ANIME: 絶園のテンペスト (Blast of Tempest)

Image from Zetsuen.net
From left to right: Fuwa Aika, Takigawa Yoshino, Fuwa Mahiro, Kusaribe Hakaze

At a glance: anime, fantasy, mystery, some probably NSFW moments/scenes; 24 episodes (20-min each)


From Aniplex USA:

One day, a sorceress princess was stuffed into a barrel and banished.
One day, a single girl was suddenly murdered, and the culprit still runs free.
And one day, a battle spanning time and space over magic and revenge began!
Sanity and madness, sense and intelligence, self-confidence and convictions.
The tragic tale of this irrational world starts now.

The Kusaribe family is a family of sorcerers under the protection of the “Tree of Origins”. Their princess, Hakaze Kusaribe, was the greatest sorceress of their family. But Samon Kusaribe, a member of their family seeking to resurrect the “Tree of World's End”, a tree that opposes the “Tree of Origins” and controls the power of destruction, stuffs her into a barrel, and banishes her to a deserted island. From the deserted island, she sends a message out to sea, which is picked up by Mahiro Fuwa, a young boy who's sworn vengeance upon the criminal who killed his little sister, Aika. Mahiro agrees to help Hakaze under the condition that she find Aika's killer with her magic. But once Mahiro's best friend and Aika's lover, Yoshino Takigawa is rescued from danger, he too gets dragged into this tale of revenge.

Luna comments

I'm referring to the characters by first name, because their last names are rarely used in the anime.

The plot was pretty good, once I got over the slightly strange idea of two all-powerful trees. I think that the foundation of the plot is the weakest thing in this anime, but I liked the actual plot & everything built around it, so I can forgive that. It's pretty interesting how they linked all the different plot elements & characters together. I do also have a minor gripe with the idea that the 'Tree of Genesis' preserves the logic of the world - I feel that order would have been a more appropriate word (but that might have been just an issue with the subtitles of the English-sub I watched).

My absolute favourite thing about this anime is all the characters (& there are no shortage of major characters, even if there are only really three main characters). I'd recommend this series even if everything else is rubbish (which is fortunately not true), because the characters are so interesting.

There is no true villain in this series. Even though you have various people & groups who work against each other, they each have their own justifiable rationales for doing what they did. There are lies, deception, manipulation, betrayal & mental sparring sessions, but I didn't think any less of the characters because of their underhandedness. In fact, I think it's amazing how they managed to make none of the characters naive & innocent (okay, maybe one), but they're all sneaky in their own ways. Each character felt different & unique.

I especially liked the contrast between the two main characters, Mahiro & Yoshino. They're in a strange, accidentally-friends-but-not-really sort of relationship. Mahiro is impulsive & driven by his desire to avenge his little sister's death, which makes him indifferent to anything else happening around him, even the possibility that the world would be destroyed. For me, this usually makes a character unlikable, but he was interesting because this made him a real wildcard in terms of other people's plans.

Yoshino, on the other hand, is quiet, rational, sensible & altogether very likable. He tags along because he didn't want to leave Mahiro alone, & then gets roped into this massive adventure.

Unfortunately, I felt that Hakaze, the main female character, was a bit lacklustre compared to her fellow characters. Not that she wasn't a good character, but she was less satisfying to watch.

& finally, I like how the only person who can save the world comes in the form of a bumbling, nervous, wimpy boy who's a bit overwhelmed by his own powers. (For some strange reason, he's the only major character who's not on the poster.)

The other characters are also interesting, but I'll leave it there.

In hindsight, I feel that the pacing is a little off (even though I had no such feeling while watching). The story splits into two very neat halves. The first half of the story is very fast-paced; the second half is still fast, but not as much, & I also felt that the tension was maintained better in the first half. Having said that, the characters are more interesting in the second half =]

My favourite parts

• Mahiro & Yoshino's confrontation with Samon
• Flashback of how Mahiro & Yoshino met
• Timing of the title screen in episode 15
• Episode 21

Closing

Watch it, even if it's just for the characters =]

ANIME: 言の葉の庭 (The Garden of Words)

This is also known as Kotonoha no Niwa , which is the romanisation of the Japanese.

Image from official website
Where he tries to make shoes for her. Click for larger image. Isn't the art so pretty?

