2025 read #32: Lioness Rampant by Tamora Pierce.

Lioness Rampant by Tamora Pierce

363 pages

Published 1988

Read from March 31 to April 11

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

After habitually taking three or more years between installments, I decided to switch it up and read the last volume of the Lioness Quartet immediately after I finished The Woman Who Rides Like a Man.

Perhaps I should have waited at least a little bit longer. This is the bulkiest book in the quartet, stuffed with a couple books’ worth of plotlines, the convenient return of more than one previously defeated enemy, and a lot of introducing one friend group to another friend group. Focused on my own writing this month, for the first time since 2022, I found I didn’t have much attention to spare, especially for the chapters away from Alanna. In particular, a forty page chapter cramming together all the political scheming that’s been happening in the capital in Alanna’s absence took me days to get through.

Rampant suffers, I think, from the need to give everyone and everything resolution. The result is an unevenly paced finale that’s less satisfying than it should have been.

2025 read #31: The Woman Who Rides Like a Man by Tamora Pierce.

The Woman Who Rides Like a Man by Tamora Pierce

269 pages

Published 1986

Read from March 29 to March 31

Rating: 3 out of 5

I read the first book in this series, appropriately enough titled Alanna: The First Adventure, in 2018. It wasn’t until three years later that I read the second, In the Hand of the Goddess. Somehow even more time has elapsed between reading the second and third book, which I’m only just now getting around to, almost three and a half years later. Truth be told, though, 2018 feels much farther from 2021 than 2021 does from now. Pandemic time has never made sense, and the pre-pandemic world feels like a different lifetime compared to the eternal present of the 2020s.

More so than when I read the first two books, something clicked with this series; I think I finally get it now. It is, quite simply and gloriously, wish fulfillment for 1980s horsegirls. Alanna is a badass young knight with violet eyes, a magic cat, a sword named Lightning, and a horse named Moonlight. This installment features a series of incidents rather than a plot, but it works. As a hyperlexic child, I would have eaten it up.

Unfortunately, Woman has its share of 1980s yikes: noble desert tribes, a hook-nosed villain, white imperialism, a prophecy that the Northern King must rule the tribes to bring peace. There’s also a dubious age-gap relationship.

On the other side of that coin, the Overton window has shifted so sharply to the right over the last four decades that Pierce’s starter-kit feminism — Alanna has sex outside of marriage! Alanna uses magic birth control! Alanna seeks her own path in life! — would somehow be more controversial today than it was in 1986. If this were somehow published for the first time today, it would soon be banned in fifteen states, and not because of the age gap.

2025 read #18: The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum.

The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum

Illustrated by John R. Neill

159 pages

Published 1909

Read from February 12 to February 13

Rating: 2 out of 5

I figured I’d knock this one out real quick, since it’s the last Oz book included in my library’s omnibus volume. (Well, I guess it isn’t an omnibus if it’s only the first five books, but still.) My country is accelerating into fascism and I can’t spend all my time spiraling about it.

This time, Dorothy trustingly accompanies a drifter dubbed the shaggy man. They reach an enchanted crossroads, pick the seventh road, and inevitably bumble through a series of silly adventures in different parts of fairyland. Many of the lands and creatures this time around skew closer to Aesop than to Baum’s usual blend of rustic and clockwork aesthetics. Soon enough, though, Road reaches the typical Oz fare: checking in with every single companion from the previous four books, because that’s why we simply begged that Mama and Papa must get the new storybook! Also, Santa Claus shows up for a birthday party, because why not.

I have no idea if I’ll continue on with the next nine Oz books from Baum. These five have been a pleasant distraction, but aside from Ozma of Oz, and the ending of The Marvelous Land of Oz, they haven’t done much to distinguish themselves. I suppose if my library gets any of the later volumes, I might consider it.

2025 read #17: Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum.

Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum

Illustrated by John R. Neill

128 pages

Published 1908

Read February 12

Rating: 2 out of 5

Back at it again with the fourth Oz book. This time Dorothy falls into a vegetable kingdom deep inside the Earth, where she happens to meet the Wizard of Oz, out being a humbug as usual. Together with their new companions — Zeb the human boy, Jim the horse, and Eureka the kitten — they adventure through a series of subterranean realms.

It’s a step down from Ozma of Oz, at least to my modern adult tastes. The episodic bedtime story structure is back, sending our friends pell-mell through tunnels and caverns, meeting strange new folks, then moving on. When they happen to reach the Land of Oz, the narrative sputters away into a hangout sesh. But it wasn’t actively unpleasant or anything.

2025 read #15: Ozma of Oz by L. Frank Baum.

