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manga: Koihime Soushi (complete)
Dec. 21st, 2008 02:37 pmPrincess Koiko has the ability to send out “love beams” that can make anyone around her be overwhelmed with love for her. In time, she’s told, the power will fade, but for now she’s content to use it to have her way. Thankfully, she is apparently devoid of anything resembling malice. The only person who is unaffected by this power is her childhood friend and protector, Shiro, who she’s in love with. When Koiko learns that she’s to be married, she rebels and announces that she’ll only marry Shiro, at which point, she learns that “Shiro” isn’t real, but is a ninja named Asagi who was her bodyguard, but who has been sent on another mission now that she’s to be married. Not satisfied with this, Koiko runs away to find Shiro, attempting to help another pair of separated lovers along the way, though her efforts have unintended consequences.
I almost skipped over this at the bookstore before I noticed that it was by Koge Donbo, the mangaka of the wonderfully, morbidly funny Yoki Koto Kiku that I read last year. (I really need to read some of his/her actual series, instead of just the one volume stuff.) Koihime Soushi is cute, but not as engaging as Yoki Koto Kiku. At a glance, with the chibi-styled art and energetic princess, it looks like a comedy manga, but it’s more of a bittersweet romantic drama disguised as an energetic comedy.
There’s also a very strange short story at the end about a young woman about to meet a potential husband who wishes she could go back in time to see her lover who died in the war one last time, and ends up in prehistoric times. Mind you, she does manage to make a spear and take down a woolly mammoth all on her own.
