One-Shot for the Weekend – Natsu Yasumi Zero Zero Nichime

Natsu Yasumi Zero Zero Nichime (夏休みゼロゼロ日目) | 00 Day of Summer Holiday

Mang-aka: Akizuki Sorata

Genre: Romance, School Life, Shoujo, Slice of Life

Sometimes love visits you in the most simple yet unexpected moments in our daily lives. Where love can come in even a form of a pop of a bubble, to give us the courage we need to take our relationships.

Originally published in Aoi Lala by Hakusensha.

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You’d think that because it’s winter, we’d toss out a winter themed recommendation. Or perhaps choosing a summer one-shot for the winter is way predictable? After a few weeks of adjusting my life in the States again, I hope to start blogging more consistently. Akizuki Sorata has been one of my favourite manga artists of all time, it’s strange that I’ve never really pushed her work as strong as I may have done but I do have my own reasons and frankly, she doesn’t need that extra publicity anyway. Her work can pretty much do all the talking and I hope to cover her most popular work in the near future. I chose a summer one-shot because I really need a bit of warming up, like literally. The temperature just plummeted 20 degrees and my sister has been sending me photos of London being thrashed by snow. I dislike snow unfortunately. I’ve also been suffering silently in my room freezing and I’ve just bought a portable heater to make myself feel like a normal human being.

But weather-y rants aside. This is a breath of fresh air for those who need some escape from the wintry months both physically and emotionally. In some ways summer is about being carefree – do whatever you want and be adventurous and in this instance, in love. Summer love is a strange little thing, it’s always associated with pain and everything seems to fall apart after the sweaty season. But yet, most of us are willing to go through it again, whether we be hurt or not. I believe in taking the plunge. This one-shot is fresh, the scenario is new, but with the nostalgic summer spirit of bubbles cascading in the air. The characters are normal, familiar, they aren’t blown up just like slice of life is suppose to be. And with Akizuki Sorata at the helm, she never fails to add her poetic touch and remind us that reality is often just as sweet as the imagination. So here’s my current winter manifesto, take the harsh winter with a summer heart. Or for some, embrace winter with a mind full of snow(quoting Wallace Stevens).

Rating: 4.5/5

Lala DX 09/2011~

Okay, this sneak-peak post is way overdue. I meant to complete this in August. August was actually a big fail since M.W only churned out SIX posts. Ah well…look out for Monthly Lala 10 soon. I need to get going with these posts since I’ll be travelling soon, so no scanner. I’m hoping to introduce a new feature post on M.W so please stay tuned…

This issue of Lala DX is like, the ultimate love issue for most of the serialisations(the ones I actually go through)!!! Lots of Kisses! It’s about time since I’ve been coming across all these serialisations ending with no love. Haruka takes the cover this time round, Tohko Mizuno is a very busy manga artist y’all.

Monthly Lala 08/2011~

Heya folks! This post is totally late due since Lala 9 has already been released! I have yet to make my order on amazon but I might wait until Lala DX 9 is available so I can ship them all at once. I hope I can be that patient since Amano Shinobu has her new work in Lala 9, very excited!

Lala DX 07/2011~

Hello, peeps. Or peepz if you’re feeling rather excited, maybe even funky? I hope I bear a great post, for which I will now birth. And you, my dear friendoid, will be ready to receive. I was going to release this weekend’s one-shot post instead but heck, this post took me so long to conceive I’m going to release it now. Forgive me for all the references to pregnancy, I am not pregnant, someone telling me they’re buying dinner bears more joy for me. Jokes.

ANYWAY. Here we have the very exciting bi-monthly magazine, packed with awesome-ness-ness that is Lala DX 07/2011. The pleasure is yours. Hyuck, hyuck. There isn’t exactly any news that we haven’t heard of, just more emphasis on Natsume Yujincho and Hotarubi no Mori E.

Now, let’s go boogie, woogie, woogie down on why this issue is so special. First of all, my favourite shoujo manga(it’s kind of slipping dramatically off that title now though) – Akagami no Shirayuki-hime by Akizuki Sorata is featuring on the cover. And the freebie is a Akagami no Shirayuki-hime mini file! If you’re a HUGE AnS fan, I cannot emphasise just how much you will need this. The illustration is gorgeous and you know what? We have no idea when there’s going to be an AnS freebie again and this might even be the LAST. It is highly unlikely that there’s going to be some production of merchandise for us to buy since it isn’t on the ground of popularity with manga such as Ouran High School Host Club. The AnS fan club will need this to survive the winter, and the summer.

Lala DX 05/2011~

Hello Dearies! I’ve decided to add some(I said some but it’s really only gonna be about 1-3?) scans in my magazine posts to heighten your viewing pleasure. Also, I understand that some of you out there would like to use the illustrations or what not since that’s what I love to do. Anyway, here is Lala DX 05/2011 with Haruka 5 by Tohko Mizuno gracing the cover. I scanned the cover myself so you get a high resolution picture.

Freebie time! I still have my Ouran Bookmarks from Lala Special which I haven’t used yet, such nice collectibles!

Haruka 3D Book-Marks! Click for a larger picture:

I didn’t scan or take any photos of the colour pages at the beginning since they were nearly identical to the ones in Monthly Lala 05/2011. I just took photos of each featured story again^_^.

One Shot for the weekend – Four-Season Color of August

Title: Four-Season Color of August

Author:  Akizuki Sorata

Artist: Akizuki Sorata

Genres: Drama, Romance, Shoujo, Slice of Life

Summary: Sakinomiya Hazuki decides to go the beach before she moves to a new home, and along the way, she catches and hat that flew by. She almost falls when a boy helps her. He introduces himself as Komatsu Yuuto, but the little kids, Haruki (Spring) and Fuyumi (Winter) call him Natsu-neechan (Summer) because he comes to play with them in the summer. She introduces

herself, but the boy gives her the nickname , Aki (Autumn), because her original name was too long. They play together throughout the summer, but will they want to split up when it’s over?

Collected as an omake(extra) in volume one of  Akagami No Shirayuki-hime.

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I’ve always found the transition of seasons rather solemn when I think about  how nature keeps progressing – leaving things behind and never looking back. This one-shot re-creates that exact same feeling, making it bittersweet to remember fond memories but reminds us that to forget, is above all, the most sad. It encourages us to constantly look forwards into future, because we can frankly be very surprised.

Overall rating: 4.3/5

-chungky