Higuri You - Cantarella, vol. 10 (Eng. trans.)
Fri, Apr. 18th, 2008 02:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterEeeeeeee! 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.
(no subject)
Sat, Apr. 19th, 2008 03:00 am (UTC)Sigh. I am hoping it will be over soon, but GoComi says they will pass on any info they get.