At a glance: drama, romance, contemporary; movie (46 minutes)


Summary from the English website:

When Takao, a young high school student who dreams of becoming a shoe designer, decides to skip school one day in favor of sketching in a rainy garden, he has no idea how much his life will change when he encounters Yukino. Older, but perhaps not as much wiser, she seems adrift in the world. Despite the difference in their ages, they strike up an unusual relationship that unexpectedly continues and evolves, without planning, with random meetings that always occur in the same garden on each rainy day. But the rainy season is coming to a close, and there are so many things still left unsaid and undone between them. Will there be time left for Takao to put his feelings into actions and words? Between the raindrops, between the calms in the storm, what will blossom in THE GARDEN OF WORDS?

Luna comments

The first thing that strikes me about this film is how incredibly well-presented it is, especially in the artwork and the soundtrack. As you can see above, the artwork is ineffably beautiful. It's realistic, but also has a certain element of fantasy in it, even though the story is firmly rooted in the real world. There's an insane amount of detail (unfortunately I didn't watch this in very high resolution) but also softness in the pictures. The central setting for this film is the garden (the Shinjuku Gyoen), but the way the artists have drawn it makes it almost like a magical, otherworldly place. The rainy scenes are drawn especially well.

There's a subdued & bittersweet tone to the movie. The pace of the story is rather slow, which I actually didn't mind in this one - for one, it suits the story, & for two, it gave me time to absorb the imagery & the music.

The plot is centred around the Akizuki Takao, the 15-year-old serial truant (only on rainy days) & Yukino, the 27-year-old woman who keeps skipping work. Both of them are lonely in their own lives, & come to enjoy each other's company. There's something really...nice, for lack of a better word, in the simple interactions that they share. He's very mature for his age; she feels a bit lost & childish for hers. I like how I didn't even feel the massive age gap between them, & I also liked how they didn't even know very much about each other all the way through. I guess that this film, for me, seems to strip away all the things unnecessary to a fulfilling relationship (not just in the romantic sense) with other people.

My favourite parts

• Anything that takes place in the garden
• The final scene before the song & credits

Closing 
I would recommend this show purely for its artwork; fortunately, it has the rest of the goods to match =]

TV SERIES: 刁蛮公主 (My Bratty Princess)

Image from Chinese Wikipedia

At a glance: comedy, historical


From DramaWiki:

Situ Jing, a mischievous free-thinking lady, and her companion, A Lian*, go on a series of adventures. She does not know that she is a princess of the former royal family. To protect her family's reputation outside the home, Situ Jing dresses as a man and calls herself Xiao Long Xia. Concerned about the plight of the refugees which the officials have been ignoring, she comes up with various schemes to help them.

Emperor Zhu Yun has been steadily working on consolidating the empire that his father had left him. A monk once gave him a puzzle, telling him that whoever solves it will help him with the problems of the empire. He escapes from his palace to wander around the city with his companion. He befriends Xiao Long Xia after he realizes that the money she has conned and stolen from others is being spent on the refugees. When Xiao Long Xia solves the puzzle, he decides to maintain closer ties with her.

The Lord of Yunnan's sister was the previous queen who drank poison and died when the last dynasty was attacked. His son, Bai Yun Fei is betrothed to Princess An Ning, sister of Emperor Zhu Yun.

An unlikely friendship develops between the Emperor, Xiao Longxia and Bai Yu Fei, each pretending to the others to be someone else. Palace and court intrigues, rebellion and assasination plots abound.

* Edit made from "A Ling" to "A Lian"


Luna comments

I really liked this show. I also have a lot of problems with it. But I enjoyed it a lot.

The summary above is a pretty good introduction to the three main characters, who basically drive the story. The remainder are about: how a rebel group tries to use Situ Jing to restore the old dynasty; how the Lord of Yunnan tries to get out of his marriage; how the emperor deals with the power-hungry, corrupt, selfish, opportunistic vultures who are his court officials.

So, what I liked about it - it's funny! Comedy almost always guarantees that I like something, as long as it's done in a style of humour I'll laugh at.

& it's not funny just because of visual humour or because of the dialogue & witty remarks. There are those, too, of course, & they're funny, but the funniest parts are where people get entangled in other people's plots. It doesn't sound funny, but it is. There's good use of dramatic irony. =]

The emperor is also very smart, and the scenes with him in them are amongst my favourites. I also think that the actor did a great job in his role - his facial expressions really suit the stuff he's doing. When he's being sneaky, he turns away and smiles. When he's trying to manipulate other people, he can pull off all sorts of performances, pretending to be any/some combination/all of the following: crying, defeated, angry, clueless, frustrated, so on. & no matter what he does to the people, they can't do anything but swallow their defeat and smile at him.

