Title: 君が望む永遠 Portrait*4　大空寺あゆ (Kimi ga Nozomu Eien Portrait*4 Daikuji Ayu)
Original Creator: Age
Vocals: 浅井清己 (Kiyomi Asai)
Release Date: 2/4/04
Catalog No.: LACM-4121
Rating: 2/4

Is there really a following for Ayu that warrants a character image single? I never particularly cared about her. During the game, I pretty much glossed over all the situations in the restaurant and didn't really care about the characters there (MayuMayu was funny on some occasions). So yet again, I'm biased, but this time, against Ayu.

The second song isn't that great. Actually, it's pretty bad. I can enjoy the first song though. It's her singing about herself and of course, you can't have Ayu talk without her signature phrase, Neko no Unko Fume!

Title: 君が望む永遠 Portrait*3　凉宮茜 (Kimi ga Nozomu Eien Portrait*3 Suzumiya Akane)
Original Creator: Age
Vocals: 上原ともみ (Tomomi Uehara)
Release Date: 12/26/03
Catalog No.: LACM-4117
Rating: 3/4

I really like Akane's voice in all her roles from the video game, anime, and now the character image song. Haruka's voice is too soft (and she usually never speaks in complete sentences). Mitsuki's voice is at times very whiny. But Akane, or rather Tomomi Uehara, has a certain distinction in her voice that makes it interesting to listen to (kinda like Kanako's in Love Hina). So that sense, I'm a little biased.

The two songs included are light and upbeat. The lyrics fit well with her personality. I wouldn't mind listening to these songs occasionally, but not as addicting as the theme songs to Kiminozo.

Title: 私の狼さん (My Wolf)
Artist/Author: 藤原ここあ
Book Size/Pages: B-6, 178pp., w/furigana
Volume: 1/1
Original Serialization: Monthly GANGAN Wing 9/00, 4/01-7/01
First Printing: 9/27/01
Rating: 3/4

This single volume was kinda non-sequitur for me. I had come into it expecting a story that that has a beginning and an end, but for the most part, the chapters were loosely tied together. There was a central theme about the mystery of Subaru's right hand, but I had to read a few pages over before I got everything straight in my head. I don't think "dear" follows the same Lycanthrope situation. I did enjoy the stories though, despite re-reading a bit of it.

Bonuses are a color first page, a mini-comic at the end, and a letter from the author to his fans.

1. 小桃 (Komomo), a young girl who is living by herself after her mother's passing, wants to be a hero and her first task that she assigns herself is to defeat the king of the people who possess magic. Her attack fails and instead, 魔王 (King), takes her in and falls in love with her. When his servants disapprove, he renounces his throne. When his successor wants to kill him though, he reveals his true power as a Lycanthrope.

2. Komomo and the King are wandering the villages in search of work (Komomo still wants to be a hero). She hears about a girl who is to be wed against her will to a monster. In exchange, the monster will no longer terrorize their village. Komomo offers herself as the bride and at the right moment, defeat the monster. She has some trouble during battle, and so the King helps her out.

3. Komomo tries helping out at a village fesitval and causes a lot of trouble. At the end of the day, she and King spend the night looking at the fireworks.

4. The secret of Lycanthrope is revealed. Lycanthrope is a right arm that gets passed down from generation to generation. Each time a person with the wolf arm dies, the candidates for the successors have their arms chopped off and grafted with this wolf arm. If it's not a match, they turn into monsters, if it is a match, they become the king. However, Lycanthrope lives off blood, the arm is slowly eating away at him. Komomo thinks she sees him die, but in fact, he gets healed by one of this former servants and has a regular arm back. Since he's just a regular person now, he tells her that his name is 昴 (Subaru).

5. This is a one chapter story, isolated from the previous four chapters. It goes through how Subaru has the ability of the wolf. When Komomo gets attacked, saves her and the chapter ends with them in an embrace.

Title: 妹 (Sister) Vol. 2
Artist/Author: 山花典之 (Noriyuki Yamahana)
Book Size/Pages: B-6, 215pp., w/o furigana
Volume: 2/2
First Printing: 4/24/00
Rating: 4/4

Not much plot, but good artwork and entertaining stories which in my opinion are all that's needed. I'm looking forward to reading the next set of books. These first books are titled "Sister." The next books also have the "Sister" kanji, but have Akane in furigana (meaning it should be read "Akane" and that's why I have it sorted under "あ"). There's a color first page which is all for bonuses

7. 義母の浴衣 (Stepmother's Yukata): Marina asks Akane to go to the festival. However, Akane doesn't have a yukata. She talks to Shinpei about this and he brings out her childhood yukata, which has a long history behind it. When she was a child, her mother couldn't afford one, so she would be teased at school. Shinpei, who got a new glove, felt bad for her sister so he returned his glove and gave the money to her to buy a new yukata. After the flashback, he brings out their mother's yukata and she wears it.

