The Green Toenails Gang by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat and Mitchell Sharmat, 2005.
Olivia’s best friend, Taffy, who left San Francisco and moved to Carmel just before the beginning of the first book in the series, writes a letter to Olivia and invites her to come for a visit. In her letter she mentions that there is a club in Carmel that she doesn’t want to join. Olivia senses that Taffy is upset about something and decides to visit her for the weekend.
When Olivia visits Taffy, Taffy tries to persuade her at first that nothing is bothering her, but Olivia correctly guesses that the club she was talking about is one that refuses to let her in and that she’s upset about it. Taffy calls the club “stupid,” and Olivia says that “lots of clubs are stupid. Like, if three people have green toenails they form a green toenails club and leave everybody else out.” (I like the way Olivia puts things.) Taffy is inspired by what Olivia says, and she suggests that they should really form a green toenails club and exclude everyone, including the members of the other club. Olivia thinks that the idea is interesting, but the problem is that there is only the two of them (three, if they can persuade Olivia’s chauffeur to join them) and that when Olivia goes back to San Francisco, Taffy will be the only member of her club in Carmel.
Olivia
questions Taffy about the members of the other club and what they do. Taffy says that a lot of it is secret, but the
members are all girls her neighborhood, and they all wear shirts with their
first initials on them. Olivia and Taffy
begin to spy on the girls to learn more about them and to see how they can help
Taffy to fit in with their club.
When
they see the girls riding bicycles, Olivia thinks that they must be a bicycle
club. She buys Taffy a bicycle and teaches
her how to ride it. Riding a bike works
to get the other girls’ attention. Olivia
and Taffy ride their bikes past the other girls and stop to talk to them. The other girls seem friendly enough, and
they invite Taffy to go riding with them later.
However, to Olivia’s surprise, one of the club members calls her later
and invites her to join the club, not Taffy.
The girl, Nettie, tells her that they aren’t really a bicycle club and
that only members are allowed to know the true purpose of the club and the
conditions for joining. Olivia fits the
conditions, but they’ll only explain it to her if she agrees to join. Nettie also says that they all like Taffy but
that they’re “not ready for her” and that they’ll be one step closer to inviting
Taffy if Olivia joins. What is this club
really about, and how will Olivia joining help Taffy to join?
I
guessed, even before Olivia did, that names are important in the club. The girls were very interested when Olivia
told them her name, and there is a reason why they all wear shirts with their first
initials on them. The five girls in the
club are: Jasmine, Katrina, Leah, Millicent, and Nettie. In order to get Taffy in, Olivia has to point
out that Taffy’s last name is Plimpton. (Get
it?) There, I was a little surprised
because I had expected that the name Taffy would turn out to be a nickname and
that Olivia would tell them that her real name is Patricia or something. I had forgotten what Olivia said her last
name was.
I
thought that Olivia made some good points about the nature of clubs and
exclusivity. The reasons for a lot of exclusive
groups are really silly and arbitrary because the main point of those group is just
to be exclusive, not to fulfill any other purpose. That this particular club rides bikes could
have been their main purpose, and that would be a purpose that actually
involves doing something, but their real requirement for joining is much more
arbitrary and is mostly based on random chance, making it very difficult for
them to ask new people to join even when they want to invite them. Taffy would have had exactly the same problem
if her name had been Abigail or Wendy. I’m
not really sure what they would have done if she had been Jessica or Linda. Either they’d have to allow some duplication,
or they might say that they couldn’t have her at all.
Olivia says, “I hate clubs. All those secret handshakes and pins and meetings and all that rot.” To Olivia, the whole thing is just silly, and she thinks that they should just be friends with people without all the silly secrecy and ritual. I liked that stuff more when I was a kid myself, and I remember forming clubs with varying degrees of secrecy with kids in elementary school, but to tell the truth, none of them did very much or lasted very long because they had little other purpose to them besides just being a club and the routine of meetings with all the trappings that annoy Olivia take more effort to maintain than they’re worth. The best solution to having a lasting club would probably be to give the club a purposeful activity or set of activities that all of the members could enjoy and that would allow them to recruit new members easily. If this club eventually focuses more activities like bicycling, it would be likely to last longer and leave them open to more members than they currently have whenever they want to add them.
The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.
The Encyclopedia of Immaturity by the Editors of Klutz Press, 2007.
This book is part of the classic children’s hobby and activity series from Klutz Press. It’s a collection of pranks, stunts, and fun things to do. There is too much in this book to describe everything in detail, so I’ll just explain some general themes and highlights.
The stunts and activities are in no particular order, and the book isn’t divided into any special sections. Most of activity or stunts just takes up a page or two of explanation, but some are longer, about three or four pages. None of them are very long.
Some of the activities are classic kids’ activities or pranks, like skipping stones, hanging a spoon from your nose, and Peep jousting (a more modern classic – the book points out that you can do it with regular marshmallows, too, but I like Peeps for the imagery). I remember the one about how to blow a bubble gum bubble from your nose instead of your mouth (found on p. 271) being mentioned in Amber Brown Goes Fourth, when Amber’s new friend, Brandi, teaches her how to do it.
There are also some more difficult tricks to master, like how to do an ollie on a skateboard and how to do a wheelie on a bike. (At least, I consider things like that difficult because I’ve never been able to master them.) I also don’t know how to whistle with my fingers, although the book shows multiple ways to do it.
Some of the pages are designed to be cut out and made into things, like the page that provides a pattern for a paper fortune teller and the page where you cut a square of paper so that it’s possible for a person to go through it.
Some of the activities in the book were also in previous Klutz books, like juggling and how to use trick photography to take pictures that make people look like they’re small enough to pick up. I also remember the backseat rituals for long car trips being part of the Klutz Kids Travel book.
My two favorite sections in the book are the part about how to be a headless person for Halloween and how to sneak around. I never dressed as a headless person as a kid, but I like the idea, and might still do it. I did a lot of sneaking around as a kid because I always loved hide and seek.
There’s quite a variety of activities in this book, including some indoor activities and outdoor activities, and things that can be done on car trips. Some of these activities look kind of gross to me (and still would have when I was a kid because I wasn’t one of the kids who was into gross outs), like how to make fake dog barf, but there’s such a wide selection of activities, I’d say that there’s plenty here for anybody to find fun things to do!