I think I might have watched the show entirely to see how he made everyone dance around him.

The other characters were...alright, I guess. Situ Jing is a pretty cool character - she's independent, smart, adventurous, & she sneaks out of home because she gets bored. Typical for a fictional female, but this series did it well enough. I think what ruined her for me was the way the characters kept praising her - because I like her, but I don't think she's that awesome, even though I guess she actually is, given the time period.

So, the emperor made the plot very interesting. The dynamics between him and the two other main characters are also very good, because at the start they're all concealing their identities & you can see them being wary of each other, trying to figure each other out, but being good friends at the same time (because they were all supporting the refugees).

I felt that once their identities were revealed, though, their dynamics weren't so interesting any more. From that point on, though, the more political side of the plot gets thicker & then you see the emperor pulling off more of his tricks. So that kind of made up for it.

I do have a lot of things I didn't like about it, which can be summarised as: illogical bits, lame bits, anachronisms, & too much praise of the lead female.

Illogical bits are within the plot, so I don't want to go into them. There were a few eyebrow-raising moments, but I'm okay with those because they don't overall ruin the awesomeness of the emperor, whom you may remember is the primary reason I watched this.

Now the anachronisms are a little more interesting. For one, I have no idea what happened with the costumes because, as little as I know about the Chinese costume & its differences throughout time, I swear that a lot of the female costumes are wrong. Why would they do that?! It couldn't be that the costume department was too cheap to get some legitimate-looking hanfu? This grated on me for the whole series.

& the second...there was a prison scene in which the servant brought in snacks, & one of the snacks was...biscuit rolls. Truthfully, I don't know whether they had biscuit rolls 500 years ago, but it...was strange. I think they were the chocolate variety, too. So, umm...

There are lame bits. Really fake laughter. I won't go into that, but that seems like staple in more recent Chinese TV series.

& then there's way too much praise for Situ Jing. It seems that everyone (except her parents, who get into trouble because of her antics) talks about how good she is & how she lives her life to the full. Which I'm okay with, for the first few times, but not after fifteen episodes. The way they praised her made it more unconvincing, in the way of - if you really believe that she's so cool, then don't you think you'd have convinced me by now?

Anyway. Aside from those things, I quite enjoyed it. Because of the emperor. He's too cool. Yes, he's in an all-powerful position & everyone has to obey him, but that doesn't necessarily secure his rule. So it's very interesting to see how he sets the field up for himself. The only thing I can imagine being even cooler is if there were two people like him in the same show, & they were pitting themselves against each other.


Closing

I highly recommend this, because I highly recommend watching the emperor at work, & he comes with the rest of the show.

FICTION: Horrorstör by Grady Hendrix

Image from Amazon.com

 
At a glance: horror, paranormal


For Goodreads users: the book's page is here


From the publisher:

Something strange is happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Columbus, Ohio. Every morning, employees arrive to find broken Kjerring wardrobes, shattered Brooka glassware, and vandalized Liripip sofa beds—clearly, someone or something is up to no good. To unravel the mystery, five young employees volunteer for a long dusk-till-dawn shift—and they encounter horrors that defy imagination. Along the way, author Grady Hendrix infuses sly social commentary on the nature of work in the new twenty-first century economy.

A traditional haunted house story in a contemporary setting (and full of current fears), Horrorstör comes conveniently packaged in the form of a retail catalog, complete with illustrations of ready-to-assemble furniture and other, more sinister accessories. We promise you’ve never seen anything quite like it!

Minor edits made e.g. spacing between words.


Luna comments:

This story started off really well. Four paragraphs in, I felt the need to text my friend (who had recommended it) & tell her how much I was already enjoying it. The writing was funny & satirical, & it imitates the Ikea catalogue as well as a book can. I really liked the satire in the book, which was kept up even after the bulk of the funny part was over.

So it was a bit sad that the author couldn't keep up that tone once the plot gets started - which is perfectly understandable, mind you, because I don't think a horror story that makes you chuckle every two lines is going to work too well. & the tone didn't really come back in the resolution, probably because it'd be wrong for the atmosphere. So I wish Hendrix kept it up, but I can understand why he didn't.

