horror

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Lenni Reviews: “Dark Gathering” Vol. 13, by Kenichi Kondō

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

Kei and Eiko release Black Asura to save Yayoi and dispel the amassed spirits, but there is a much more powerful force working against them.

It’s about time some other priests got involved. All these horrifying entities out there, and it’s taken 13 volumes for more people to get involved. Aside for the spirits our group has been facing, the ultimate showdown is to face a GOD, and our main cast shouldn’t have to face that alone. As usual, the creature designs are shiver-inducing and I am excited to see what fresh new horrors we’ll see when the final battle happens. It was interesting to see the original concept for the start of this series as an add-on at the end, but I would have rather had more of the story. 4 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “After God” Vol. 4, by Sumi Eno

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

Waka has to deal with her vow to slay the gods and the fact one is living inside her. 

It’s probably just me but this volume turned the crazy up to 11. What was an interesting premise seems to have gone off the rails; the gods are squabbling, people getting kidnapped right and left, trying to have the goofy personalities alongside bloody violence and body horror, there’s what I feel like is a big lore dump… It’s not bad per se it’s just… What? None of this is turning out how I’d expected and I’m confused but also entertained. 4 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “Choujin X” Vol. 9, by Sui Ishida

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

Palma Shishinegura proves to be helpful to the Yamato Mori by getting information from a dead drug dealer and they push her abilities to the limit in order to get the opium source.

While Tokio takes Ely and Palma with him to the poppy fields, he has some real doubts about the prophecy and I wonder if this will lead to a betrayal of some kind. The prophecy may be bullshit but that doesn’t matter if people are willing to kill and die for it. I also love that Palma is part of the group now. Her abilities have fantastic potential and she’s just a sweetheart, There are some awesome fights in this as well so, this volume is a total package. 4.5 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead” Vol. 17, by Haro Aso & Kōtarō Takata

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

The group heads to Kagoshima where they visit the headquarters of Space W and their president, Ukaji; who is still working on his dream to send humanity to the stars even in the throws of a zombie apocalypse.

Well, this whole thing is just a wacky way to get our gang into space and have a Space X parody. The zombies are peppered in as a threat but overall, I found this goofy and didn’t take it seriously. I do like the drips of lore we’re getting and while the company parody is there, Ukaji isn’t an Elon Musk stand-in. Ukaji is inspiring and again, a bit goofy. It’s all fun but like candy it’s sweet but not a meal. 3 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “Fool Night” Vol. 5, by Kasumi Yasuda

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

As Ivy’s existence highlights very reasonable debates over transfloration, Kamiya and Hourai look into who is behind the anti-transfloration protests: Dr. Koudai.

While we get a funny story involving Kanaero hunting for a special goldfish, the cracks in the system are widening and it’s looking like this mysterious doctor is gonna make things very dangerous for the transfloration company. This may not be such a bad thing since the way people are being taken advantage of is horrific. It’s not sustainable. Why the doctor has been absent for 40 years, why he helped create a murderous plant, how all this will shake out morally for Kamiya and Hourai as their jobs are on the line will all remain to be seen. I can feel things ramping up and it’s all very interesting. 4 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “My Name Is Shingo: The Perfect Edition” Vol. 5, by Kazuo Umezz

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

Monroe is still obsessed with finding Satoru and Marin as its intelligence grows along with its body count.

I was a little shocked by the gruesome violence taking place right off the bat. Again, Monroe has no care for human life and Marin is NOT okay. I get some major Akira vibes (the original dub, not the remake) because while the anime kept a focus on the supernatural/psychic parts, the manga went off on many other tangents. None of this ever goes where I think it’s going and I am very uncomfortable with Marin’s consistant suffering. This poor girl… Satoru doesn’t have to deal with molestery shit. Heck, he’s barely in this volume. 3 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews – Challenge Edition: “100% Match” by Patrick C. Harrison III

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*This book is intended for mature readers only.

At 30 years old, Bart is looking for his perfect woman, a match for him in every way, and is obsessed with the statistics around what women want. But with a dead-end job, rotund bod,y and suspect habits, how would he find such a woman?

The horror comes from Bart’s proclivity for contaminating customers’ food at his fast food job and murder. My first complaint is the physical book:

This story was originally part of an anthology, and as you can see in comparison to my hand, it’s really small. I am shocked I was able to get this, as in my professional librarian’s opinion, books like this are a shelving nightmare. I expect them to vanish either by being stolen or lost among the regular-sized materials.  What does this have to do with the content? Nothing, I walk about what I want. Deal with it. If the author wanted this as a physical copy on its own, I don’t see any better way of doing it other than a pamphlet or holding on to it until you write a bunch of other stories to pad things out to a regular-ish sized book. This is a very mild complaint, and I don’t hold it against the story itself.

Reading this gave me the same sort of feeling I had when I watched August Underground, only this was significantly less boring. The same casual tone used when speaking of his normal actions, Bart uses with the obscene acts he commits. It’s not poorly written, and the twist ending gave me a chuckle, but overall, this was just an okay read. 2.5 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “Bad Dreams in the Night” by Adam Ellis

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This book is a collection of horror comics by Adam Ellis.

Far be it from me to not jump on a horror anthology whenever I can. And from one of my favorite comic creators online? Sign me up. I freely admit I’m biased because I love Adam’s work so much. I can also admit that if you follow his posts, you’ve seen these comics before, but having them in your hand to read and such a pretty book (I’m a sucker for books with a ribbon) is great. If you wanna curl up with some quick, spooky tales, this is a great collection. 5 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews Challenge Edition: “Woom” by Duncan Ralston

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Determined to end the pain of all his accumulated trauma, Angel rents Room 6 of the Lonely Motel and enlists the services of a plus-sized prostitute named Shyla.

This book uses Angel and Shyla’s “date” as the wrap-around to a bunch of other stories having to do with the motel and Room 6. Each story is leading up to Angel’s ultimate plans for Shyla, which I will not spoil, but there’s a reason why her being plus-sized is important. I’m not gonna lie, I expected SOOOO much worse. After “Cows” and “Playground” this was a cake walk. In fact, it was almost tragically beautiful because it’s all about Angel dealing with his pain and rage. And I will spoil a tiny bit where I don’t think Angel’s penultimate plan is… Biologically possible? I wasn’t about to Google that. I’m probably on several watch lists already. I appreciate not having graphic descriptions of rancid female private parts but it is graphic; detailed descriptions of shit, vomit, and gore. No spoilers, but I was not expecting the outcome of the prom date gone wrong. It also read fast and in the end, I just felt bad for Angel. I finished it in an afternoon. 3.5 out of 5.

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Lenni Reviews: “Dark Gathering” Vol. 12, by Kenichi Kondō

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*This book was given to me in exchange for an honest review.

Yayoi, Eiko, and Keitaro face the Spirit of F Park and with her defeated, only one more site remains.

It looks like Keitaro is finally having some reservations about Eiko’s reactions to the terrifying things happening to them.

(This is not the face of a normal person)

The backstory of the granny F Park spirit is just so fucking tragic. I mean, most of these spirits do, since they’re even still lingering in the first place, but they really went deep with this one; one tragedy after another. 

As soon as the group decided “Oh, let’s speed run this” I knew it was gonna be a shitshow and I was not disappointed. This last creature is so horrid to look at and is diabolical. The body count in this book is off the charts. This volume is a standout in the horror tension of this series. Very well done. 5 out of 5.

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