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies), along with the sequel to the book, The Encyclopedia of Immaturity, Volume 2.
Tricky Pix: Do-It-Yourself Trick Photography by Paula Weed and Carla Jimison, 2001.
This book is part of the classic children’s hobby and activity series from Klutz Press and explains how to perform trick photography. Originally, this book came with a real camera that could be used to take trick pictures. The camera was a film camera instead of a digital camera, using 35mm film, but the film was not provided.
Now, digital cameras have almost entirely replaced film camera for popular photography, and film is actually much harder to come by, and not as many places offer film development services. In the very early 2000s, when this book was first published, digital photography was just starting to take hold, and digital cameras were more expensive, so a kid’s first camera was still likely to be a film camera. In just a few more years, that shifted abruptly with the increasing popularity of cell phone cameras and further developments that made digital cameras increasingly affordable for general use. The beginning of the book explains how the camera works and how to load the film.
The fact that this book was designed to be used with a film camera is important because this style of trick photography relies on physical illusions, not images that are digitally altered with Photoshop or similar software. In a way, this makes the pictures more interesting because they are largely unaltered from their original form. That is, you’re seeing what the camera saw at the moment that the picture was taken. The tricks involve using different perspectives and camera angles to achieve the illusions.
Strategic poses and the use of physical objects to block part of the scene can be used to create illusions like disembodied heads, people with extra limbs, or people with really long legs or bodies.
An often-used trick for making people look tiny enough to be picked up or stepped on by another person involves forced perspective – strategic positioning the subjects so that there is physical distance between them but no visual cues to indicate just how much distance there is between them so relative sizes are difficult to gauge.
When images in this book are altered, it’s with the old-fashioned method of literally cutting and pasting them onto each other, something that is now done digitally.
Personally, I enjoyed the fact that there was less of a reliance on software and digital technology in the production of these photographs. I think that learning how to do things without relying on technology to do most of the work can encourage creativity, and in particular, the use of physical illusions like forced perspective is also educational. Artists need to understand the use of physical space, perspective, and lighting, and these photographic tricks demonstrate these concepts well. Even though this book doesn’t make use of digital photography, any of the tricks in this book could also be performed when taking pictures with a digital camera.
The book is available to borrow and read online through Internet Archive.
It’s 1724, and twelve-year-old Rachel Howell is traveling to where her father lives in Charles Town, South Carolina. Rachel has been living with her grandparents in New York since her mother died seven years earlier. Her father also used to live in New York, but after his wife’s death, he decided to move to South Carolina, hoping to start a new life. Now, her father has established himself in South Carolina and wants Rachel to come and live with him. Rachel has wanted to live with her father for some time, but she’s nervous because she doesn’t know what life in South Carolina will be like.
Rachel’s new life has a terrifying beginning when the ship that is taking her to Charles Town is attacked by pirates. The pirates force the passengers on board to hand over jewelry and other expensive items. They even take Rachel’s pendant, which belonged to her deceased mother. Fortunately, the pirates don’t hurt or kill anyone and let the ship go once they’ve taken everything of interest to them.
When Rachel arrives in Charles Town, she and her father have difficulty recognizing each other at first, but they are happy to finally be together. Rachel’s father is appalled when he hears about the pirates stealing Rachel’s mother’s necklace, but he is relieved that Rachel is all right. He explains that piracy has been a serious problem to shipping in the area. The local government has tried to combat the problem with harsh punishments, hanging many offenders. However, the pirates have money, and so local businesses still tolerate their presence.
The talk of pirates is shocking, but Rachel is soon in for another shock when her father tells her that he has become engaged and that Rachel will soon have a new mother. Rachel had been looking forward to having some time alone with her father to get to know him again, so she is not pleased at the news, but the engagement is the main reason why her father has sent for her. He wants Rachel to have a mother to care for her and for them to live as a complete family again. He tells Rachel that his fiance, Miranda LeBoyer, is from Philadelphia. She will be arriving in Charles Town soon with her aunt.
Rachel’s father is often busy with his work in the shipping industry, but he grants Rachel more freedom than she had with her grandparents, so she is able to explore her new town and make some new friends. The first friends she makes are the Pugh family, especially the daughter, Sally, who is about Rachel’s age. The Pughs own a local tavern, and Rachel often goes to visit them, sometimes helping with chores and learning to cook. She tells Sally about her worries about her new stepmother, but Sally says that she might not be so bad.
Like her life in South Carolina, Rachel’s first encounter with the woman her father plans to marry takes a disturbing turn. First, Miranda seems to disapprove of Sally and her brother, and Rachel fears that she will interfere with their friendship. Then, her father’s new business partner, Mr. Craven, stops by, and Rachel notices that Miranda seems to both recognize and dislike Mr. Craven. She overhears a conversation between the two of them in which Miranda calls Mr. Craven a “scoundrel” and refers to some kind of illegal dealings in his past. Yet, when Rachel’s father tries to ask Miranda what they’re talking about, Miranda lies and says that they’re discussing the weather and hurricanes that occur in Charles Town. Rachel worries about why Miranda would lie to her father and what kind of dishonest business Mr. Craven might be doing. What are the secrets that people in this town are hiding, and is Miranda really what she seems to be? With the help of her new friends, will Rachel find out the truth before it’s too late?
There is a section in the back of the book with historical information about piracy and life in South Carolina during the 18th century.
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
Aria Volume 6 by Kozue Amano, 2005, English Translation 2011.
This is the sixth volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
Unfortunately, although this book is only about halfway through the series, this is the last book of the series that I actually own because the others haven’t been printed in English yet, although I think that additional volumes will be published in English.
The stories included in this volume are:
Orange Days
Athena comes to visit Alicia at Aria Company, and the trainees’ mentors reminisce about how they first met when they were trainees.
Akira was just as prickly and competitive when she was young as she is as an adult. Although trainee Akira said that she was just observing the “losers” at Aria Company, she kept coming around and became friends with Alicia. When she heard about a new trainee at Orange Company with an amazing singing voice, Akira wanted to seek her out, worried about the competition.
