AsoIku book 9, finished
(and, actually, book 10 started; I just didn’t have time to write anything about it earlier)
Maybe Eris' Mom was right...
In book 7, Eris’ slightly-ditzy mother misread her letter home, and got the idea that she was in a serious relationship with both Kio and Aoi. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” and Mom went so far as to reassure Aoi that Catian scientists had plenty of experience helping interspecies gay couples have children together. Cue blushing all around, and stammered explanations of the actual state of affairs.
Except… Aoi really is developing feelings for Eris that she doesn’t understand, and that her emotionless-killer childhood hasn’t prepared her to deal with. It’s a tangled-up mess of friend, comrade, big sister, little sister, rival, and, most recently, as she helps Doctor Dyureru give a feverish Eris a sponge bath, “wow, she’s hot”.
Where’s it going? No idea. At this rate, I think we have to wait for Eris to go into heat again for anything to happen in this relationship. Given that the good doctor grins to herself when she sees Aoi’s reaction, and also listens in approvingly a bit later as Aoi pulls back just before blurting out to Kio that she wants to be his wife, I suspect she won’t be providing any heat-canceling pills next time. And since Captain Kuune is also gleefully shipping this trio, Kio and Aoi will probably find themselves locked in a room with a horny catgirl and a week’s worth of food.
Note that despite my expectations that book 10 will have major plot-advancing action, as of the end of chapter 5 (of 9), Eris’ sponge bath is the most significant event.
“Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”
AsoIku book 10: "finally, some action!"
[Update: finished, and while it doesn’t resolve the 30-day challenge, it does wrap up a lot of dangling plot threads, with a surprise at the end suitable for ending a season (should there ever be one…). Some of the threads don’t make a lot of sense, though, and I don’t think it’s incomplete understanding on my part; they just were never adequately explained.]
With two chapters to go, things are finally heating up. If they ever make a second season of the anime, it looks like book 10 can be the climax, and the reason is that Kio “gets a grip”. A very senior, and very scary, Catian official pushes him hard to defend humanity, and when he stands up to her, issues a challenge; if he fails, they’ll leave Earth forever and never come back. He has 30 days, and, fortunately, the help of some very talented women.
(actually, this was in the first half of the book, so technically the sponge bath wasn’t the most significant thing that happened, but I didn’t want to change the subject…)
Meanwhile, the opposition is planning a decisive strike, and for reasons of their own, two Dog deserters want to stop it. The gang is stunned when they show up and tell their story, and when Kio reports it all to Captain Kuune and asks if they should be trusted, she forces him to make the call. With a wink and a grin, she puts her faith in him. If it’s a trick, the lives of all her crew could be lost, so, y’know, no pressure. All he has to do is…
AsoIku book 11: WTF?
I have no idea what’s going on in book 11. That is, I understand the individual scenes, but have absolutely no idea where the story is going.
The latest bafflement is Jack showing up at Kio’s door and introducing herself (apparently for the first time) as a new neighbor, wearing her trademark barely-there cowgirl outfit and giving a completely different name that nonetheless has the initials JACK. This is minor compared to the literal catfight between two previously-unmentioned culture professors on a Catian space station, over who gets to go to Earth as part of the exchange program. And then there’s the teenage goth-loli MI6 agent who collects assistoroid plushies and just moved into the house formerly occupied by 6-chan’s friend Mahiro.
All of which seem positively normal when compared to Kuune holding a reception on board the ship (currently parked offshore from the new embassy) for a collection of Earth’s kami.
AsoIku book 11: progress, still WTF
Finally had time to do some more reading, and the story remains chaotic. I’m currently about halfway through chapter 5 of 10.
AsoIku 11: still not done, still WTF
Several times now I’ve had to slow down and re-read sections of this one, because of either vocabulary overload or a grammatical dogpile that blocked understanding of a scene.
That is, after Arkamatsu (elderly Catian Earth-culture scholar with a special interest in crime, illicitly exploring Earth with the help of his old-fashioned assistoroid Igor) rescues Black Amarylis (teenage goth-loli secret agent with a cybernetic heart that gives her bursts of super-speed) from other spies, he requests her assistance in robbing a bank. Suddenly, they’re joined by “veteran bank robber” Annie (who looks precisely like the richest girl in the world wearing a domino mask, down to the cat-ear headband), whose partner (a child-sized figure wearing a paper bag over its head) rescues them all from an incredibly lethal attack by spies wielding Metalstorm launchers. Annie then leads them to a secure hideout (Ichika’s home and studio) to relax and plot their crime, gleefully incorporating late arrival Sara, who had finally stopped panicking when she realized that she could track down her wayward mistress by getting another assistoroid to locate Heihon.
The teenage cyborg goth-loli secret agent is the most normal person in the room.
Relief!
Amazon Japan just sent me a notice that Okina Kamino has a new novel out,Tarot Knight. My first response was that AsoIku was dead for good, since he’s got three other series running now; my second thought was suddenly aborted when I clicked through and saw that the “customers who bought this also bought” linked to AsoIku book 15. And it’s not just a repackaging of the short stories that were included with the BDs; it looks like Aoi’s half-sister is coming back with marriage on her mind (ah, but who’s the lucky one…), and Chaika’s other two daughters are sneaking out to play on Earth.
Guess I should finally finish book 11 and catch up.
(as for Louie, well, I hit the first honest-to-gosh Stupid Thing and set it aside for a while; the worst part was that it wasn’t Louie’s bad idea, it was Merrill’s. It’s a bad plan, honey)
Fun with automatic translation, AsoIku edition
Some days, Google auto-translation just charms me. Eris’ race is キャーティア, “Kyaatia”. Google reliably translates it as “aiiieee tear” or “aiiieee tier”.
…and now I need to read Cat Tail Output!, because it turns out to be a spinoff series where the schoolgirl heroine’s deep dark secret is that she’s Melwin.
