VIZ MEDIA – @VIZMedia
MANGAKA: Aya Shouoto
TRANSLATION: JN Productions
LETTERS: Inori Fukuda Trant
EDITOR: Nancy Thislethwaite
ISBN: 978-1-9747-0402-6; paperback (January 2019); Rated “T” for “Teen”
172pp, B&W, $9.99 U.S., $12.99 CAN, £6.99 UK
The Demon Prince of Momochi House is a supernatural and romance manga series written and illustrated by Aya Shouoto. It began serialization in Kadokawa Shoten's shojo manga magazine, Monthly Asuka, in July 2013. VIZ Media has been publishing an English-language edition of the manga as a graphic novel series under its “Shojo Beat” imprint since July 2015.
The Demon Prince of Momochi House focuses on Himari Momochi. When she reaches her 16th birthday, Himari learns that she has inherited an old house located deep in the woods. She has never seen this domicile, which is called “the Momochi House,” and does not know that it already has three inhabitants. One of them, 17-year-old Aoi Nanamori, is the “Nue,” the “Demon Prince” of Momochi House, which acts as a barrier between the human world and the spiritual realms.
As The Demon Prince of Momochi House, Vol. 13 (Chapters 47 to 51) opens, Himari believes that she is dead because the conniving ayakashi, Kasha, shot her with a pistol. However, what Kasha shot Himari with was really an “ayakashi item.” It only removed Himari's spirit from her body, and while she isn't dead, the struggle to return Himari to her body is... well, quite a struggle.
Kasha has plans and ulterior motives, and even his agreement to return Himari to her body is a ruse. But everyone will be shocked when Kasha reveals his true intent. Plus, Himari gets help from two returning supporting characters.
[This volume includes miscellaneous illustrations.]
THE LOWDOWN: The Demon Prince of Momochi House manga is delightfully infused with a sense of magic and mystery. Practically every page of this delicious series is populated by ayakashi (yokai), but sometimes the series seems too dreamy for its own good.
The Demon Prince of Momochi House Graphic Novel Volume 13 pays off the killer of a cliffhanger ending that Vol. 12 presented. Kasha shot Himari at the end of the previous volume. That leads to this – Vol. 13 being one of the best volumes of the series. What makes it so good? The answer is first, conflict, and secondly, is hindrance.
Kasha and a special guest star both force Himari to struggle for what she wants, and one of the characters proves to be not only a tremendous adversary for Aoi, but also something else. The chapters in this volume, all five of them, are one long series of hindrances in the way of Himari's determination to make everything right again.
So conflict and hindrance create drama, and Vol. 13 offers some of The Demon Prince of Momochi House's most potent drama to date, and JN Productions' translation conveys that drama in all its potency. And as ever, letterer Inori Fukuda Trant offers stylish lettering and word balloons that bring out the beauty in the supernatural chaos and strife.
I READS YOU RECOMMENDS: Fans of high school supernatural romance and of yokai fiction will want to visit the “Shojo Beat” title, The Demon Prince of Momochi House.
A
9 out of 10
Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"
The text is copyright © 2020 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.
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