While she was telling Alicia about it, the two of them accidentally had a collision with young Athena’s gondola, which is the first time either of them had seen her. Athena was knocked over by the collision, so the other two girls treated her to lunch, partly to make it up to her and partly because Akira wanted to pump her for information about the new trainee at Orange Company, not knowing that Athena herself was the new trainee.
However, Athena didn’t answer their questions about the new trainee. Even back then, she was a person of few words, and she just made a drinking straw crawly snake to amuse President Aria. Still, Athena became friends with Alicia and Akira, joining them in their practice sessions, like Akari, Aika, and Alice share their practices together. Alicia and Akira only discovered that Athena was the trainee with the amazing voice when they decided to practice singing canzones one day.
The mentors end their reminiscences by saying that it seems hard to believe that, now that their training is over, they are so busy that they hardly have time to see each other. When they were trainees, it felt like they would always practice together every day, but now, their lives are different. These comments make the present trainees uncomfortable because they realize that the same thing is likely to happen to them when their training is complete. Alice, Aika, and Akari have come to value each other’s friendship and companionship, and they find it difficult to imagine being without each other.
However, Alicia and Athena tell the girls to not worry too much about it. Time is always moving forward, and it’s true that things will change for them, but that’s not entirely a bad thing. Even though they sometimes miss their training days when they spent so much of their time together, they are also happy with their current lives. They enjoy their careers, and they like helping to train new Undines. In fact, helping to train the next generation of Undines helps them to connect to their own pasts because the young Undines remind them of their own training days. Alicia’s advice is to enjoy where you are and what’s currently happening around you as much as you can. Life will eventually move on, and things will change, so you might as well make the most of where you are now and enjoy it to the fullest, so you will be ready to move on to the next stage of your life and enjoy that as well. Athena says, “Fun times really aren’t meant to be compared. Just enjoyed.”
The young trainees are still affected by the story of their mentors’ friendships and the changes in their lives. Aika points out to Akari that their lives aren’t changing just yet, but the girls have come to a greater realization that their lives will eventually change.
It’s just like how, when people are young and in school, surrounded by the same other students every day, it can be hard to imagine that there will come a day after you graduate when you won’t all be working at the same place and you won’t all be eating lunch together every day. As you get busy building careers and families, it will be harder to see each other and keep in touch. However, that’s not entirely a bad thing. As some people like to say, “You can’t begin the next chapter of your life if you keep rereading the last one.” There are many things in life to enjoy and accomplishments to be made, and like Alicia and Athena explain, you might as well enjoy where you are right now and make the most of it so you won’t look back with regret when it’s time to move on.
Venetian Glass
Akatsuki’s elder brother comes to Aria Company to hire Akari to transport some delicate Venetian glass. Akari is excited because this is the first time that anyone has specifically hired her, although, because she isn’t a full Undine yet, Alicia will have to accompany her on her errand.
When they go to pick up the glass, Akari sees glass-blowing and Venetian glass for the first time.
One of the workers from the glass factory seems kind of surly, but he accompanies them while they transport the glass and explains the history of Venetian glass and what makes it so special.
The reason why the glass worker is so surly is that he feels like a lot of people don’t appreciate his craft. He and his master put their heart and soul into their work, but people say that their “Venentian glass” is fake because it’s made in Neo-Venezia, not in the real Venice, which sank beneath the ocean years ago. The worker laments that the craftsmen who left the sinking city were scattered across Earth before making their way to Neo-Venezia and that details of their craft have been lost over time. Neo-Venezian glass will never be quite the same as the original Venetian glass, and people will never look at it the same way, which the worker finds depressing.
However, one of Akari’s great strengths is finding the beauty in everything and bringing it out for other people to see. She tells the worker that the glass is kind of like Neo-Venezia itself. It’s true, it’s not the original Venice, only re-created in its image. Some aspects of it are the same, but it’s also a different place, on another planet. To some people, that might make it seem like a fake city, just an imitation of the original, but Akari doesn’t think that the real vs. fake concept matters because she loves the city for the beautiful treasure it is. Similarly, Akari thinks that Neo-Venezian glass is a treasure by itself and likes it for what it is, regardless of what the original was or what others say about it.
The worker finds Akari’s viewpoint inspirational and is enchanted by Akari herself, remarking that she’s also a unique treasure. Akatsuki’s brother jokes that Akatsuki might have a rival now for his affection for Akari. Akari knows that Akatsuki has had an unrequited crush on Alicia, so she doesn’t think too much about it. Although it’s true that Akatsuki has a crush on Alicia, Akatsuki’s brother is also correct that Akari inspires greater feelings in others than she realizes and Akatsuki values Akari more than he lets on, maybe more than even he realizes himself. Akari is unique because of her unusual way of looking at things, and her optimistic point of view influences others.
Snow White
One day, while they’re practicing together, Akari asks Aika what kind of adult she wanted to be when she was a kid. Aika, who has admired and even hero-worshipped Alicia ever since Alicia was kind to her when she was a young child, says that she’s always wanted to be an elegant woman like Alicia. Akari says that she wants to be like Alicia, too, but Aika criticizes her for wanting to copy her ambition and says that it’s not likely that Akari would ever be as elegant as Alicia because she still does kid-like things, like collecting stuffed animals.
Their discussion causes Akari to wonder what sort of adult Alicia wanted to be when she was a little kid, and she asks Alicia about it while they’re out walking one day. Instead of answering her directly at first, Alicia demonstrates by starting to build a snowman and pointing out how the people around them react to it.
Each time Alicia and Akari start to make a large snowball for the base of the snowman, different adults stop and help them to make it a bit bigger.
Alicia says that she noticed people like this when she was a child. There are always adults who, when seeing a young girl making a snowman, feel compelled to help her because she can make a much bigger snowball with their help. That’s the type of adult Alicia always wanted to be.
Alicia genuinely enjoys not only her career as an Undine but her role as a teacher and mentor in Akari’s life and in the lives of her friends, helping them to develop in their trade and to become better Undines because of her influence.
