Review: The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 1 by Eiji Otsuka and Housui Yamazaki
The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 1
by Eiji Otsuka and Housui Yamazaki
Nearing graduation from a mid-level Buddhist university, Kuro Karatsu has little chance of finding a job. Growing desperate, he joins a group of student volunteers led by Ao Sasaki to chant prayers for suicides at Aokigahara. While there, Kuro reveals to the others - a mortician, a boy who hears the voices of aliens, a dowser and a computer hacker - that he can hear the voices of the dead. One of the bodies asks the group to help him reunite with his dead love; they committed suicide together but his spirit can’t find her in the afterlife. After they assist him, a lottery ticket that was in the corpse’s pocket wins a jackpot - and Ao decides that the group should stick together and work for the dead, who in return will pay them “karmically” as the first corpse had done with the lottery. Whether the deaths are natural, self-inflicted or murders the Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service will help the dead achieve their final goals.
The characters are very quirky. The mortician Makino acts like a peppy junior high school student, contrasting nicely with Numata, a big, silent, strong-man type who melts for pop idols and Prada. A mop of black hair on a skinny frame, Yata, channels the voices of an alien through a sock puppet; the alien’s personality is so distinctive from Yata that it’s almost the sixth member of the team. Ao is a little hard to read; she’s very, very focused on money but she also came up with the idea of providing services to the dead, and that has an altruistic aspect since pay isn’t a certainty.
Kuro is the most interesting of the group…well, he is the main character, after all. At the start of the book, he thinks of himself as definitely average save for this ability to listen to the dead. But as the book goes on, and it is revealed that there’s some sort of spirit working through him - an ancestor? a demon? - he proves to be quite exceptional. I’m looking forward to learning more about him in future volumes.
This is a funny series, with a very dark and morbid sense of humor. It made me laugh quite a bit, but I would often feel a little guilty immediately after because it’s also a very gruesome, gory series. In the first chapter alone there’s implied incestuous necrophilia and a graphic depiction of a rotting corpse, so this is not a book for the weak-stomached. But to put it in perspective, I couldn’t even finish the movie Kill Bill after the scene of the Bride biting off a man’s tongue, and comic books like this are fine. So if blood and guts and nudity can be a problem for you, you’d best proceed with caution…but this is a very promising and entertaining start to a series that is still running in Japan with thirteen books published so far.
4.5 out of 5 stars
To read more about The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 1, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.
by Eiji Otsuka and Housui Yamazaki
Nearing graduation from a mid-level Buddhist university, Kuro Karatsu has little chance of finding a job. Growing desperate, he joins a group of student volunteers led by Ao Sasaki to chant prayers for suicides at Aokigahara. While there, Kuro reveals to the others - a mortician, a boy who hears the voices of aliens, a dowser and a computer hacker - that he can hear the voices of the dead. One of the bodies asks the group to help him reunite with his dead love; they committed suicide together but his spirit can’t find her in the afterlife. After they assist him, a lottery ticket that was in the corpse’s pocket wins a jackpot - and Ao decides that the group should stick together and work for the dead, who in return will pay them “karmically” as the first corpse had done with the lottery. Whether the deaths are natural, self-inflicted or murders the Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service will help the dead achieve their final goals.
The characters are very quirky. The mortician Makino acts like a peppy junior high school student, contrasting nicely with Numata, a big, silent, strong-man type who melts for pop idols and Prada. A mop of black hair on a skinny frame, Yata, channels the voices of an alien through a sock puppet; the alien’s personality is so distinctive from Yata that it’s almost the sixth member of the team. Ao is a little hard to read; she’s very, very focused on money but she also came up with the idea of providing services to the dead, and that has an altruistic aspect since pay isn’t a certainty.
Kuro is the most interesting of the group…well, he is the main character, after all. At the start of the book, he thinks of himself as definitely average save for this ability to listen to the dead. But as the book goes on, and it is revealed that there’s some sort of spirit working through him - an ancestor? a demon? - he proves to be quite exceptional. I’m looking forward to learning more about him in future volumes.
This is a funny series, with a very dark and morbid sense of humor. It made me laugh quite a bit, but I would often feel a little guilty immediately after because it’s also a very gruesome, gory series. In the first chapter alone there’s implied incestuous necrophilia and a graphic depiction of a rotting corpse, so this is not a book for the weak-stomached. But to put it in perspective, I couldn’t even finish the movie Kill Bill after the scene of the Bride biting off a man’s tongue, and comic books like this are fine. So if blood and guts and nudity can be a problem for you, you’d best proceed with caution…but this is a very promising and entertaining start to a series that is still running in Japan with thirteen books published so far.
4.5 out of 5 stars
To read more about The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 1, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.