Ozma of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Illustrated by John R. Neill

153 pages

Published 1907

Read from February 9 to February 10

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

I liked this installment, which largely discards the “new adventure every chapter” storybook structure of the first two Oz tales in favor of a simpler but more cohesive storyline. Dorothy is back in “fairyland” after another weather-related mishap, this time in the company of a pugnacious hen named Bill and, eventually, our good friend Ozma. The quest to locate and restore the royal family of Ev isn’t as iconic as defeating a Wicked Witch or gender-bending into a princess, but for early 20th century kidlit, Ozma of Oz is solid.

2025 read #10: The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum.

The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Illustrated by John R. Neill 

145 pages

Published 1904

Read from January 28 to January 29

Rating: 2 out of 5

Perhaps because this second installment lacks the nostalgic familiarity of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, I didn’t appreciate it as much. Or perhaps it’s because it’s hard to find the joy in life when an illegitimate fascist government employs shock doctrine to demoralize and dismantle your country.

It’s hard to separate Wizard from its movie, so it’s difficult to say which book is better. For most of Land, Tip is a less engaging protagonist than (the movie version of) Dorothy. Pumpkinhead has a promising introduction, but the eventual adventuring crew of the Scarcrow, the Tin Man, the Saw-Horse, the Wobble-Bug, and so forth feels much less entertaining than (the movie version of) Wizard’s cast. Their scenes are full of bickering, and puns, and bickering over puns. For a depressed adult in the twenty-first century, it grows tiresome.

Without beloved cinematic plot beats to carry it, Land is a bit of a trudge to this modern reader, the frenetic bedtime story pace giving very little to latch onto. Even its proto-feminist message of “girls get to sit at the table too” gets lost in its “girls want jewelry and bon-bons” antics.

That said, the final gender-bent twist is delightful, especially for a book this old. It elevates my final opinion of Land quite a bit, and reassures me that the rest of the Oz books might be worth reading.

2025 read #5: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 13 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 13 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

180 pages

Published 2024 (English translation published 2025)

Read January 16

Rating: 4 out of 5

It’s been a hell of a bad ride since I finished the previous installment of Witch Hat Atelier back in September. Fuck.

It’s an adjustment to go from splurging through the series to being all caught up and having to wait months for the next translated tankōbon. The number of characters and tangle of plot lines in Atelier makes it especially difficult. I floundered at first to recall what was going on; when a new character (Richeh’s big brother) got introduced, I was confused, concerned that I’d completely forgotten someone important.

This is a solid installment, progressing the conflict between the principles of the Pointed Caps and their desire to help people. The way forward chosen by the characters — invent new spells! — seems a bit trite, but Shirahama’s artwork is stunning as always, whirling between characters and scenes with assurance and verve.

2025 read #3: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum.*

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum*

Illustrated by W.W. Denslow 

122 pages

Published 1900

Read from January 6 to January 7

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

* Denotes a reread.

My partner R introduced me to the film version of Wicked the other night, a movie so enjoyable it rekindled my interest in the book version. I’m not sure I’ll ever follow up on that; I attempted to read Wicked back in 2014, got seventeen pages in, and gave up. It isn’t a good novel. Still, I might try again someday. And in either case, I thought it might be fun to revisit The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, perhaps even work my way into the later Baum books.

Having grown up on the 1939 musical, Wizard of Oz was a disappointment to my childhood self, who expected the same technicolor pageant in book form. The prose is weightless, as was so often the case with early chapter books. The story flits between wacky encounters and creatures at a bedtime story pace, and its ironies are about as subtle as a tornado. The Wicked Witch of the West, for instance, is Dorothy’s antagonist for just one chapter. In comparison, the movie is polished and tightly plotted. I can’t exactly criticize a book for doing exactly what was expected of it in its time, but that doesn’t mean I have to enjoy it, personally.

I’d be curious to read a gloss of Oz that illuminated the turn of the century political satire underlying everything here. No publisher ever seems to bundle this book with commentary, sadly.

2025 read #1: Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle: 1 by Kagiji Kumanomata.

Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle: 1 by Kagiji Kumanomata

Translated by Tetsuichiro Miyaki

168 pages

Published 2016 (English translation published 2018)

Read from December 31, 2024 to January 1

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

In 2024, I read 157 books, the most I’ve ever read in one year as an adult. It was also the very first year I read at least ten books each calendar month. Many, possibly most, of the books I read were quick reads: manga, magazines, novellas, poetry collections. Some might sniff at that, but a record is a record, and who cares what others think? It’s not like anyone but plagiarism bots reads these reviews anyway.