I didn't actually care for the plot very much. It's basically about the creepy history of the site upon which Orsk (the Ikea rip-off furniture store) is situated, & I felt that there wasn't very much going for it except the author trying to squeeze out all these terrifying situations. (Hendrix doesn't mind jabbing a few barbs about the endless culture of work, though. I didn't mind, but I would if it had been a different topic he was jabbing at, so there's a warning.) I did like the parallels he drew between the current furniture store &...whatever there was beforehand. I don't want to spoil it.

Having said all that, though, I was most disappointed (not in a bad way, though, because I don't like horror) by the fact that no part of the book scared me, & I've been freaked out by books that aren't labelled as horror (most notably: Jonathan Stroud's Lockwood & Co series). Maybe it's because the expectation was there for this book. So I don't like horror as a genre, but I was disappointed I didn't feel the horror. Hmm. There were some graphic moments though.

I think the thing I most enjoyed about it was the way it's set out like an Ikea catalogue (as mentioned above). It has a store map & introductions to various furniture items. Even in the story, there were constant references to locations in the store. The setting and worldbuilding was done really well for this story. I think it works so well partially because of Ikea's uniqueness & the strong impression it leaves in my mind, so that reading the setting of Horrorstor felt like a familiar experience.


Closing

I began this with too many expectations, I think. If I hadn't, I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more. But it was good, as it was =]

MOVIE: Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb

Image from Wikipedia

At a glance: comedy


From the official website:

Get ready for the most wild and adventure-filled Night At the Museum ever, as Larry spans the globe, uniting favorite and new characters while embarking on an epic quest to save the magic before it is gone forever.

Luna comments

I think this is one of those stories that highlights the big difference between movies and books. If this was a novel, I don't think I'd enjoy it. As a movie, though, I did - probably mainly because it was comedy. There's a lot of visual humour, and I found it very funny.

I like museums, too, so that's another plus for the setting =]

Aside from that, though...there's not much to say about the film. I liked it, that's all. The plot isn't anything really special - there's a very simple problem, and they have a very simple solution (that takes a bit more work to get it to work). It's a rather simple "Do this, do that, some complications thrown in" sort of film. There's nothing to love or hate about the story. To me, it's just a sort of background on which to hang the comedy, & that's okay with me.

Similarly, the characters aren't very interesting or very dull. They're what you need for this film to work, & that's okay too. & of course, there's some requisite stuff about the importance of relationships and friendships thrown in - the sort of thing I'd get sick of from overuse, if I didn't feel bad about getting sick of it. I did, however, like the father-son dynamics between Larry Daley and Nick, especially the look, no plans, dad! attitude from Nick and Larry's stressed-father antics.

The ending is also a nice, fitting conclusion to both the movie and the series. =] (Surely they're not going to be like Toy Story 3 and pull out a fourth movie. This ending feels too final to have anything else added.)

My favourite parts:

• The cat video
• The familiar Roman city
• Sir Lancelot's nose

Closing

It's a light film with a pretty straightforward and typical plot, but quite funny =] It's good for when you don't feel like taking anything seriously. 

FICTION: The Last Knight by Hilari Bell

Image from Amazon.com

At a glance: young adult, fantasy, humour


For Goodreads users: the book page is here


From Amazon.com

Need a Hero?

You've got one in Sir Michael Sevenson.

Although there hasn't been a knight errant in over two hundred years, this young noble has decided to revive the trade. He's found himself a reluctant partner in Fisk, a clever rogue who has been given the choice of serving as Michael's squire or going to jail for a very long time. Now Michael and Fisk are on a quest to right wrongs, protect the innocent, and make the world a happier place.

It's not going to be easy. On their first attempt at rescuing a damsel in distress, they break a lady out of a tower, only to discover she was there for good reason: awaiting trial for poisoning her husband. Now the would-be heroes must find Lady Ceciel and return her to justice or be condemned themselves.

Luna comments

The edition I picked up didn't even have a blurb. Where one should have been, the publisher decided to reproduce the opening paragraph, & I borrowed the book purely based on that.

Which is to say, I really like the tone of the novel. It's narrated in alternating POVs, so we get a glimpse into the sharp, street smart mind of Fisk, as well as the very noble and naive world view harboured by Michael. Michael does everything based on morals and honour, while Fisk tags along more or less because the law requires it. Both of these characters are very interesting in their own way, and that clash of personalities leads to some of the most interesting character dynamics that I've seen in the books I've recently read.