Stray Cat
Alice finds a tiny stray Martian cat one day while waiting for Akari and Aika to meet her for practice. The cat’s mother doesn’t seem to be around, and Alice doesn’t know whether the little cat is lost, orphaned, or abandoned. When Aika arrives for practice, she finds both Alice and Akari lying on the ground next to the cat because it looks so happy lying in the sun that Alice thinks they should also try it.
Although Aika warns Alice that she won’t be able to keep the cat because she lives in a dorm at Orange Company and isn’t allowed to keep pets, Alice becomes attached to the cat, names it Maa, and hides it in her room.
At first, she is afraid that her mentor, Athena, will be angry with her, and Aika scares her by saying that Athena will probably kill the cat because she doesn’t like cats. However, Alice loves Maa because she misses the previous president cat of Orange Company, who recently passed away, and Maa reminds her a little of him.
When the secret gets out, and Alice is confronted by Athena about the cat, Alice is scared because Athena is holding a knife for slicing fruit and runs away to leave the tiny Maa where she found him, thinking that it might be the only way to save his life. However, she finds herself unable to abandon Maa and returns to get him, only to find him missing from the box where she left him. In a panic, she spends all night searching the city with her friends to try to find Maa.
However, when they finally give up the search, they discover that Athena has Maa. When she had tried to talk to Alice before, she wasn’t angry. She followed Alice to the place where she left Maa and retrieved him and has been waiting for Alice to return to Orange Company. In Alice’s absence, Athena has persuaded Orange Company to keep Maa as their new company president. Like the other cats used as the presidents/mascots of gondola companies, Maa also has blue eyes.
Aika has a more practical explanation for what it is, that the sounds of freight trains are more noticeable at night, when everything is quiet, but Akari discovers the truth when President Aria gives her a special train ticket.
It turns out that the mysterious train is a train of cats. (Guess who the conductor is?) Akari could use the ticket from President Aria to ride the train, but instead, she gives it to a sad little kitten who lost his ticket.
Because Akari doesn’t board the train, she never finds out where the train was going. The next morning, it all seems like a strange dream, except both Akari and President Aria have the stamps on their foreheads that Cait Sith gave them.
A Parallel World
President Aria accidentally finds a parallel world in which all the people he knows who are girls are boys and vice versa. Frightening!
President Aria has always wanted to find a gateway to another world, but everything seems so strange that all he wants to do is get back to his world.
He ends up returning to the world he knows when someone tosses him too high in the air while playing with him. Did any of it really happen, or was he just dazed from when he fell?
This one isn’t one of my favorite stories in this series because I think that the premise is kind of goofy. The characters don’t really look all that different when their genders are switched. Most of the difference is in hair styles, and the uniforms of the Undines have pants when they’re normally just long dresses.
Aria Volume 5 by Kozue Amano, 2004, English Translation 2009.
This is the fifth volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
The stories included in this volume are:
Mailman-San
When Akari’s mailman friend has a hole in his gondola, he tries to hire Alicia to help him deliver the mail. However, Alicia is busy, so she allows Akari to help him instead, even though she’s only a trainee.
Akari gets to visit the post office and spends the day helping the mailman deliver the mail. During the course of the day, Akari thinks about the number of letters that people in Neo Venezia send and wonders why they send physical letters instead of e-mail. The mailman explains to her that physical letters feel different from e-mail, and Akari understands.
People in Neo Venezia like the feel of doing things the old-fashioned way, often because the old-fashioned ways have more of a personal touch. The mailman tells Akari that she has really become a part of Neo Venezia.
Canzone
Alice’s mentor, Athena, is also one of the three greatest Undines on Aqua, the Three Water Fairies, like Akari’s and Aika’s mentors. However, Alice has little patience for her because she is clumsy outside of a gondola. Alice hates clumsiness and weakness, even punishing her own left hand for not being as strong as her right.
Akari is concerned about Alice when she sees what she’s doing to her left hand, and she has a sleepover with Alice to learn more about what’s happening with her. That’s when she meets Athena for the first time, although she had earlier seen her in her gondola, singing an enchanting canzone. Athena’s singing ability is one of the reasons why she is so famous as an Undine.
Akari observes the little things that Athena does for Alice, like singing to her at night, and points out to Alice that her left hand helps her more than she realizes.
Alice doesn’t believe it at first, but the next day, she begins to notice that Akari is right. While Alice eats with her right hand, her left hand holds her bowl. When she writes with her right hand, her left hand is holding the page. Her left hand isn’t inactive or useless; it’s been providing support that allows the right hand to do its job.
This revelation also causes Alice to see her mentor in a different light. Like her left hand, clumsy Athena has also been giving Alice quiet support that Alice often fails to notice. Alice reflects on how Athena’s singing comforted her when she first arrived at Orange Company and was homesick. Alice asks Athena why she sings to her, and Athena tells her that she’s just singing as she pleases, that she doesn’t need a reason to sing, that songs don’t really need to be noticed or thanked, and that she should just let the song do its work. However, Alice gains a new sense of gratitude toward her mentor and begins to treat her much better.
The Night of the Meteor Shower
Akari and her friends find out that there is going to be a meteor shower, and Aika suggests that they invite Al the Gnome to watch it with them.
Of all the boys the girls know, Aika likes Al the best. Al isn’t temperamental like Akatsuki or spacey like Woody. Aika is kind of fascinated by how he looks younger than they are even though he’s older and also talks like an old man or an old-fashioned gentleman.
Plus, after living in the underground city, Al has really good night vision, which is helpful as the girls search for a good place to view the meteor shower, away from the lights and crowds of the public square.
Aika finally suggests that they go up on the roof of one of the Himeya Company buildings, which has an excellent view.
Akari explores the rooftops a little on her own, leaving Aika and Al alone together. When Al, whose work as a Gnome is managing the gravity of Aqua, talks to Aika about gravity and attraction and how the gravity of Aqua pulls, the meteors in, she understands a little more about the attraction she feels for Al.
Margherita
Aika’s mentor, Akira, is tough, but she genuinely cares about her students. After a day of training in which many things go wrong, she finds a way to show the trainees how much she appreciates their hard work.