Moving into 2025, I want to read more deliberately, instead of for big numbers. I want to read less overall, to free up time for writing. So naturally the first book of 2025 is… a volume of manga.

I learned about this series thanks to an ad in the back of a volume of Frieren. I’m always open to charming high fantasy manga, especially now that I’ve finished Delicious in Dungeon and I’m all caught up with Witch Hat Atelier. Sleepy Princess looked promising, an adorable tale of a kidnapped princess who, safe and bored inside a castle of monsters, goes to great lengths to get quality sleep. As a fellow princess-and-the-pea sleeper myself, I could relate. The manga pretty much delivers on that premise, and does so adequately. The way Princess Syalis hunts through the demon castle for her various bedding needs is pleasantly reminiscent of Delicious in Dungeon, if you replace food with sleep.

Unfortunately, at least in this initial volume, Princess lacks characterization, and the princess’s nocturnal side-quests quickly become repetitive. This slim tankōbon is packed with thirteen chapters, each of which is fairly self-contained. As a result, the story is episodic, and never develops much substance. I don’t think I’m intrigued enough to continue spending money on this series.

Also discouraging any investment: the binding error in this copy (most of chapters nine and ten are replaced with repeats of chapters four and five). Bad luck, or a shoddy press? I’m not shelling out more to find out.

2024 read #110: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 12 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 12 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

179 pages

Published 2023 (English translation published 2024)

Read September 11

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

This is it. I’m now caught up with the current English language tankōbon run of Witch Hat Atelier, with no more until January. Hard to believe I hadn’t even heard of this series when I googled for manga to sate my Delicious in Dungeon hunger this spring.

And what a stunning volume this is. After two fairly quiet, understated books, Shirahama unleashes magical violence in intricate panels, jaw-dropping splash pages, and adroit compositions. Action shots and moments of introspection are staged with equal finesse.

In the midst of the action, all the character development of the last two volumes amply pays off. Characters have climactic moments of trust, of doubt, of rising to the occasion. Tears sprang to my eyes more than once.

Witch Hat has dominated my summer the way few, if any, series ever have. I could have used these books when I was a kid, yet Shirahama is the rare author who pulls together a story just as compelling and comforting for adults as it is for younger readers. I’m sad to part from Atelier these next few months, but I’m so happy it’s become part of my life.

2024 read #109: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 11 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 11 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

158 pages

Published 2022 (English translation published 2023)

Read September 11

Rating: 4 out of 5

Creative block, and the pressures of deadlines, are significant themes in this volume. Which feels particularly apt this time around.

Much like Volume 10, this tankōbon largely feels like a plateau in between major plot movements, setting the pieces for what's to come. The Silver Eve procession is delightful, and this volume sees significant growth for Agott, the character I relate to the most. But, aside from a handful of flashy panels, and of course the gorgeous, monstrous menace of the cliffhanger sequence, the art and storytelling are muted, utilitarian. I assume Shirahama was pacing herself, saving her energies for more intricate pieces to come.

That's part of the manga business, or so I assume. I cannot imagine the pressures, the workload, the stress of deadlines involved in authoring an ongoing serial like this. I'd happily wait longer for volumes if it meant the artist is less stressed and has more time. But clearly, I'm not a capitalist.

2024 read #91: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 10 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 10 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

156 pages

Published 2022 (English translation published 2022)

Read August 9

Rating: 4 out of 5

We’ve reached the end of my self-allotted ration of Witch Hat for the month. In September, I’ll read volumes 11 and 12, and be all caught up with the translated books. Sad face.

After the emotional tension and thematic knots laid out so beautifully in Volume 9, this tankōbon feels a bit like a muddle, quick-cutting through storylines for all the girls (and Tartah and Custas too) while also introducing fresh complications in the form of King Deanreldy and his son Prince Eoleo.

It all feels important to Shirahama’s themes of power, its risks, and who decides who gets to wield it. It gives us the most visceral glimpse yet into why certain practices of magic have been banned in this world. But the storytelling felt a bit like a plateau after the breathless build of Volume 9.

Not that I didn’t like it, by any means. Shirahama continues to expertly weave tragedy and dread throughout the seemingly innocent fantasy. Certain other series about young people learning to be witches could never maintain this level of quality.

2024 read #90: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 9 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 9 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

174 pages

Published 2021 (English translation published 2022)

Read from August 5 to August 6

Rating: 4 (maybe 4.5) out of 5

If Shirahama’s artwork felt less ambitious in Volume 8, she more than makes up for it here. Right from the first sequence of Chapter 46, which transitions from a storybook of old legends into Coco and friends’ arrival in the city of Ezrest, and then visualizes the girls' explorations of the city as a board game, this tankōbon is full of clever, creative, and downright gorgeous uses of art to tell (and to augment) the story.

