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Familiar Diversions

I'm a librarian who loves anime, manga, and reading a wide variety of genres.

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Reading Challenge 2024

1523 BOOKS

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How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Vol. 1
Dojyomaru, Fuyuyuki, Sean McCann
Progress: 103/374 pages
Darkly Dreaming Dexter
Jeff Lindsay
Progress: 424/470 minutes
Wait Till Helen Comes: A Ghost Story
Mary Downing Hahn
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Parental Guidance
Avery Flynn
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Julia Quinn
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The Twisted Ones
T. Kingfisher
Progress: 385/385 pages
Educated
Tara Westover
Progress: 315/730 minutes
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, Vol. 2
Satoru Yamaguchi, Nami Hidaka
Progress: 24/171 pages
Graphic Medicine Manifesto
MK Czerwiec, Kimberly R. Myers, Scott T. Smith, Michael J. Green, Susan Merrill Squier, Ian Williams
Progress: 26/172 pages
Ao Oni: Mutation
Kenji Kuroda, Karin Suzuragi, Alexander Keller-Nelson
Progress: 30/152 pages

Recently added

How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Vol. 1 - Dojyomaru, Fuyuyuki, Sean McCann
Heart Change - Robin D. Owens
The Saga of Tanya the Evil, Vol. 1 - Carlo Collodi, Emily Balistrieri, Kevin Steinbach

The Girl from the Other Side (manga, vol. 4) by Nagabe, translated by Adrienne Beck

12:25 pm 24 November 2018
The Girl from the Other Side, Vol. 4 - Adrienne Beck, Nagabe

Shiva's aunt tells Teacher the story of how she found baby Shiva Outside, next to her dead parent. She also tells Teacher that the true horror of the curse isn't just how it changes people, but that it

makes those it affects immortal (which is why soldiers kill everyone while that's still possible). After that, she grows more and more protective of Shiva, even going so far as to urge Shiva to run away with her. Meanwhile, Teacher feels lonely, and like an interloper. Shiva and her aunt come back, however. Auntie begins to lose her memories and ends up leaving. The volume ends with the Outsider from earlier in the series bringing back her head. Does this mean she has somehow died, despite telling Teacher that Outsiders are immortal? I guess I'll find out later.

(show spoiler)


This volume is heart-wrenching on multiple levels. First there was Teacher, who was clearly distressed at the possibility of being left alone but who, at the same time, wanted what was best for Shiva. Then there was Auntie and

her deterioration. I wonder why it started so suddenly and progressed so quickly? Do all Outsiders find themselves forgetting the people and things they loved and moving on? It doesn't seem to affect relationships formed after they become Outsiders, or Teacher would have forgotten Shiva and moved on already. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, Teacher seems to do better when Shiva is around. If Shiva's aunt had stuck around, could she have learned to love Shiva again? Or maybe it would have been too upsetting for everyone involved.

Extras: a couple full-color pages and a few four-panel comics, one of which revealed that Teacher managed to learn how to bake a pie from Shiva's aunt before she forgot how to make pies. Aww.

(show spoiler)

Speaking of pie-baking, I loved the artwork during the scene where the flour got dumped everywhere. It was the first clear view of what Teacher and Auntie's facial structures were like.

 

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

fantasy Curses adrienne beck nagabe the girl from the other side little girl
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