Akira has Aika, Akari, and Alice show her how they would handle a real customer, from helping them into the gondola to giving them a pleasant tour with interesting information. However, she is critical of the way they do things and particularly, some of the safety regulations they forget, like speed limits, not warning other approaching boats of their presence, and allowing themselves to be stuck when high tide comes and makes it impossible for them to pass beneath certain bridges.
Akira says that the reason why she’s being tough is that, when the girls become full Undines, they will be completely on their own in their boats with their customers, with no one else to help them. When there’s a problem or when they make a mistake, it will be their job to fix the situation themselves with their own skill and ingenuity.
When they become stuck on a section of canal because of the rising tide, Akira challenges them to find a way to solve the problem themselves. They find a side waterway that’s been closed off, and take the gondola through that way.
Akira rewards the trainees by taking them to a pizza parlor for a Margherita pizza. (Named for a queen, it’s topped with tomatoes, basil, and olive oil.) The trainees ask her why she didn’t punish them for making a serious mistake in their practice, and she tells them that there would be no point in punishing them because they realized what they did wrong and made an effort to improve, learning from their experience.
I quibble a bit with the teaching method just telling the students to find a way to fix the problem themselves without guidance. It kind of works here because Aika and Akari are now journeyman Undines and have had basic training and experience of the waterways of Neo Venezia to call on, but you can’t do this sort of thing with real beginners who haven’t had that grounding. I’ve had teachers who have tried, and I know the frustration of having them expecting me to call on a grounding I hadn’t received. When I was a kid, I felt terrible about those situations, like I was an idiot, but as an adult, who has since had gaps in my early education filled, I’ve come to realize that the fault wasn’t with me but with the teachers who had not taught me what to do but still expected me to somehow already know. I couldn’t figure out what to do because I didn’t know enough about what I could do yet. You can’t progress well in your education or training for anything without having someone explain the basics to give you the right grounding to build on. You can’t do algebra without knowing your basic operations. You can’t understand how to cook from memory or improvise a dish without first learning how to follow basic recipes. Akira’s approach to letting the students figure out the solution to a problem themselves calls attention to what the girls already know and encourages them to use it, but when that doesn’t work in real life, when you just don’t know what to do at all, it’s time to take a step back and reacquaint yourselves with the basics. You can figure out what to do if you know what’s possible to do, but I’d like to point out that if you don’t know what’s possible, you need some help and guidance to learn.
Shadow Chasing
Akari never minds waiting for people because there are always interesting things and people to watch. One day, when Alicia has to attend a Gondola Association meeting at a famous cafe, Akari says that she and President Aria will just wait for her instead of heading home.
Akari drinks lattes and watches the people going by, just enjoying the ambiance of the square.
There is a man there who seems familiar to Akari, and the two of them begin talking to each other about people watching in the square. The man introduces Akari to the custom of “shadow chasing”, where the restaurant employees move the cafe’s tables into the shade as the shadows move.
Akari reflects on the history of the cafe, Caffe Florian, which she says is actually the same cafe that once stood in the original Venice (which, in Akari’s time, is now submerged beneath the ocean), having been dismantled and moved years ago.
It turns out that her new friend is actually the manager of the cafe.
Aria Volume 4 by Kozue Amano, 2004, English Translation 2008.
This is the fourth volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
The stories included in this volume are:
Neverland
Alicia and Akira arrange a special, surprise trip to the beach for the trainees, a happy day that reminds Akari of Neverland. It starts out with an invitation for each of the trainees that supposedly comes from Peter Pan, inviting them to Neverland, but it turns out to be a fun day at a beach that President Aria found.
Akira wanted the day to be a day of training, but Alicia convinced her that a day of rest and relaxation would benefit the trainees more. The girls put on their swimsuits and enjoy a day of swimming.
Akari thinks that the beach and their day there really is like Neverland, and Alicia realizes that it is because of the way that Akari looks at things. Akari’s strength is the ability to enjoy the simple pleasures in life for what they are, finding the magic in daily life.
This story emphasizes the theme of the series, which is that the most important thing is to choose to be happy.
Traveling Water
Summer on Aqua is very hot, and Akari experiences her first mirages. People on Aqua sometimes call them “traveling water” because they can look like water that you can never reach. (I grew up in Arizona, and I grew up seeing that. On a straight road, the heat waves will look like distant water, waving and reflecting the scenery, but they appear to dry up or move further away as you go toward them.)
On a very hot day, Akari sets out to buy a night light chime and, oddly, seems to find herself all alone, except for President Aria. She follows President Aria, hoping that he will lead her to a place where she can cool off.
Akari finds herself at a mysterious cafe, which is nice and cool. The server gives her and President Aria ice cold milk, and Akari feels better, but the cafe is no ordinary cafe.
It turns out that the cafe is a secret hangout for cats and their king, Cait Sith. Humans do not ordinarily find their way there. They give Akari a special night light chime and urge her to go on her way …
Unless it was all just another mirage.
I love this story for its “was it all a dream” theme and for the cat-shaped chime that helps confirm that it all really happened. I also like the idea/warning that the server offers to Akari, that maybe it’s a good thing not to completely catch up to a mirage. Akari is sometimes a special guest of the magical characters that inhabit their world, going to places and seeing things that others don’t, but she can’t stay among them because her life is in the human world, and she has to let the fantasy elements slip away to return to her ordinary life that is a little less ordinary for the experiences she’s had.
Flying Fish in the Sky
Akari notices that some of the professions on Aqua relate to the four elements: water, fire, earth, and air. The Undines represent water because they spend their time rowing their gondolas, the Salamanders represent fire because they control the heat levels in the atmosphere to control the weather, and the Gnomes represent earth because they work underground to control gravity. The fourth element-based profession is Sylph, which represents air. They are flying deliverymen.
Akari helps a sylph called Woody, a flying deliveryman with a poor sense of direction, after he falls off his flying bike and loses the map he depends on in order to make his deliveries. It’s kind of a scary ride, but it’s also exciting, and Akari gets a bird’s-eye view of her city.
Woody also appears in later stories.
