hard time believing that. It just doesn’t work all that well with reality. But it’s possible, and it is what I would really like to happen.

Manga Review: Ouran High School Host Club, Volume 18, by Bisco Hatori

Rating (Out of 5): ~4.5

Publisher: VIZ Media (Shojo Beat)

Volumes: 18
Spoilers?: Yes.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Reads R to L (Japanese Style), for audiences rated teen. In this screwball romantic comedy, Haruhi, a poor girl at a rich kids' school, is forced to repay an $80,000 debt by working for the school's swankiest, all-male club--as a boy! There, she discovers just how wealthy the six members are and how different the rich are from everybody else...

Final Volume!

Review:

I love this series, you guys. Just thinking about it makes me happy and re-reading it gets me all excited again and, while this wasn’t quite what I thought it’d be, it was still awesome. And I seriously wonder if Hatori can do something that I don’t love. And I want her to do more and for it to get published over here so I can read it.

This was the last volume of Ouran, which makes me so sad, because that means there’s no more of these characters to come, and I’m going to miss them so much. This was a very good ending, though.

God, just looking through this volume again as I write this makes me smile all over again.

The volume starts with the love confession between Haruhi and Tamaki, which is so completely awesome. It’s hilarious and they’re yelling at each other and they kiss and it’s so cute. The best confession ever and I don’t know how it could have been any better.

Some things get worked out between Tamaki’s father and grandmother, and Haruhi goes to talk to Kosaka. Haruhi wants to do something with Tamaki but is pretty content having just confessed to him, while he is freaking out and trying to think up the perfect date. There’s some commotion about that before they go on the date, which is over the top for Haruhi, but the gang is following them to make sure nothing goes wrong. And they end up going to Haruhi’s mothers’ grave, which is sweet.

And then we find out the big news, something that I didn’t think much about because I thought Haruhi would decide she cared too much about everyone and couldn’t possibly leave them to go away to school and there would be a big cheesy moment about it: instead, Haruhi has decided to go to school in America, as paid for by the school. There’s some trouble with this and Haruhi’s father is upset about it and the host club throws a party and do a thing for everyone at school to find out that she’s actually a she (which is particularly entertaining because they all say they knew, only to later find out that they meant they thought they knew Haruhi was a girly, maybe gay, boy). There are some very good moments between everyone. during this.

And then Tamaki tells her that he’s going with her, and he’s going to be living in the apartment right next to hers. And then everyone else moves into the apartments surrounding theirs. I wasn’t expecting this, and at first thought it was a bit too much, too cheesy, but after a while I’ve warmed up to the idea and just kind of love it. Particularly having Haruhi and Tamaki living right next to each other, with a door leading to the others’ place. I like the thought of them right next to each other, bickering and teasing and just so cute. Like a newly living together couple or newlyweds. Pretty much, I just love them. Also, I'd never noticed their height differences. But Tamaki is practically all legs in comparison to Haruhi, which is just adorable. They are just adorable and I love them.

After that, there a couple extras. There’s one long chapter featuring the group going to Spain because Kyoya’s father has set up his brother with some woman, and they end up helping her. This was mostly okay, although a bit entertaining a points, particularly at the end when Haruhi gets Tamaki all flustered.  Then there’s a tiny chapter starring Haruhi and Tamaki and a cuddle session which is just so adorable.

Throughout the volume, there are also several quarter or full page panels of the characters in the future, with what the author thinks might happen to them. She says that it’s not official, but I enjoyed them all nonetheless.

I’m so sad that it’s all over now; there’s no more Ouran for me to wait for or fangirl over. Although, since I do own them all, I can re-read them as many times as I want, which I’m sure will happen. While this volume, and several before it, never got a five star rating, the series as a whole gets one, in my mind. It’s one of my favorite manga, or story in general, if not the one at the top of the list, which is very high praise coming from me. But I just love this series so much, as I've stated before. And now I have to console myself because of the fact that it's all over now.

Teaser Tuesday[14]: Before I Wake (Soul Screamers, #6) by Rachel Vincent

Teaser Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by MizB over at Should Be Reading! All you have to do to participate is:

Grab your current read

Open to a random page

Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)

Share the title & author, too, so that other TeaserTuesday participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

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 Warning: You maybe shouldn't read this unless you've read the five previous books in this series, at least if you care about spoilers, because there might be some in here.

I have been reading kind of slowly the last week, but I plan to go a bit faster this week. Also, I got quite a bit reviewing done over the weekend, which made me feel productive. Not too much else has been going on with me, though. Just been going to classes; haven’t had too much homework yet, at least not as much as I’d suspected I’d have, but who knows how long that’ll last. Oh, and I ordered some new books the other day, ones that came out a while ago and that I really want but had been putting off buying; now, I’m very excited to finally get to read them.

Here’s what I’m reading right now (which I am almost done with, and is really good so far):

Before I Wake (Soul Screamers, #6) by Rachel Vincent

Publisher: Harlequin Teen

Goodreads Synopsis:

 I died on a Thursday—killed by a monster intent on stealing my soul. The good news? He didn't get it.

The bad news? Turns out not even death will get you out of high school…

Covering up her own murder was one thing, but faking life is much harder than Kaylee Cavanaugh expected. After weeks spent "recovering," she's back in school, fighting to stay visible to the human world, struggling to fit in with her friends and planning time alone with her new reaper boyfriend.

But to earn her keep in the human world, Kaylee must reclaim stolen souls, and when her first assignment brings her face-to-face with an old foe, she knows the game has changed. Her immortal status won't keep her safe. And this time Kaylee isn't just gambling with her own life….

Excerpts:

“’Death itself would wait for you, Kaylee…’” (Paperback, pg. 164)

“I was stirring green peas into my mashed potatoes, poking the lumpy concoction aimlessly, when Emma kicked me beneath the table. Or rather, she tried, but her foot went right through my leg and hit the bottom of the bench instead. And that’s when I realized I was fading out again.” (Paperback, pg. 164)

What are you reading right now?