(no subject)

[skygiants]

Okay, before I vanish from the internet for a week and inevitably get way behind on writing everything up, one last booklog post! (Well. Mangalog . . . that word looks exceedingly bizarre.)

Back in April, I made a post about romances and a whole bunch of people promptly recced me Mori Kaoru's Emma. I've now read the first three volumes, and I'm very much enjoying it, though it took me a while to warm up to it - uh, largely because the romance, while sweet, is the least interesting part to me.

Basically the manga takes place towards the end of the Victorian era and centers on William, the son of a rich merchant family, and Emma, the quiet and beautiful maid to his former governess. Naturally they fall in love! This is most of the first volume, and I was a little dubious - I really liked the art and the historical detail, but I've been reading Victorian-era historical novels for many many years, and I was sort of unconvinced that even extremely naive teenagers would be oblivious to the class barriers between a wealthy merchant and a housemaid. (Which is not to say the manga is oblivious to these barriers - in fact, it focuses on them very closely and for the most part accurately - but William and Emma constantly seem to be amazed at them, which amazes me.) But I kept reading, and I'm glad I did, because as of the third volume the manga has definitely grown on me. Mori often focuses more on slice-of-life in the time period than on dramatic plot developments, and potrays the different kinds of life very well - I love the large household that Emma joins in the third volume and the various dynamics among the servants, and I really like, too, that the emphasis isn't on tearjerking "SUFFERING AND TRAGEDY OF THE DOWNTRODDEN!" or on heaping misery onto Emma, but instead just kind of calmly depicts how people go about their lives. And the art really is gorgeous. (She did her costume research! I did a little dance when Emma borrows a dress from her employer and the fashion was accurately out-of-date!)

Also, unrelated to the main story, but the zany zooming notes-from-the-author at the end kind of made me fall a little in love with Kaoru Mori.

Comments

[furikku.livejournal.com]

There's more Mori goodness in Shirley, which is mostly short stories and partially about an adorable 13-year-old maid. :3

[skygiants]

Which the library even has! *bookmarks happily*

[spellcoats.livejournal.com]

Your icon is unbearably pretty.

[skygiants]

Thank you! :D I am now trying to restrain my long glowing description of how this is because the lady in the icon is the most gorgeous amazing badass swing-dancing lady REVOLUTIONARY ASSASSIN in the history of television um.