The Legendary Major Fairy
The trainees go to meet the founder of Aria Company, who is considered the Legendary Major Fairy, the grandmother of the younger Undines. She now lives in the countryside, and as the girls help her with some chores and enjoy other activities, Aika keeps looking for hidden tests of their skills or lessons slipped into the activities.
When hidden tests and lessons don’t seem to be in these activities, and the activities just are what they appear to be, Aika gets impatient and worries that maybe the older woman thinks that they’re hopeless and not worth teaching. She asks the Legendary Fairy, who asks them to call her “Grandma”, directly for some advice about being a great Undine, and what she tells them is both simple and yet something that is easy for people to forget.
Grandma’s advice is another repetition of the themes of the entire Aria series, but it’s worth repeating. She tells the girls to enjoy themselves in everything they do (the activities she gave them earlier were for them to enjoy, nothing more), remember that the world and life itself is full of things to enjoy, give yourself credit for your hard work, and when you encounter pain and sadness, try to turn it into something better.
The Redentore
The Undines celebrate Rendentore, a special festival of thanksgiving, with a party on a boat for all of their friends, organized by the trainees. In keeping with the tradition, the trainees invite special guests and use the opportunity to improve their hostess and entertaining skills, designing invitations and planning the meal and entertainment.
The party is a success, and one of the best parts is that the girls have brought together a group of people who otherwise would not have spent time together, except they are tied together by their roles in the lives of the girls.
Aria Volume 3 by Kozue Amano, 2003, English Translation 2004.
This is the third volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
The stories included in this volume are:
First Gale of Spring
It’s been a full year (full Martian year, which is equal to two Earth years) since Akari moved to Aqua and began her Undine training, and she’s happy that it’s spring again! While Akari and Aika are practicing their rowing one day, they meet another trainee Undine, Alice.
Alice is a young prodigy, only 14. Even though she is rather young and still in school, she’s really good at handling a gondola. However, Aika takes an instant dislike to her, partly because she belongs to Orange Company, a rival of Aika’s gondola company, Himeya. Akari tries to be friendly to Alice and tries to invite her to join them for lunch, but Alice is rude and unfriendly to them.
Aika thinks that Alice has an uppity attitude and is disrespectful to them even though they’re higher level trainees than she is. (There is some mild swearing in this part of the story. Most of the Aria series doesn’t have any swearing at all.) To prove her point and put Alice in her place, Aika decides to challenge Alice to a race.
Part of the reason why Alice is so prickly and unfriendly is that she thinks that people look down on her for being young and because they’re jealous of her skills , but she doesn’t realize how her abrasive attitude affects the people around her and their perceptions of her.
Aika has Akari row their gondola in the race, partly so she can use her secret ability to row a gondola backwards really fast, but Akari has her own ideas of how the race will end. Akari is still thinking of the beauty of spring, and even though she makes sure that her gondola will come in second by stopping to pick flowers (the fact that they had time to pick an entire boatload of flowers indicates just how much of a lead they had), she uses them to remind the other girls
Alice actually appeared in one of the prequel books to the Aria series, Aqua Volume 2, as the friend who went with Akari to visit Aika when Aika had a cold. It was the only Aqua story she was in, and this story in the third volume of the Aria series is the true introduction to her character.
Under the Cherry Blossoms in Full Bloom
Alicia and Akari decide to go on a picnic to enjoy the beauty of nature in spring. Alicia has a special place in mind for a picnic, but the two of them get lost on the way. Although Alicia remembers that getting to her special spot involves following some old train tracks, when they split off in different directions, she can’t remember which way to go.
Akari picks a random direction. It turns out that the direction she picks doesn’t take them to Alicia’s special place, but they find something else interesting: an abandoned train car underneath a cherry tree in full bloom.
The girls explore the train car and find that part of the roof is missing. They lie in the train car and enjoy the cherry blossoms raining down on them. Akari apologizes to Alicia for not finding her special place, but Alicia says that’s fine because this place is nice, too. She says that sometimes, you have to get a little lost to find something new.
Town Treasure
Akari, Aika, and Alice find a message in an old gondola that they borrow from the gondola repairman while Aria Company’s gondolas are being service. The message is in a small box in a hidden compartment of the gondola, and it turns out to be the first clue in a treasure hunt with a special surprise at the end.
Curious to find the treasure, the girls follow the clues through Neo Venezia, and their search leads them to take a second look at places they pass by all the time with little notice and takes them to lesser-known parts of the city that even Aika and Alice, who were born there, haven’t seen.
The treasure hunt finally ends on an often over-looked stairway that actually provides an excellent view of Neo Venezia, and the treasure they find there is the one that made Akari enjoy the treasure hunt from the very beginning.
The girls decide to put all the clues back where they found them, and to their surprise, they notice that there are marks that indicate that many other people have done the same.
Three Water Fairies
Akari and Aika are training under two of the Three Water Fairies, the best-known Undines on Aqua. However, Aika’s mentor, Akira, is much more strict than Alicia. One day, Aika gets fed up with Akira’s strictness and decides to run away and train under Alicia.
When Akira shows up to reclaim her wayward trainee, Akari learns more about Alicia, Akira, and especially about Aika. Akira was seen briefly in Aqua Volume 2, when Aika snuck out of her room to go buy some pudding, and she was the person Aika was trying to avoid because she was the one making her rest from her cold. However, Akira wasn’t actually introduced until this book, like Alice. This story reveals that Alicia and Akira were friends as trainees, like Akari and Aika, and have had a bit of a rivalry, being considered among the three best Undines, but they haven’t seen each other much in recent years.
Aika had reveals that the reason why she admires Alicia so much is that Alicia was nice to her when she was a child. One day, when she was upset about something, Alicia found her and gave her a ride in her gondola and cheered her up by trying different hairstyles with her hair. This experience is what made Aika want so badly to become an Undine herself. However, Aika could not train under Alicia at Aria Company because her parents actually own Himeya Company, something that Aika has never told Akari before. Aika’s family expects her to work her way up through the ranks as an Undine and eventually take over Himeya Company.
To settle the matter of Aika’s future training, Akira proposes a contest, a race between Aika and Akari, to determine whether Aika will become Alicia’s student or return to Himeya Company with Akira. As Alicia guesses, the “race” between their trainees gives Aika an opportunity to return to Himeya without sacrificing her dignity. It also gives both Akira and Aika an opportunity to consider how they really feel about each other and how much they appreciate each other.
