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Higuri You - Cantarella, vol. 10 (Eng. trans.)
Eeeeeeee! Finally, one of my local Borders actually has a new release!
Now if only they would read my mind and stock After School Nightmare 7, which Amazon tells me is out.
Leonardo cameo!
Also, to my surprise, I found myself less engrossed in Lucrezia, Cesare and Chiaro's storyline, and utterly caught up in Alfonso and Sancia.
A large part of this is because Alfonso is Hakkai: ever smiling, in love with his older sister, missing a right eye due to said incestuous love, and unfailingly polite. But thankfully, he is not a merciless youkai killer, and he has sort of completely and totally won me over.
Well, I was won over in vol. 9, but this further cements it.
But! The hug from the back and the desperation! The fact that he actually lets her go when she says he's hurting her! The constant swearing of total devotion!
And I really love the relationship among him, Sancia and Lucrezia, especially the way Higuri is not going with jealous women. I particularly love him and Lucrezia bonding over unrequited incestuous love, which totally cracked me up. Cantarella! You have not one completely canonical incestuous relationship, but TWO! Awesome!
And! I love Lucrezia and Sancia bonding, and Lucrezia telling Alfonso that she'll protect Sancia for him. And, oh, the bit when he sings and Sancia actually gives him a kiss!
And! Even more! I mostly just adore Sancia to pieces. I love Lucrezia as well, even though she is very Standard Shoujo Heroine, and I really really love how Sancia is not being penalized for her sexuality, and how she gets angst and is, of course, sexual to hide an easily wounded heart, a la every romance hero ever. On the other hand, it would be nice if it were not because of an easy wounded heart as well, but I am still too pleased about her not being penalized for sleeping with two Borgias and other random people to care.
In fact, now I am terrified that Alfonso will die tragically in Sancia's arms. I was so terrified that I went and checked history on Wiki. Spoilery speculation for future volumes below (normally I would not cut for historical fact, but I am guessing Alfonso's fate is not well-known in history?):
Possible historical spoilers for future volumes
Aiiiieeeee! Of course he dies! Assassinated by Cesare! I am so not surprised. I largely think only Sancia and Lucrezia will make it out of this manga alive. On the other hand, while I am a sucker for tragic dying in loved one's arms, I am also hoping Higuri does something cracktastic and insane and makes it seem like he dies, only to spirit him away to a monastery or something.
I am still a little amazed by how these two siblings have overtaken my Chiaro-Lucrezia-Cesare unresolvable, completely displaced affection, occasionally incestuous triangle squee, but it has! Not that I am hoping for less for the above three, but there really wasn't that much of them in this volume.
I think I may have used up my exclamation point quotient for the week in writing this.
ETA: I cannot believe I forgot! But: NOOOOOOOO! Hiatus?! WOE! Why are all my wonderful shoujo gothic crack manga being taken from me?
At least there are still Vampire Knight and Fairy Cube.
Now if only they would read my mind and stock After School Nightmare 7, which Amazon tells me is out.
Leonardo cameo!
Also, to my surprise, I found myself less engrossed in Lucrezia, Cesare and Chiaro's storyline, and utterly caught up in Alfonso and Sancia.
A large part of this is because Alfonso is Hakkai: ever smiling, in love with his older sister, missing a right eye due to said incestuous love, and unfailingly polite. But thankfully, he is not a merciless youkai killer, and he has sort of completely and totally won me over.
Well, I was won over in vol. 9, but this further cements it.
But! The hug from the back and the desperation! The fact that he actually lets her go when she says he's hurting her! The constant swearing of total devotion!
And I really love the relationship among him, Sancia and Lucrezia, especially the way Higuri is not going with jealous women. I particularly love him and Lucrezia bonding over unrequited incestuous love, which totally cracked me up. Cantarella! You have not one completely canonical incestuous relationship, but TWO! Awesome!
And! I love Lucrezia and Sancia bonding, and Lucrezia telling Alfonso that she'll protect Sancia for him. And, oh, the bit when he sings and Sancia actually gives him a kiss!
And! Even more! I mostly just adore Sancia to pieces. I love Lucrezia as well, even though she is very Standard Shoujo Heroine, and I really really love how Sancia is not being penalized for her sexuality, and how she gets angst and is, of course, sexual to hide an easily wounded heart, a la every romance hero ever. On the other hand, it would be nice if it were not because of an easy wounded heart as well, but I am still too pleased about her not being penalized for sleeping with two Borgias and other random people to care.
