Reading

There is nothing more likely to ruin a consistently solid run of reading than starting a book reviewing blog, but I've not stopped completely. At the moment I'm wrestling with ゲゲゲの鬼太郎 (Ge ge ge no Kitarou) and since it's in Japanese, I'm struggling.

First published in 1966, this series of manga by Shigeru Mizuki features pretty much the entire bestiary of traditional Japanese monsters, or 妖怪 (Youkai). The protaganist, Kitarou (meaning Ogre/Demon Boy) occassionaly acts as a go-between for the worlds of Humans and Monsters, helping out one when the other oversteps their bounds. What I've read so far is gleefully ghoulish. Take for example, Kitaro's father, Medama Oyaji (eyeball father) who lives in his son's empty eye socket, usually obscured by that rouge flap of hair.

At the moment, a young baseball player has happened across Kitarou's bat (lying about in a graveyard). The bat of course has magical powers, and the team are on their way to becoming professionals, when Kitarou turns up, wanting it back. The young player is reluctant to relinquish his tool to fame, so a challenge is declared, naturally, with a game of baseball...Kitarou's team mates are a variety of nasty creatures, and the human baseball players are appropriately terrified, as this game may cost them their souls...

...so that's what I'm doing now...