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various – Top Shelf – 2010 – 1+ volumes

This was my final review at Manga Recon, and you can check it out over there.

I feel like I should elaborate on what I said over there, since there really is a ton of content. I could go into a lot of detail. But really, I don’t know where to begin. It really is a lot of weirdness, and it’s totally worth checking out simply because of the huge variety of detail that’s offered. It’s an amazing book, and it does have some potentially offensive content in it for some, but this really is a gift to us English manga readers, one that doesn’t come around all that often.

Okay, how about this: the Yoshihiro Tatsumi story, Love’s Bride. Commenting on the Tatsumi story is not helpful, since he’s the most recognizable artist in the collection. But it made me think of the book Blood Lake, a collection of short stories by Jim Krusoe. The book has haunted me for years, but especially a short story in it about a gorilla. It was a lot like a more depraved version of Love’s Bride. Like… The Pigman gone wrong. I highly recommend that collection.