This marks the second year in a row that I've ended our holiday reviews with a Ai Yazawa manga. It's almost like it took Viz way too long to figure out that there was a majorly pent-up desire for more works of hers beyond Nana!
Regardless, I'm always ready to celebrate when we get more older shojo titles on the shelves and what is Christmas if not a celebration?
LAST QUARTER (Kagen no Tsuki), by Ai Yazawa. First published in 1998 and first published in North America in 2024.
PLOT:
Mizuki was frustrated with everything: her dead mom, her dad's infidelity and remarriage, her new step-sister, her cheating boyfriend. She's willing to throw everything away to be with the handsome, troubled musician Adam...until it ends up costing her life.
Young Hotaru had an encounter with Mizuki while she was in a coma. Now she finds herself drawn to the house where Mizuki and Adam once lived, where Mizuki's spirt now dwells, unable to remember who she was and why she is there. Thus it's up to Hotaru and her classmates to solve the mystery of the ghost they dub "Eve."