While Akira and Alicia talk about Aika and how she’s both similar to and different from her mentor, Akari and Aika aren’t really having a race. Instead, they talk about how Aika feels about Akira.
Aika says that her position as the future heir of Himeya Company doesn’t matter much to her because she just wants to be an Undine, like Alicia, but she admits that people at Himeya treat her differently from the other trainees because they know who she is. They are extra nice to her and try to avoid getting on her bad side because they want to be friends with the boss’s daughter, who will be their future boss someday. Aika admits that, strict as Akira is, she’s also the one who’s the most honest with her, correcting her when she needs it and not worrying about making her angry. Aika realizes that she needs that honesty in her life and that Akira’s training is helping her. At Aika’s insistance, the girls end their “race” and go buy some walnut pastries for Akira, which Aika offers to her as an apology before returning to Himeya with her. Akari realizes the the bond between Aika and Akira is stronger than either of them wants to admit, and she hopes that, someday, she’ll have a bond that strong with Alicia.
This story is important for explaining more of the backstory of the characters and how they relate to each other. There is a running theme in these stories of having characters whose names begin with the letter ‘A’. In most cases, I don’t mind because the names are usually different enough that it doesn’t matter, but Akira and Akari are rather close.
Festa del Boccolo
Festa del Boccolo is the time when men give red roses to the women they love. Akatsuki has had a crush on Alicia for a long time, and he enlists Akari’s help to give her a boatful of roses to impress her. He needs her help because the town is flooded during high tide again, as it is every year during late spring.
Unfortunately, his elaborate gesture doesn’t go as planned because Alicia has already received many other roses from other people, and she assumes that Akatsuki has bought all of his roses for Akari.
Akatsuki accidentally spills the roses in the water, while trying to get Alicia’s attention. He thinks that he’s completely screwed everything up, but Akari points out that his gesture wasn’t futile because, like the roses floating on the water, his love for Alicia spreads out around him and touches everyone, and one day, Alicia is bound to notice. Akatsuki gives Akari a single rose to thank her for her help, and the two of them enjoy a walk together through the flooded city.
Aria Volume 2 by Kozue Amano, 2003, English Translation 2008.
The is the second volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
In the second volume of the Aria series, winter comes to Neo Venezia, and Akari experiences the delights of the changing season and the celebration of a New Year as well as continuing to learn more about her new home.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
The stories included in this volume are:
Snow Bug
Snow Bugs (a kind of fluffy aphid) appear on Aqua at the onset of winter. They are larger than Earth aphids, and they look like cute little puff balls with eyes.
Akari makes friends with one of them when she and Alicia go out to gather some firewood, and she brings her Snow Bug friend home with her for awhile.
However, the Snow Bugs appear at this time of year because they are migrating to their winter home, and as snow comes to Neo Venezia, Akari has to accept that her little friend must move on with the other Snow Bugs as it gets colder. Fortunately, Snow Bugs have long life spans, so Akari can count on seeing her little friend again next winter.
Utopia
Akari has trouble adjusting to the winter in Neo Venezia because it’s much colder than the winters she is accustomed to on Earth. Aika suggests visiting a hot spring, which Akari has never done before because people on Earth are more technological and not so much into the beauties of nature. Alicia takes Akari and Aika to visit a very special hot spring where the baths are built into a magnificent old mansion.
The mansion has been there for years, and parts of it are now crumbling with disuse, but the hot water from the spring beneath it is now allowed to flow through the lower floors of the old mansion, giving it a mysterious atmosphere, yet it’s still a very relaxing hot bath.
The girls indulge themselves in the baths and have dinner on one of the upper floors with a grand view of the ocean. (Alicia is older than the other girls and a legal adult, so she drinks alcohol. She lets the teenage trainees try a small amount to see what it’s like, but mostly, the younger girls have iced coffee milk.)
After the younger girls have a nap, they go back in the baths, and Alicia shows them a special part of the hot springs. Akari feels a little guilty for taking the day off and indulging themselves, but Alicia says that a break now and then is good.
This is one of my favorite stories in the Aria books because I just like the idea of a mansion being turned into a giant hot spring bath, with water flowing through it. The crumbling bits look a little dangerous to me, but it’s fun to imagine what the rest of the house might be like.
A Day in the Life of the President
President Aria may be an intelligent Martian cat, but he is still a cute kitty. He does cute kitty things, like climbing into bags and boxes, worrying about Akari’s hair dryer, and fighting with a hair brush. It even says that he doesn’t like baths, although he didn’t mind going to the hot spring in the previous story.
Martian cats are supposed to be as intelligent as humans, and it’s established in the series that President Aria and other cats have their own community with Cait Sith, the king of the cats, sneaking off sometimes to meet with each other, but President Aria also does things that people would expect from ordinary pet cats, and it’s not clear why. Then again, it might not matter. The Aria stories are mostly atmospheric and about emotions, so not everything has to be completely explained.
Voices of the Stars
Akari learns about the Gnomes, a group of people who control the gravity on Aqua. Alicia tells her about the gnomes one day when she explains why the gravity on Aqua seems to be the same as on Earth even though its natural gravity would be much less strong. The Gnomes live in their own community underground and only come up to the surface from time to time to go shopping.
One day, Akari and Aika see a group of Gnomes shopping. They help one of them, who is having trouble loading his supplies into his boat. Akari offers to take him home in her gondola, and he accepts, taking her and Aika to see where the Gnomes live underground.
The Gnome, Al, is a trainee Gnome, just a few years older than Akari and Aika, although he is short and looks younger and, oddly, speaks like an older, old-fashioned man. He explains to the girls how the Gnomes control the gravity on Aqua by conducting special high-mass gravitational rocks through a network of pipes surrounding Aqua’s core. As always, the science and technology on Aqua are borderline magical.
Al shows them where he works, and the machinery that controls the sending of rocks through the pipes is like a large pipe organ, making beautiful musical sounds as it works. Al becomes a recurring character in the Aria stories.
