From the back cover: Young Mikan runs away to Tokyo following her best friend, Hotaru, who has been enrolled in an exclusive, secretive private school for geniuses. But it turns out that Alice Acdemy is a lot more than meets the eye. Whether it's Hotaru's gift for inventing gadgets, the cranky Natsume's firecasting ability, or Professor Narumi's control of human pheromones, … [Read more...] about Gakuen Alice 1 by Tachibana Higuchi: B-
Comics
A Distant Neighborhood 1 by Jiro Taniguchi: A
Forty-eight-year-old Hiroshi Nakahara is a businessman with a love of alcohol and little time for his family. One day, in 1998, as he is returning home (hungover) from a business trip to Kyoko, he accidentally boards the wrong train and ends up traveling to Kurayoshi, the town in which he grew up and which he hasn’t visited for many years. With some time to kill before the next … [Read more...] about A Distant Neighborhood 1 by Jiro Taniguchi: A
One Piece 9 by Eiichiro Oda: B+
I enjoyed being unspoiled on this, so if you want to be unspoiled too, go no further. From the back cover: Luffy and crew must contend with "Saw-Tooth" Arlong and his nasty Fish Man pirates, who specialize in using mafia tactics to squeeze the lifeblood from innocent villagers. Needless to say, it comes as a big surprise to everyone that pirate-hating Nami is actually a member … [Read more...] about One Piece 9 by Eiichiro Oda: B+
One Piece 8 by Eiichiro Oda: B
From the back cover: If Luffy wants to get out of a year's worth of chore-boy duty on the oceangoing restaurant Baratie, he's got to rid the seas of the evil Don Krieg. Unfortunately, Krieg's armed to the teeth and aided by his "Demon Man," Commander Gin. The battle takes a surprising turn as Krieg reveals his increasingly deadly military might! Meanwhile, Nami has sailed off … [Read more...] about One Piece 8 by Eiichiro Oda: B
One Piece 7 by Eiichiro Oda: B
From the back cover: Don Krieg's evil pirate armada attempts to hijack the oceangoing restaurant Baratie, but the pirate-cooks put up a fierce resistance—until Krieg reveals one of the greatest secret weapons in his arsenal: Invincible Pearl! When sous-chef Sanji steps into the fray, it turns out that he and Chef Zeff have some unfinished business concerning the loss of the … [Read more...] about One Piece 7 by Eiichiro Oda: B