Yorumori no Kuni no Sorani — vol. 1
Alice in Wonderland meets Kiyuzuki Satoko-inspired style
Art & Story: Harikamo
Genres: slice of life, comedy, weird fantasy
Sold digitally: no
I̶t̶’̶s̶ ̶b̶e̶e̶n̶ ̶a̶ ̶w̶h̶i̶l̶e̶ ̶s̶i̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶I̶ ̶r̶e̶a̶d̶ ̶Y̶o̶r̶u̶m̶o̶r̶i̶ ̶s̶o̶ ̶I̶ ̶d̶i̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶m̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶s̶,̶ ̶i̶f̶ ̶I̶ ̶e̶v̶e̶r̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶m̶y̶ ̶h̶a̶n̶d̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶l̶a̶t̶t̶e̶r̶ ̶v̶o̶l̶u̶m̶e̶s̶ ̶I̶’̶l̶l̶ ̶r̶e̶a̶d̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶a̶g̶a̶i̶n̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶u̶p̶d̶a̶t̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶.̶
As a matter of fact I did buy the entire set and read it since, but still not sure how to properly update this. Anyway, next volumes are very much in line with the first one so this wall of text still applies. Left some fresh notes though.
tl;dr synopsis
A girl with amnesia and a frying pan wakes up in a totally weird forest that’s always dark, gets confused for someone else every chapter and has wacky misadventures with total weirdos inhabiting this world for a while now.
some more words
I came to know about Harikamo, the author of this manga, thanks to an end card he did for Joukamachi no Dandelion which I’ve been keeping up with. My first reaction was “shit, that’s 3cute5me, does this guy draw mango or something” and my second one was a disappointment that nobody ever picked his titles for scanlation — and I don’t really like reading in Japanese thanks to my crap-tier grasp of it.
Harikamo has a thing for slice of life stories set in some rather unusual settings, something I like quite a bit, and it’s a nice breath of fresh air after all these school-based comedy comics and cartoons. The setting in this work is a “forest of the night”, a place never lit by the sun where people who don’t want to wake up from their dreams end up in. It’s just as odd as it sounds and in the first volume at least it’s about all the explanation you’re going to get. There’s also a neighbouring “forest of the day” which is another part of this dream world — but a place the characters prefer to avoid for personal reasons.
The cast, besides the cheerful main character who ends up being called Sorani, as in “accidental resemblance”, is a diverse selection of non-overused (yay!) stereotypes who you’d never think would be in the same manga.
There’s a calm and a bit mysterious (think Prof of GA and Kuro of Shoulder-a-coffin, but acting like a normal human being) manager of the forest called, well, Yorumori, literally “night forest”. She deals with the problems of people and other people-like creatures around and is lightly shipped with Sorani in a typical Manga Time Kirara style.
Joining her as regulars are a nurse with killer instincts as deadly as Sorani’s cooking (no wonder she was supposed to be a policeman in the original concept); a local Gyro Gearloose and some flamboyant-looking guy calling himself “Prince” and running a bank — wait, why would you even need a bank in this place?
The first volume is all about the setup of the setting. While Sorani struggles to remember anything at all from her life and tries to understand why does everyone keep confusing her for someone else, most of the chapters deal with other dwellers of the forest and their reasons for not wanting to wake up to reality (you could say it’s a metaphor for why you keep watching all these korean cartoons 24/7 — not really, but nevertheless). The plot gets moving at the end, but leaves you with more questions than answers, not surprisingly.
Perhaps the best chapter dealt with the backstory of a boy who i̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶a̶n̶ ̶a̶c̶i̶d̶ ̶t̶r̶i̶p̶ was seeing the world kind of like the protagonist of Saya no Uta and got shunned a lot because of that. But that did make him a talented artist of sorts and while in the forest he managed to befriend these colourful wacky creatures he observed instead of people. That’s the kind of stuff you can expect from this manga at its best.
the good
- The setting. It’s really, really nice and awesome. I’m biased, yes.
- The incredibly colorful art. Harikamo’s style is very cute and recognizable as it is, but what is especially remarkable is all the semi-abstract style of the backgrounds and the props. Naturally, it shines in the coloured pages — and the surprisingly high amount of them soothes my old heart. It’s a super high quality production, especially among 4komas.
- The character variety really is refreshing. You don’t get a cast like that very often and it’s a pleasure reading their interactions.
the bad
- The humour is very hit or miss. Even though this manga has been described as “dark fantasy” by some due to the themes it explores and the fact that most of the characters are effectively denying reality by existing in this phantasmagorical world — it’s also supposed to be a comedy, and… The gags do work to loosen the atmosphere, but not much else. Stealing a Japanese reviewer’s opinion, “push this style deeper and they could just get rid of the gags altogether to nobody’s discontent”.
- Plot and character development are a bit shallow-ish so far, if I had to nitpick.
Update: the last volume wraps up the plot well, no complaints there, although it rushes a lot of the character development all at once and it feels like there was a typical “oh the manga’s cancelled, gotta rush everything” moment. Still, the backstories were worth waiting three volumes for even if the main one lacked any kind of foreshadowing and seemed out of the blue.
afterword
Overall, a good and enjoyable manga that I recommend reading at least for the art and the setting. For the COLORS. Even if you don’t get hooked up on the plot (and I did, despite the last paragraph), it’s simply gorgeous. Am I going to keep reading it? Yes, definitely, as soon as I get my hands on the remaining two books.
Update: finished it and that last volume was pretty intense despite the story being on the simpler side. Very satisfied with Yorumori’s development as a character. It doesn’t hurt Manga Time Kirara titles at all to have a good measure of plot. Pick this up when there aren’t enough Kirara adaptations in the current anime season for a short and colorful refreshment.
Japanese difficulty: moderate (not much trouble reading with a dictionary)
P.s. you’re asking why did I put Alice in Wonderland in the subtitle and never mentioned it again? Well, I don’t want to spoil the last chapters for you. Let’s just say the inspiration shows.