Auguri Di Buon Anno
Akari celebrates New Year’s Eve with her friends. It’s interesting how they compare Japanese New Year’s traditions with ones from Venice, from the types of food eaten during the holiday to the way that Japanese people traditionally consider New Year’s Eve a family holiday, while Akari’s friends consider it a holiday to spend with friends in public. Alicia explains to Akari that one of the traditions of Neo Venezia is similar to a traditional Italian custom of throwing out old things on New Year’s Eve as a way of throwing off bad memories from the previous year.
Akari and Alicia join their other friends in the public square on New Year’s Eve, and Akari reflects on how much her life has changed during the last year, since she came to Aqua. During that time, she’s had many new experiences and made many new friends, and she’s grateful for everything that’s happened and all of the good memories she’s had.
Akari and her friends stay out all night and see the sun rise on the first day of the new year.
Carnival
Akari is introduced to the traditions and wonders of a Venice Carnival! Alicia explains the origins of the tradition to her.
However, Akari becomes intrigued by mysterious figure dressed as Casanova. Rumor has it that the same person has played the role of Casanova for 100 years, but no one knows who it is.
Aika and Akari try to follow a member of Casanova’s entourage to see if they can find out who Casanova really is. The two girls get separated, but Akari meets up with Casanova, and he invites her to join his entourage to parade through the crowd.
In the end, Akari does get a look at Casanova without his mask, and it’s a magical end to Carnival!
Aria Volume 1 by Kozue Amano, 2002, English Translation 2004.
The is the first volume of the second part of a fascinating manga series that combines sci-fi, fantasy, and slice of life. The series takes place about 300 years in the future, when Mars has been terraformed and renamed Aqua (because of all the water on its surface). The human colonies on Aqua are designed to resemble old-fashioned cities on Earth (called Manhome here). The people of Aqua prefer a much slower pace of life than people on Manhome, and aspects of life on Aqua more closely resemble Earth’s past.
The series is divided into two parts. The first two books are the Aqua volumes and introduce Akari Mizunashi, the main character, a young girl who came to Aqua to learn to become a gondolier in the city of Neo Venezia (which resembles Venice). Female gondoliers, called Undines, give tours of the city, giving Akari plenty of time to admire the beauty of her new home and meet interesting people. The two Aqua books are the prequel to the main series, Aria. Aqua covers Akari’s arrival on the planet, her introduction to life on Aqua, and the beginning of her training. The main Aria series show Akari’s continuing training, her progression to becoming a full Undine, her evolving relationships with her friends, and as always, her delight in learning more about her new home and admiring its beauty.
The series has received some criticism for being slow and lacking danger and adventure, but that is not really the point of the series. The main purpose is to show people how to appreciate the small pleasures of life. The sci-fi and fantasy elements (the spaceships, advanced environmental controls, intelligent Martian cats, and even the occasional appearances of the legendary Cait Sith) are mainly background to the stories about the magic of friendship and simple pleasures. Each volume contains a few short stories about Akari and her friends and the little adventures they have on a daily basis and the life lessons they learn. It’s a great series for relaxing when you’re stressed out.
The stories included in this volume are:
Neo-Venezia
As autumn comes to Neo Venezia, Akari encounters a grumpy old man, a visitor from Earth, who has gotten separated from his daughter and lost in the city. He is frustrated with the confusing and inconvenient nature of Neo Venezia.
Akari says that she can help him find his daughter and gives him a tour of the city, showing him the beauty of the city and changes his mood with the help of some baked potatoes and green tea. A slower pace of life and appreciation for the little pleasures has benefits.
Drydocking
It’s time for the gondolas to be cleaned, so they are moved onto dry land. Akari and her friend, Aika are in charge of the cleaning, but it is Akari who makes it fun.
The Bridge of Sighs
Like the original Venice, Neo-Venezia also has a “Bridge of Sighs.” Akari goes there one day to meet Aika and finds her friend, Akatsuki, waiting for someone. Akatsuki is impatient while he is waiting, so he convinces Akari to give him a short tour to pass the time. Akari tells him about the original Bridge of Sighs and how she thinks the name is still appropriate but for a different reason.
The original Bridge of Sighs, as Akari explains, was between an old courthouse and a prison, and the prisoners were said to sigh as they crossed the bridge because they were being led away to be incarcerated. However, Akari sighs because she likes living in the beautiful city of Neo-Venezia and feels like she’s lucky to be there. Her sigh is a sigh of contentment.
When the person Akatsuki is waiting for shows up, it turns out to be his older brother, who also appears in later stories.
Sun Shower
Although Akari lives in Neo-Venezia, which is designed to look like Venice, there are other parts of Aqua designed to look like different parts of Earth. Alicia takes Akari to an area much like Japan to see the changing autumn leaves and get some inarizushi.
They see a shrine on the island, and the woman at the sushi shop tells them a Japanese legend about the fox’s wedding, giving them a warning that the Inari fox might spirit them away to another world.
While admiring the red autumn leaves, Akari finds herself separated from Alicia, and she witnesses a strange wedding procession. When she seems to be invited to join it, she thinks quickly and gives the procession her inarizushi instead.
The story explains that a Japanese term for a sun shower (when it rains while the sun is still shining) is “the fox’s wedding.” Sun showers happen quite often when it rains where I live in Arizona, and I now think of this when I see one. I also know where to get some inarizushi. The Aria stories are good for making me want different types of food, whether it’s inarizushi or baked potatoes and green tea or pudding (from a previous book).
Vogare Longa
This story is based on a real gondola race that takes place in Venice.
Akari and Aika are told about the Vogare Longa gondola race, which all of the gondoliers, including the trainees, will participate in. Aika is determined to make a good showing in the race because there’s a rumor that it is used to judge trainees, but Akari gets caught up in the beauty of the day.
In the end, Akari admits to herself that she never forgot what Aika said about the race being used to judge trainees, but she just didn’t want to hurry because she was enjoying herself, and that’s the way she feels about her training in general. Akari wants to become a full Undine, but she wants to do it at her own pace and enjoy herself along the way.
It turns out to be just as well because the rumor about the race being used to judge trainees was only a rumor.
Jestress's Forgotten Books and Stories 