The story is set in a medieval-like world in which there is magic. There are magical creatures and plants, and people with various Gifts. These are rather typical in fantasy, so the idea doesn't take too long to grasp. I did like the little detail with the two moons in their world, which Bell often refers to. It gives a sense of "familiar, yet very different".

The plot somewhat resembles that of a 'questing'-type story, but it has a certain element of mystery surrounding Lady Ceceil and the circumstances of her husband's death. I enjoyed reading through Fisk and Michael's adventures, and the longwinded path they took to arriving at the conclusion.

Things to look out for

• Fisk, when he's getting ideas or planning or cheating people
• Character interactions between Michael and Fisk

 
Closing

I quite liked this =]

MUSICAL: Wicked

I finally got around to watching this, after "Defying Gravity" first took (a fraction of) my grade by storm, once upon a time in high school.

Image from Ticketmaster.com.au website

From the Australian official website

Awe-inspiring and spectacular, WICKED is the untold story of the witches of Oz. Long before Dorothy dropped in, two other girls meet in the land of Oz. One, born with emerald-green skin, is smart, fiery and misunderstood. The other is beautiful, ambitious and very popular. WICKED tells the enthralling story of two unlikely friends and how they became the wicked witch of the west and Glinda the Good. 

So it's a good idea to know the story of The Wizard of Oz, because this musical is adapted from the novel which justifies the actions of the 'villain'. (If you're interested, that's Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire)


Luna comments

A note on musicals

This is the first professional musical I've watched, & it doesn't disappoint. In fact, it did the exact opposite, & I've been obsessing over the soundtrack ever since.

Wicked is about a witch, Elphaba, who was born green & unsurprisingly subject to discrimination because of it. She eventually befriends Glinda, the popular girl, and they take sorcery classes together. Meanwhile, the animals of Oz are losing their powers of speech. Elphaba sets out right things. (Except you can probably guess that it didn't turn out well, since she ended up as the villain.)

Before the first time I watched musical, I had doubts as to them - really, a story being told while the people burst into song every so often? How does that even work? But every musical I've watched since tells me that it does work. It's just a different way to tell a story.

So if you haven't watched musicals before, Wicked wouldn't be a bad place to start =]

The actual musical

A list of the things I liked most about it: the humour, the music, the props. More on those later.

The thing about the musical is that it's very fast-paced, and so it breezes over certain things - most notably, Glinda and Elphaba go from hating each other to being best friends in the span of about two scenes. I could keep up partially because I've read the novel. So from a novel-reader's point of view, that isn't done too well. (From a musical-goer's perspective, well, I haven't been to enough musicals to say.) Having said that, I prefer the plot of the musical over the plot of book, perhaps because I like the simplicity of the musical plot.

I really liked the characters in here. I didn't think I would, because you start with somewhat typical raw materials from a very typical sort of YA high school story: 1x withdrawn, rejected girl (Elphaba); 1x popular bubbly queen bee (Glinda); 1x handsome, charismatic young man (Fiyero). Despite this, I ended up quite liking the characters and their interactions, especially how Glinda and Elphaba came to be friends. Some things also hint to me that, even at the start, Glinda isn't the airhead that the musical initially presents her to be, but that's up for interpretation.

But, since it's a musical, it's probably best to dedicate more attention elsewhere. Like humour, music and props!

The musical was surprisingly funny. Even though I'd heard some of the songs before, I didn't expect it to be so light-hearted, because the novel was heavy.

Now the props. One can practically see the dollar signs on stage. There's so many props and so much detail in the props that there was no hope of catching it all. There's a dragon, numerous lights, nice backgrounds. My favourite of them is Glinda's bubble =] (I didn't know it was a bubble until Elphaba said so, much much later, so I don't think it hurts to say so here.)

And finally the music - the highlight of the whole thing. I'm not a seasoned musical-goer, as I've already said, but I think that Wicked deserves the hype. One thing that amazes me is how much better and entertaining songs sound when you watch them performed live, compared to listening to live recordings. It's hard to describe music, but I guess I can say that I think they really do depict the emotions and thoughts of the characters very well. If you're interested, the WICKED official Australia website even links to the Soundcloud for the original Broadway cast recording. Altogether, it sounds EPIC. =]

Lastly - I think it's rather sad that the musical is almost an independent thing to the cast, & that even if I watch it again, it'll be a different combination of actors & actresses on stage. The cast can be replaced, but it's the same musical. So I want to note that I really like the cast I watched (Jemma Rix, Lucy Durack, Steve Danielson, Edward Grey, Emily Cascarino, Glen Hogstrom, Reg Livermore, Maggie Kirkpatrick) =]

My favourite parts

• All the songs, but I'd make a special note of: "Dancing Through Life", "Popular", "Defying Gravity" and "For Good".
• Glinda and her bubble =]

Closing

If you like music and pretty costumes, I think you should watch it. If you're mentally adventurous, I think you should watch it. Musicals are on the expensive side of things (especially if you start comparing it to novels or movie tickets), but it's worth it.

