A handful of years ago, I read Uzumaki and felt... distinctly underwhelmed. Much to my continued self-consciousness, the review I subsequently wrote became my most popular review on this site. And although the attention it garners is nothing compared to a lot of other people's reviews, every time I get a notification that someone has liked that review, I feel a little uncomfortable. I've come to suspect that perhaps my take on Uzumaki was half-baked at best.

So I very much wanted to revisit Junji Ito, hoping to build upon my already well-established appreciation for his art and to find an appreciation for his texts, as well, or at least, a better understanding of what he's doing in them.

And with Tomie, that's what I got. I really liked this book. The episodic and repetitive qualities of the collected stories work in favor of the concept: a not-human girl who replicates herself like a virus, sowing madness with her beauty and using her destruction as a means of spreading her sinister influence. I like the grotesque art and the macabre humor, the moments that hit the same combination of funny and repellent as Cheryl taunting Ash from under the cellar door in Evil Dead. One snag is that the opening story lacks the polish of the later ones, which makes it a confusing opening to the book. But if you read on, you're in for a bloody treat.