In fact, now I am terrified that Alfonso will die tragically in Sancia's arms. I was so terrified that I went and checked history on Wiki. Spoilery speculation for future volumes below (normally I would not cut for historical fact, but I am guessing Alfonso's fate is not well-known in history?):
Possible historical spoilers for future volumes
Aiiiieeeee! Of course he dies! Assassinated by Cesare! I am so not surprised. I largely think only Sancia and Lucrezia will make it out of this manga alive. On the other hand, while I am a sucker for tragic dying in loved one's arms, I am also hoping Higuri does something cracktastic and insane and makes it seem like he dies, only to spirit him away to a monastery or something.
I am still a little amazed by how these two siblings have overtaken my Chiaro-Lucrezia-Cesare unresolvable, completely displaced affection, occasionally incestuous triangle squee, but it has! Not that I am hoping for less for the above three, but there really wasn't that much of them in this volume.
I think I may have used up my exclamation point quotient for the week in writing this.
ETA: I cannot believe I forgot! But: NOOOOOOOO! Hiatus?! WOE! Why are all my wonderful shoujo gothic crack manga being taken from me?
At least there are still Vampire Knight and Fairy Cube.
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I worked my way through Absolute Boyfriend 1-4 and Samurai Deeper Kyo Volume 1 and I don't even like Absolute Boyfriend. But I'm evidently in a manga mood, preferable Gothic Shoujo. Without spoiling me, is Cantarella my thing?
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Absolute Boyfriend makes me do angry flailing hands and pile it in a little pyramid with Chobits, to kick over. And then write epic essays entitled ROBOT SEX! How to Know You're Doing It Wrong.
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Absolute Boyfriend. So wrong in so many ways. I was to aware of the issues with Chobits to even look at it.
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Hmmm, other alternates...Vampire Knight, Canon, maybe Lament of the Lamb, if you like vampires? Bride of the Water God and Merupuri if you'll take kindabadwrong age differences? xxxHOLIC if you don't mind getting sucked into Tsubasa at some point?
THE ROBOT LOVE TRIANGLE RESOLUTION WAS PASTEDE ON YAY. Apparently Yuu Watase can only write one decent thing at a time, and Absolute Boyfriend lost that coin toss hard. As long as the good luck remains on Fushigi Yugi Genbu Kaiden I think I will be content. Although she has now started a yaoi(!) series, and if that one does not initially suck I may end up torn!
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Dooooo itttttttttt!
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I read vols. 1-2 of Absolute Boyfriend and it made pretty much no impression on me. Well, I had a brief crush on Glasses Guy in v. 1 because I am a sucker for people with unrequited crushes, but that didn't last through v. 2.
Hrm. I think you might like Cantarella? It actually has better gender politics than most Gothic Shoujo, but to be honest, that's not saying much (manga industry, why will you not create a feminist Gothic Shoujo series just for me?). But while it's pretty cracked out (literal damnation! demons! evil hands!), it's also fairly politic-y and more plotty than I anticipated.
Other Gothic Shoujo I like: YUKI KAORI OMG. Though I do not blame you for being turned off by the insanity of Angel Sanctuary. I love Cain Saga/Godchild like the gothic crack it is, but be warned, it has HORRIBLE gender politics and I know it squicked several people. Also, if you do pick it up, the first volume of Cain Saga sucks and has pretty much nothing to do with the rest of the story. Also also, the art improves tremendously in Godchild (she took a break in between Cain Saga and Godchild to write AS and it shows).
Vampire Knight! Again, bad gender politics and some really boring things re: the good vampire, but OMG. It has blood licking and finger sucking and not-even-thinly-disguised metaphors for sex everywhere even though the characters don't even kiss!
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I've read Vampire Knight Volumes 1-4 and all the scans, that is what started my urges towards gothic shoujo.
I'm turned ON by the insanity (for lack of a better term) it's the religious issues.
That and my younger cousins told me to read Twilight, and I heard that this was both better than Twilight, and doesn't feel like cheating on LJ Smith. She's my one true cheesy YA supernatural romance/horror author.
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Um. I feel VK is much better than Twilight, possibly because insanely gorgeous vampire types work much better in a visual medium than in prose, where I can see the pretty pictures, as opposed to having to read lots about jewel-toned eyes.
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Oh oh oh oh! I got the first Meljean Brook book because clearly I am on a cracktastic gothic streak that has broken my reader ennui.
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HIATUS? WHAT? NNNOOO!!!
I just got Vol 2 from Amazon today and was going to read it and vol 9 after I got caught up on Claymore...but...but...hiatus?
Woes...
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Sigh. I am hoping it will be over soon, but GoComi says they will pass on any info they get.
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