May the songs stick in your head the way they're sticking in mine.

FICTION: Momo by Michael Ende

Happy New Year! & happy start to my blog, I guess.

I can't reasonably start this blog without a reference to my favourite book of all time: Momo by Michael Ende.

Image from Amazon.com

Audience/At a glance

Momo is ostensibly a children's fantasy, but it is actually an allegorical in nature, about how people choose to allocate their time. It's suitable both to be read like any other fantasy story, or to be read more deeply and have meanings extracted from the text.

From Amazon.com

At the edge of the city, in the ruins of an old amphitheatre, there lives a little homelss girl called Momo. Momo has a special talent which she uses to help all her friends who come to visit her. Then one day the sinister men in grey arrive and silently take over the city. Only Momo has the power to resist them, and with the help of Professor Hora and his strange tortoise, Cassiopeia, she travels beyond the boundaries of time to uncover their dark secrets.

For Goodreads users

Here is the page for this edition, & here is the page with many more editions.

Note about editions 

The novel was written in German.

The first English translation I read, and my favourite translation, is by John Brownjohn, and the above cover is for that edition. The John Brownjohn translation is also the one on which I'm writing this post. There is a newer one, by Lucas Zwirner.

Luna comments

Reading the summary, it sounds as though Momo has a superpower, which she doesn't (at least not in the sense of the Marvel/DC superheroes). Her special talent is just listening - she can help people solve their problems simply by listening to them. 

Back to the story.

General comments

I absolutely love this novel. I think this novel is pretty much the closest that any novel can get to my idea of 'everything done right'.

The central theme of this story is about time, and how people choose to allocate it. To rip a quote from the book: 

Time is life itself, and life resides in the human heart.

Perhaps in line with this, the story begins slowly, meandering through Momo's scant backstory, friendships and neighbourhood. It's slow, but it's never boring. The pace picks up about a quarter of the way in, but it's worth the wait.

I enjoyed the plot a lot =] I don't want to say too much because I don't want to deprive anyone of the experience of reading it with relatively few prejudices.

John Brownjohn is an excellent translator, and the writing is lyrical and soothing without being ostentatious. I really like the fairy-tale-like atmosphere created by the prose. It's a shame that none of the (more recent?) English editions feature the original pictures drawn by the author, for example, the book cover:

Image from the Thienemann-Esslinger website.

Momo isn't a typical hero or heroine, even though she's very much like a typical child. In the face of the crisis, she's lost and clueless, and unsure of how to proceed. Her actions are very much reactive, rather than proactive. Refreshingly, her triumph isn't due to her physical or mental superiority, but her circumstances and her special ability to listen. I do enjoy a good physical or mental battle, but it's nice to see something different.

Despite this being an allegorical tale, and despite Ende not being subtle about his message, it never feels as if he's forcing his readers to accept his viewpoint. His ideas are elegantly woven through the characters and plot. This is one of the books in which, the more you read it, the more you see in it.

Things to look out for (i.e. my favourite scenes)

• Girolamo's stories and tall tales, some of which he tells to unsuspecting tourists who think they're listening to a tour guide.
• The Men in Grey roping in one of their first victims, a barber named Figaro.
• Momo's first meeting with old friends after she returns from a visit to Professor Hora, and seeing the way the world has changed since she left.

Closing

It'd be nice if Momo were required reading for school, except I don't want anyone to have bad memories of it just because they were forced to read it. Anyway, I think that Momo is almost perfect in terms of children's literature, and that you should really read it if you haven't already. Consider re-reading if you have. =]

I also wouldn't mind seeing a Studio Ghibli take on it. (Or any other anime/cartoon versions, as long as it's 'done right' & to my liking =P It's just that so far, I feel that Studio Ghibli & select other anime directors would be more likely to get the tone right.)