Book Review- Hey! Order Up by Kenji Sonishi

Title: Hey! Order Up!

Author: Kenji Sonishi

Series:   Neko Ramen

Published:  8 June 2010 by Tokyopop

Length:160 pages

Warnings: None.

Source:Library

Other info:There are four volumes to Neko Ramen. Not sure how many are published in English though.

Summary :A cat makes the ramen.

Taisho was a former kitten model, who ran away from home and had a hard life on the streets...until the day he was saved by a kind ramen shop owner who later served as his mentor. Now Taisho takes pride in his noodles...and is easily angered when customers are dissatisfied! So step aside, Soup Nazi - there's a new cat in town!

Review:There isn’t really a plot to this. There kind of is. But there’s not much to it. The cat on the front, Taisho, runs a ramen(noodle) shop. Tanaka, a man who to me looks like a young-middle aged man but could be any age due to the drawing style, is his only regular customer. The book is mainly four panel strips documenting their conversations regarding new ramen (dessert ramen with milk and strawberries, jumbo ramen with two giant fishcakes that is free if eating within the half hour, ad diet ramen, half the size of a normal portion and yet the same price), and occasionally other things such as Taisho’s ramen making history.

Neko Ramen is pure comedy. The plot doesn’t really progress, unless you count hiring staff our gaining random customers plot development. The real thing, aside from the comedy, is the characters.
Taisho and Tanaka are both very likeable. The enjoyment of Tanaka was slightly spoiled for me by the fact that the intro sheet at the front had a sticker over his name, and he doesn’t tell us in the strips until halfway through, but that’s not Kenji Sonishi or Tokyopop’s fault.
Taisho never stops coming up with outlandish ideas, no matter what’s going on with his business. My favourite ramen idea is the zero calories one. Which is a bowl of hot water. Even minor setbacks don’t seem to stop him. He’s an amazing cat.

Overall:  Strength 4 tea to a fun little collection of strips that won’t fail to make you laugh somewhere along the line.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | 

Book Review- Cat Paradise Vol 1 by Yuji Iwahara

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Title: Cat Paradise vol 1

 Author: Yuji Iwahara

Series:  Cat Paradise #1

Published:  4 August 2009

Length: 192 pages

Warnings: a little romance that doesn’t go anywhere, demons

Other info: There are 5 volumes of this in total.

Summary : Nine lives might not be enough to survive this catfight!
At Matabi Academy, students are allowed to bring their pet cats to the dorms. For Yumi Hayakawa, whose favorite hobby is making clothes for her kitty Kansuke, Matabi seems like a sure bet. After all, nothing can possibly go wrong with her best friend at her side! But on the first day of school, the two find themselves face-to-face with a murderous demonic minion on campus! Will Yumi and Kansuke be able to defend themselves and their school against an ancient cat demon's thirst for vengeance?

Review : This is a school set manga with a difference. At Matabi Academy, students can bring pet cats  to school. And it's set on a site where a princess and her cat died after a fight against a demon. And the student governers and their cats have special powers enabling them to protect the school from said demon, and its henchmen. But apart from that, it's your typical gakuen(school) manga. Girl, in this case, Yumi, starts at new school, settles in, plot moves on in some way and she falls in love. In Cat Paradise, the love interest is Tsubame, a fairly interesting boy in that, like the rest of the student council, he and his cat can do something special to protect the school. The way the plot moves on is that a demon, not the one mentioned earlier, who is called Kaen,but another one, shows up and wants to eat Yumi, along with the other humans. And then various things happen, Yumi and her cat gain special powers and by the end Yumi and her cat have to save the school.

This was a fun interesting plot. The back story provided was good, and the things happening in the present day happened fast enough to keep you interested.

Some of  the things are hard to remember, such as the names of minor characters and their cats. This is only to be expected as a lot were introduced in a short period of time. However the plot in general was easy to follow and understandable.

The characters aren't exactly the best, but they're fun and have distinctive personalities. I like the way the cats have their own personalities too, that match or otherwise compliment the owner's.

The art is realistic, for the humans and cats anyway. I don't particularly like the shading style- ie mainly pure black and white, with greys thrown in every now and again. It works for single pieces of art, but for 200 pages worth it gets boring easily. However the fantasy creatures are drawn very well and are very imaginative.  

Overall:  Strength 3 tea to this fun quick read that isn't really the best thing ever but you might enjoy it.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | 

Book Review- Emily the Strange- The Lost Days by Rob Reger& Jessica Gruner

Title: Emily the Strange-The Lost Days

Author: Rob Reger and Jessica Gruner

Series: Emily the Strange #1

Published: 226 pages

Length: June 1 2009

Warnings: gambling, extremely faint one sided romance

Other info: Emily the Strange is also a popular franchise.There are other books in the series.

Summary : Emily may be odd, but she always gets even!

Meet Emily, the peculiar soul with long black hair, a wit of fire, and a posse of slightly sinister black cats. Famous for her barbed commentary and independent spirit, this rebel-child in black has spawned an Internet and merchandising phenomenon (Emily's web site gets 35,000 hits per month!). Emily the Strange,her first book, captures the quintessential Emily, featuring her most beloved quips and a host of new ones. Anarchist, heroine, survivor, this little girl with a big personality appeals to the odd child in us all.

Review: the first thing I want to talk about is the originality of this book. Not many start with a list of things the main character does and does not know. This one does. We then go with our heroine around the  small town of Blackrock. Earwig, as she decides to call herself, meets Raven, the girl at the coffee shop, Jakey, the nine year old psychic boy, the owners of a travelling medicine show, someone who is extremely alike to her, and four cats. she does all this not knowing who on earth she is.

So the whole book is about this girl, who you may have worked out is Emily, trying to find out who she is and why she doesn’t remember anything and answering all those little questions you’d probably want answered if you woke up in a random town with full amnesia.

I liked the slightly sarcastic voice which was very fun to read. I liked the form of pretty much all the dialogue- it’s all presented as a script form, as Emily obviously couldn’t be bothered to write it all out fully.

Emily herself is a great character with a very strong personality. The supporting characters were also interesting to read aobnut and hard individual personalities and it was easy to distinguish them.

Some of the things that actually happen, at first, very possibly might make you think “what on earth is going on here?”. Such as one character deciding that he was going to move all the buildings in the town one inch to the east. And the truth about Raven, which I won’t reveal. Spoilers.

I love the layout of this, and the design work that went into this. Unlike most books, which are *page colour* and black, this is pure white (page), black, and various shades of grey and red. It breaks up the monotony and adds interest to it. I like the original drawing style (even though its hard to draw) and its obvious that if the pictures were’nt there, the book wouldn’t nearly be as good as it is.

Overall:  Strength 5 tea to an amazing, original and funny book that makes me want to see more of Emily. And her cats.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Emily the Strange