Month: May 2024

‘The Pig and the Peacock’ – a pig has a strange occupation (even for this world)- he’s a taxidermist. Preserves the bodies of his fellow animals- at the request of family members usually- and prides himself on his skill and artistry, making them look so lifelike. Pig meets a peacock who is a police officer, at first just there inspecting his “borderline illegal” business, then they get to talking. The peacock reveals he’s soon getting transferred to a dangerous district and is afraid of being eaten alive by the predators there. He wants Pig to preserve his life as it is now. Pig is horrified. Comes up with something to help the peacock face his fears and ward off the aggressors at his new locale.

‘The Shiba Inu and the Shiba Inu’ – A Shiba Inu dog is admired by all- so cute! and is launched into an immediately successful career in modeling- especially feminine clothing- even though he’s male. He starts to resent the duplicity. Envies a female Shiba Inu he meets who works a lowly but simple, stress-free (so he imagines) job as a store clerk. And then one day he overhears some tigers criticizing his modeling gig and blows up at them in public …

‘The Crow and the Kangaroo’ – We learn that albino animals (called ‘brights’) are endangered, made targets for their rarity. By the carnivores. Special secluded districts exist for them to live in. A white crow goes there and meets a female kangaroo with a secret- she’s not pure white! (Has some spots in a private location). But the district official allows her to stay if she gives sexual favors to any male there, and she’s afraid to leave, putting herself at risk. The crow isn’t at all interested in her advances, and helps her brave the outside world.

‘The Stellar’s Sea Eagle and the Mongolian Gerbil’ – This eagle has a cushy job ferrying a gerbil with a high-paying job to and from her office. She avoids traffic and risk of being stepped on by larger animals, he lives easy. Until she announces her plans to marry. The eagle begs to keep on living with her- even promising to overcome his fear of thunderstorms (before, he would refuse to fly in them and she’d have to find other transport or skip work those days).

‘The Chipmunk and the Mountain Hare’ – A magazine editor is desperate to get the final chapter from a popular and very reclusive writer, before the deadline. He sends a chipmunk to talk to the author and retrieve the manuscript. Shocked to find the novelist isn’t a mountain hare (as advertised) but a large predator with a sensitive soul. He has some serious writer’s block, stuck on the final scene, and needs to observe an herbivore feeling abject terror. So now with the chipmunk on his doorstop he has the perfect subject for a little experiment to enhance his writing . . .

‘The Wolf and the Rabbit’ – Legoshi and Haru! and other Beastar characters are in this one. Haru is turning twenty and invites Legoshi to attend a special ceremony with her, where he will purify the wound (now just scars) he gave her, way back when they first met. It’s a symbolic gesture with a superstition attached. Legoshi immediately wants to do the ceremony with Louis too, but he’s already performing it with Bill the tiger (much lesser wounds). Legoshi wonders about the incidents and thoughts of the other herbivore / carnivore pairs waiting in line. And while Haru is very focused on the present, he then gives her a kiss which shocks the attending priest, outraged.

Borrowed from the public library. Completed on 4/29/24.

Yuzu is a girl who gets sent to live with her uncle while her mother’s in the hospital. The uncle is a kind but overworked veterinarian, who expects her to help out with everything. She’s afraid of animals, so this is difficult. Everything intimidates her, from facing a kennel full of barking dogs, feeding demanding cats, taking an overly-eager dog on a walk or even just wrapping bandages on a large breed’s paw. But she’s always doing her best and finishing the tasks, no matter how nervous she is. This volume has four chapters, each with a standalone storyline centered on one particular animal patient. There’s also an overall story arc going, of Yuzu missing friends she left behind and trying to make new ones, gradually getting over some of her fears (you’d think this easy to accomplish with the clinic’s resident chihuahua, but he’s pretty fiesty!) and even facing her mother’s illness. When she goes to visit her mother in the hospital, she shows a lot of avoidant behavior and doesn’t want to hear any explanations. But after her exposure to the veterinary work, seeing how the pets are treated and recover (or don’t, in one case) and how her uncle helps owners deal with it all, she can better face the facts of her mother’s condition.

In the first story, Yuzu meets a young boy with a large dog who has always been his friend and protector- quite literally, this dog puts herself between the boys and kids who bully him in public. The dog is aging and her health faltering. When her heart condition becomes too serious, the boy is devastated and finds himself at the mercy of the bullies, but Yuzu’s uncle steps in to confront them.

Next story is about a girl obsessed with her social media image, she has a channel where she performs with her dancing toy poodle. The poodle is ill with cushing’s disease, which causes some hair loss and will require lifelong treatment. The girl’s parents pressure her to get a new look-alike poodle to replace it on the show, but the young owner is sad at leaving Popo aside, and also upset at the idea that she’s deceiving her audience with “a fake Popo.”

In the third story, a family brings in their cat for a health checkup. Yuzu is baffled by how unconcerned, even hostile, this girl seems about her cat. Then she learns the owner had lost her previous, much-beloved cat to cancer and she feels that loving a new cat would betray her memory of the old one. Yuzu and her uncle help her see that both can be loved.

Final chapter, the clinic takes in a lost dog that exhibits some odd, disordered behavior. They finally diagnose it with dementia. Then Yuzu has more patience instead of outright annoyance, at its strange mannerisms. Eventually they find the owner, who is sad that her dog doesn’t seem to recognize her. But Yuzu realizes that some things the dog does, show that he can remember things, just not quite what you’d expect. Recognizing that, and learning how to accommodate her pet’s limitations, puts this owner at ease again.

This book is very cute, though I felt that some of the animals were drawn a bit awkwardly. I was surprised to see all the serious subjects it tackled- dealing with a parent’s illness, facing fears in a new job with challenges and high expectations, keeping a friendship going at a distance, grief over loosing a pet and adjusting to getting a new one, some of the dangers pets face (one ingests a coin battery), even the frustrations of being a vet- clients who are demanding, or won’t accept the treatment recommendations, or leave and seek another vet (who will probably tell them the same thing they don’t want to hear). I’m going to look for more of this series.

Borrowed from the public library. Completed on 4/28/24.

J Fic graphic novel. Very unique look to the artwork- expressive, thick-and-thin lines, people with curiously beefy forearms and tiny flexed hands and feet. Looks like graphic and watercolor medium, very fluid. It’s mostly told in images, with the only text dialog and that very sparse. About a girl spending the summer with her grandma (or aunt?) and doesn’t have many friends, whiles away her time indoors reading comics (about a girl who’s friends with a fox). Grandma makes her go outside, she is cutting through the woods (they live out there in an A-frame style house) when comes across a huge bear that’s trapped under a fallen branch. She runs to get Grandma’s help (this round-faced sweet-looking white-haired lady who zooms around on a motorbike and can be so fierce with words!) and they free the bear. He’s ginormous, but very gentle in temperament and becomes her friend.

Then the girl has to go back home, and the bear misses her. He tries to follow. Frightening everyone he encounters (with an innocent who, me? expression on his face) on the wharves and city streets. The bear ends up with a young fisherman who’s struggling to work again after an injury. Bear becomes his partner on the fishing boat. Stuff happens, and they do get reunited in the end- bear and girl. She’d been getting teased by kids at school again, so is always glad to escape that and spend time with Kodi.

Home for her is Seattle! so I really liked seeing what I could recognize of the cityscape and natural setting, the things sold to tourists, fish shops, etc. Found out there’s a sequel and I’d be glad to read that, too.

Borrowed from the public library. Completed on 4/27/24.