8. G線上のアリア (Air on the G Strings): A co-worker of Akane's somewhat likes her. Since he plays the violin, he gives her a classical music CD to listen to. However, he also has a childhood female friend who isn't too pleased with Akane so she gets some hitmen to rough her up a bit. The co-worker goes to save her, but he gets caught up on the brutality. The friend realizes she shouldn't have done such a cruel act and tries to stop it and gets stabbed in the hand. Both the co-worker and friend leave for Germany soon after. (I *really* can't remember names).

9. 芥川さんの事情 (The Situation with Akutagawa): The manager where Shinpei works decides to bring in a tutor to help teach them some things about accounting. However, the tutor, 芥川留之介 (Ryunosuke Akutagawa) is deathly afraid of pretty girls because he's a nerd and has never been able operate when them around. Akutagawa accidentally gropes Akane and later calls to apologize. As he's talking, a group of girls approach him and make him even more depressed about his loner situation. They convince him to jump off a building, but Akane saves him just in time, but not before some beatings by the girls who are wondering why she even bothers with him.

10. チャコ (Chako): Akane is to take charge of a dog, Chako, for a day. However, Shinpei and Tetsu both think Chako is a boyfriend, and go crazy when she talks about his licking. Things clear up at the end.

11. 兄貴失格 (Disqualified Brother): Shinpei gets aroused when Akane is around. Since they're legally brothers and sisters, she feels terrible for feeling that way.

12. 慎平　男を捨てる (Shinpei Discards his Masculinity): To calm his hormones, he tries different techniques to make him stop thinking about her in that way. He finally resorts to asking the doctor to remove his masculinity, but fortunately, he doesn't go through with it because he was too scared of the operating room.

13. なかよし (Good Friends): Marina and Akane have a new friend, Tsukishima. The popular girls in the class don't like that at all, so they dish out some punishment which leaves Tsukishima in crutches and of course, they try to blame Akane. The truth comes out, fortunately, and the main girl in the popular group gets kicked out of school.

Title: ぴたテン (PitaTEN) Vol. 3
Artist/Author: コゲどんぼ (Koge-Donbo)
Book Size/Pages: B-6, 194pp., w/furigana
Original Serialization: Monthly Dengeki Comics GAO 11/00-4/01
First Printing: 5/15/01
Rating: 2/4

It's been quite a while since I've touched Pitaten that I've pretty much forgotten most of what the story is about. I don't think there's anything too substantial with the plot, so I guess I'll just leave it at that. The summary at the beginning of the book fill me in just enough.

Nothing much happened in this volume that really got my attention. There might have been some very subtle foreshadowing, but nothing provocative.

For bonuses, there's only a color first page and a summary page.

14. 目を覚まし方 (How to Wake Up): Continuing from the previous chapter, Kotaro and Shia are both passed out. Misha uses her angelic powers to bring them home, but not before Shia's cat sees her true self. In his slumber, Kotaro has a strange dream where he's a child and meets Shia and later, Misha who is bound in thorns. He and Shia recover by the end of the chapter.

15. お屋敷の歩き方 (How to Walk Around a House): Misha and Kotaro head over to Hiroshi's house for group study. While looking for a book, Kotaro gets lost in the large mansion and gets himself into all sorts of strange predicaments. At the end, Misha tells him that she's studying to become an angel.

16. 幸せの感じ方 (How to Feel Happiness): For her preparations to be an angel, Misha tries everything to make Kotaro feel happy. Unfortunately, Kotaro isn't in the mood and all she does is annoy him. At the end of the day up on the roof, Kotaro apologizes and tries to explain what happiness is. Misha leaves the next day for her test, and then another angel appears.

17. 下界の楽しみ方　その１ (How to Have Fun on Earth, Part 1): The newly arrived angel, Sasha, is out and about spreading happiness to the world. She sees Takashi (Ten) with Shia and decides that she wants to give him a boost of confidence. However, Ten sees Shia with Kotaro, which doesn't make him too happy, so Sasha tries to help some more. Kotaro then asks her who she is (she assumes no one can see her). Ten then confesses to Shia.

18. 下界の楽しみ方その２ (How to Have Fun on Earth, Part 2): Afterwards, Sasha chases after Kotaro home and discovers that he's having dinner with Shia. Sasha tries to cleanse them, but that causes Shia to faint. In bed, she wakes up and asks that Kotaru be by her side.

19. お手伝いの仕方 (How to Help Out): Misha has come back from her test, although she doesn't know the results yet. She accompanies Kotaro to school and tries to help him with sports, but being a klutz, she doesn't really help out.