Also, the thematic table-setting in Volume 8 pays off here, as the conflict between helping people with magic, and keeping magic tightly guarded for fear of its abuse in the wrong hands, makes for an explosive emotional crisis. Shirahama does an excellent job at portraying what’s at stake, both for the hardline magic cops (and why they do what they do) as well as the ordinary people who have been deprived of magic by fiat, after horrors committed centuries before.

It’s damn fine storytelling, possibly my favorite tankōbon from this series so far.

2024 read #89: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 8 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 8 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

155 pages

Published 2020 (English translation published 2021)

Read August 5

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Both for budgetary reasons and to eke out the remaining volumes, I’ve been rationing how many I can order each month. For August, I’ve obtained volumes 8, 9, and 10. I’m saving 11 and 12 (where the extant run of translated tankōbon ends) for September.

This volume begins a new story arc, with Coco (and the rest of Qifrey's atelier) preparing to go to the Silver Eve festival in Ezrest, to help out Tartah at his stationery booth. Tartah's childhood crush on Coco is perhaps the least interesting plotline in this series for me, so centering that crush (and Tartah) made this a middling volume at best.

I get that the focus on Tartah and Custas (who hasn’t been able to walk since the river flood way back in Volume 2) is to provide more of a commoner’s-eye point of view, a desire to change the world to help ordinary people, chafing against all the ancient restrictions on magic. The conflict between the desire to change the world for the better, and the very good reasons to restrict magic, is one of the core themes of the series, so it makes sense to highlight it this way, complicating Coco’s allegiances as we build toward the denouement. It underlines important concepts of privilege, accessibility, and equity.

Still, I just never clicked with Tartah as a character. It seems like a waste to focus so much on him when literally any of the characters in the atelier could use the airtime. Maybe that’s just my opinion, though. “This character isn’t my favorite” is a silly critique of a children’s manga from someone who’s an adult and not the target audience.

Shirahama’s artwork remains as impressive as always, though it doesn’t get the same chance to shine here as it did in Volume 7.

2024 read #81: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 7 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 7 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

171 pages

Published 2020 (English translation published 2020)

Read from July 11 to July 12

Rating: 4 out of 5

Reading four volumes in a row? Why not! It’s the hottest summer on record, and the coldest summer any of us will ever know again, and I don’t have the brain space for much else right now.

One thing I love about this series is how creative Shirahama is with her world and its magical contraptions. Atelier's setting is far more creative (and far more downright appealing) than, say, Harry Potter's. There's a particular magical contraption introduced here in Chapter 37, and which takes a central role in Chapter 38, that I don't want to spoil for anyone, but I cannot wait to see more people appreciate in the anime.

Of course, that brings us to the events of Chapter 40, which are notorious amongst the manga readers. I'm curious to see how all of this will resolve. For now, though, I'm fresh out of volumes to read.

2024 read #80: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 6 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 6 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

173 pages

Published 2019 (English translation published 2020)

Read from July 10 to July 11

Rating: 4 out of 5

My kid is with me for the summer, which (as it always does) makes it next to impossible to read prose for any length of time. I have some fresh poetry books on hand, so it won't all be Witch Hat Atelier. But Witch Hat Atelier sounds good right now. Especially after the trailer for the anime series dropped the other day.

The manga has hit its stride in the last couple issues. The artwork is dynamic and beautiful, the characters have gained some depth, the world Shirahama has set up has grown. The Witch Hat fandom has infiltrated my TikTok algorithm in recent days, which has unfortunately spoiled me on some future developments, but with that in mind, it’s been nice to see, say, the character Olruggio get more of the spotlight. 

Of course, Atelier is first and foremost a manga for younger readers, and that’s particularly evident in this volume, which centers storylines about bullying, loyalty, and learning to work together, in case the artwork and heightened stakes made you forget who the target audience was.

Still, I needed something light and easy to follow, and this is just about the best thing I could think of to fill those requirements while still engaging my interest. A lovely installment.

2024 read #79: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 5 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 5 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

189 pages

Published 2019 (English translation published 2020)

Read July 3

Rating: 4 out of 5

To hell with it, we're doing another volume of Witch Hat Atelier. Clearly this is my preferred method of dissociation during this stage of the fall of democracy.

