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blairconrad's Reviews (1.12k)
Probably a better work than either [b:The Tipping Point|2612|The Tipping Point|Malcolm Gladwell|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255576535s/2612.jpg|2124255] or [b:Blink|40102|Blink|Malcolm Gladwell|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255630010s/40102.jpg|1180927]. Well-written, and entertaining, but not without its flaws. One of the big problems is that Gladwell seems to fall into the classic blunder of thinking that the plural of “anecdote” is “data”.
In a few places his assertions about factors that influence people’s success are backed up by science, but in many cases it’s not clear that they are. One will often find instances of “hey, look at these 3 Jewish families – there are lots of siblings who are doctors and lawyers, so being Jewish during a certain period in New York increases the likelihood that your kids will be professionals”. Now, maybe that’s the case. Unfortunately, it’s not the sort of thing that can be determined by looking at a handful of examples, and Gladwell never makes it clear to the reader that any more rigorous analysis was performed.
That being said, the book was fun to read in spite of these little niggles – I enjoyed the conversational writing style, and the subject matter was very interesting, even if I wouldn’t necessarily take the book as an authoritative reference.
In a few places his assertions about factors that influence people’s success are backed up by science, but in many cases it’s not clear that they are. One will often find instances of “hey, look at these 3 Jewish families – there are lots of siblings who are doctors and lawyers, so being Jewish during a certain period in New York increases the likelihood that your kids will be professionals”. Now, maybe that’s the case. Unfortunately, it’s not the sort of thing that can be determined by looking at a handful of examples, and Gladwell never makes it clear to the reader that any more rigorous analysis was performed.
That being said, the book was fun to read in spite of these little niggles – I enjoyed the conversational writing style, and the subject matter was very interesting, even if I wouldn’t necessarily take the book as an authoritative reference.
Johan just keeps getting creepier (probably the moreso for his lack of screen time), and Nina becomes more interesting with every panel.
Not a lot of Tenma, but the Eva/Deiter interactions make this book worthwhile on their own. A little bit of a slowish confusing intro to the “Vampire of Bavaria” arc, but even that has its appeal.
Am I ever going to stop loving Monster? It seems unlikely at this point. The connections between the characters continue to be developed, and against all expectations, we learn that Johan may be even more evil than he’s seemed up ‘til now. Yeek!
Started off a little slow. There was some building up of a minor (but important) character’s character, and some of what I felt was rehashing of events from the previous works. After that, though, woo-hah. Things picked up, more connections were made between existing characters and events, and the suspense-o-meter went through the roof – I think my heart was racing by the time I was done the book.
One other quibble – I’m not sure the translation’s all it could be; in one or two places, I think phrasing was off and/or the order of the speech bubbles (when one person was talking) was flipped within a panel, which is funny, since we are going from a right-to-left book to another right-to-left book. Ah well, nothing disastrous.
The minor slowdowns and recaps are getting a little annoying – I feel like in the end I’ll be saying that the 18 instalments would’ve been better as 12-15 or something, but the new content in each book more than makes up for it. I need some sort of mega collection of these things.
One other quibble – I’m not sure the translation’s all it could be; in one or two places, I think phrasing was off and/or the order of the speech bubbles (when one person was talking) was flipped within a panel, which is funny, since we are going from a right-to-left book to another right-to-left book. Ah well, nothing disastrous.
The minor slowdowns and recaps are getting a little annoying – I feel like in the end I’ll be saying that the 18 instalments would’ve been better as 12-15 or something, but the new content in each book more than makes up for it. I need some sort of mega collection of these things.
Fabulous. Jam-packed. The buildup from book 8 is realized, with action a-plenty. In addition to crazy running around, we have additional psychological horror courtesy of Johan, and we learn that some of our heroes may be connected to one another in more ways than we thought.
Boy it's hard to talk about these books without spoilering.
Boy it's hard to talk about these books without spoilering.
I read 11 and 12 right in a rush, so I'll comment in [b:Naoki Urasawa's Monster, Vol. 12|1284031|Naoki Urasawa's Monster, Vol. 12|Naoki Urasawa|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1182490997s/1284031.jpg|1273078] for both.
This was the book with the weird repetition - recaps of events that happened 20 pages ago. Other than that, the high quality of the series continues. Interesting chracters, nostalgic flashbacks (good ones), and a deepening mystery. My admiration for Naoki Urasawa groes.
