What I read in December: Digest Version, Part 1 of 2

b Aria 4: Trip to the beach!  Meeting Grandma!  The perils of hitching a ride with Woody!  Aria continues to be a soothing, relaxing, wide-eyed exploration of a future world more laid back than our own.  You really want it to exist, so you can go there.

"Just consider it a secret ingredient to a happy life.  Try to turn pain into something better.  Enjoy everything you do.  Living each day is wonderful.  Just give yourself credit for your hard work." 140-141

b Dengeki Daisy1-10: So except for that one HUGE, GLARING LOGIC PROBLEM I CAN'T GET OVER WHEN I REREAD IT, I still love pretty much everything about this series.  Its goofy side, its serious side, its romantic side, it's suspense/action/techno-thriller aspects, its author's notes, its hilarious and unexpected crudity, everything it does that shojo is just not supposed to do: this is solid, good stuff here.

b Dogs 5:It's funny because the overall shallow plot means that basically the same actions get repeated each volume.  There is fighting, extreme violence, short bursts of hints about terrible pasts, smoking, mysterious crypticness, drinking, occasional touching moments between characters, miscommunication, and so much style.

b Drops of God 3:I don't drink wine.  I think it smells of fermenting things, and I just can't stomach fermenting things of any kind.  I love this manga and its crazy premise of a shojo-style, drawn out showdown between two boys, er, men as they learn and grow from interactions with each other.  There's also a lot of wine and awesome, ridiculous commentary about wine and what it tastes like.  If I had any interest in wine, this would be an awesome resource along with being an awesome manga.  It's like Yakitate Japan for grownups, and who doesn't want to read that?

b Kaoru Mori: Anything and Something: Basically, yes.  Everything from short pieces for men's magazines of various focus and fetish to trip narratives and the crazy illustrated author's notes we've come to love only in greater quantity. The quality is wildly variable, and reading it one story at a time is probably a good idea (instead of reading the whole thing in extended bouts), but I enjoyed it.