Another fine installment, Volume 5 serves to wrap up the cliffhangers of Volume 4 (which is another good reason to read them back to back). It’s almost all action sequence, with brief moments to breathe and add depth. It doesn’t stand on its own the way the best volumes of this series do, but it’s fast-paced and creative and enjoyable, full of character touches and sweeping, kinetic artwork.

This volume’s ending serves as a natural break in the story, marking the end of the trial on the serpent path. Which is good, because I’ve run out of volumes for the moment. (I may or may not have ordered a couple more, because money is fake but dopamine is desperately needed right now.)

2024 read #78: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 4 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 4 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

190 pages

Published 2018 (English translation published 2019)

Read July 3

Rating: 4 out of 5

It’s hard to do anything but doomscroll these days. SCOTUS is handing imperial powers over to the executive branch, all while the voters, somehow, have forgotten just how miserable the Trump years were. Similar trajectories of fascism are on the rise everywhere around the globe. I want to escape reality, yet it seems impossible to read these silly little books.

I hate this fucking timeline.

Anyway. Witch Hat Atelier! Yay!

Clearly, I’m not in the right headspace. Neither to appreciate a book nor to write a coherent review of it (not that I write many of those around here). Still, this book has penguin gryphons! Serpent paths! Rising stakes! A magical test! A real sense of danger! It’s all really good, coming together in a satisfying installment.

Shirahama’s artwork remains superb; she has more room to experiment here than she did in Volume 3, with chilling flashbacks to magic’s evil days, and action sequences that ripple and flow beautifully. And, because relevance to real-world problems has always been the secret ingredient to fantasy, I had a good cry after Qifrey mused, “Mankind is truly terrifying. As is the fact that so few of us acknowledge how easily terrifying things may come to pass.”

Damn it, I thought this was escapism.

Fuck the fascists. I know that none of this has anything to do with the book in hand, but fuck the fascists. Authoritarian control is the repudiation of humanity, of life and joy and change and meaning. I’m on the side of life, as long as I have it.

2024 read #76: Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne.*

Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne*

Translator uncredited

291 pages

Published 1864 (English translation published 1965)

Read from June 30 to July 2

Rating: 1.5 out of 5

* Denotes a reread

I had hoped for better, revisiting this book.

When I read Five Weeks in a Balloon back in 2015, I learned that Jules Verne had been substantially more racist than I’d picked up on as a child. Journey to the Center of the Earth had been a formative book for me; more importantly, I remembered it as a fun paleontological adventure tale without much opportunity for unhinged racism. I must have read a bowdlerized translation, however, because before his characters even leave the house on Köningstrasse, Verne found ways to be casually racist.

Another adult realization: what an abusive piece of shit the character Otto Lidenbrock is. He verbally and psychologically abuses his nephew and his servant, and subjects them to starvation when he’s fixated on something. The saddest thing to me is to observe how much I normalized all this as a child. With an abusive parent of my own, I didn't even register Professor Lidenbrock’s behavior when I was a kid; that was just what adults were like in my world. Oof.

The story is nothing more than a standard boy’s-life adventure run through a filter of primitive early geoscience. Once the party climbs Sneffels and begins their interminable descent, my nostalgia took over, and I had a decent enough time. Nonetheless, by just about any measure, this isn't quality literature. Verne’s style hews closer to fictional travel guide than to trifles like plot or characterization.

Coming back to the topic of different translations: I can’t be sure, but I think the translation I read as a kid was far better than this one. The prose is amateurish, overly formal, lacking in fluency and flow. Perhaps it’s closer to how Verne wrote in the original French; it does feel an awful lot like antique writing for children.

2024 read #68: Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 3 by Kamome Shirahama.

Witch Hat Atelier: Volume 3 by Kamome Shirahama

Translated by Stephen Kohler

191 pages

Published 2018 (English translation published 2019)

Read June 13

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

After I read Volume 2, I meant to give my bank account a little break and not immediately rush out for the next installment. My partner R, however, treated me to it, so we're back at it again!

This volume spends much of its run establishing plot points and developing characters. Important "setting the table" stuff, to be sure, but it feels like a bit of a lull. I think part of that feeling comes from how it resolves the cliffhanger that ended Volume 2. (Mild spoiler: They Steven Universe it and convince their antagonists to stop, mid attack, by talking it through. Nothing wrong with resolving conflict by talking it through, but it's anticlimactic go through the trouble of a cliffhanger to get there.) The art remains as solid as ever, but this installment didn't give Shirahama as much opportunity to flex her splash page skills.

Overall, I'm glad to have a bit of a hangout vibe, giving our characters some space to breathe. But not all that much happens here, making this specific volume feel a bit thin, especially in comparison to the wonderfully paced first book.