Reviews

These stories were.. okay. And that's being generous.

All of the stories feel like a really flat urban legend of creepypasta that boils down to "one time this girl saw a spooky thing, then 5 years later she saw the same spooky thing, then two years later something mysterious happened the end."

The art is good, but that's not a surprise. Really the best thing this book has going for it is that it's short and can be read in one sitting.

angelicardale's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

i loved this !!! literally so good, i think the choice to add illustrations from junji ito really elevated the stories. i felt like i was hearing urban legends while sitting around a campfire! it felt very cozy and mysterious, i really loved my experience reading this.

jo_in_bookland's review against another edition

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3.0

Plainly told stories that apparently document true supernatural experiences. There wasn't much to them but Snowy Day was quite creepy. The artwork and the bonus manga strory by Junji Ito was the best part.

sugasbeanie's review against another edition

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dark mysterious fast-paced

4.0

allisonhollingsworth's review

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dark tense fast-paced

2.75

I saw a glimpse of the reviews of this book before I read it and desperately hoped people were being snooty. I had hoped the stories were going to be more dark, more gritty, as is typical of Junji Ito stories, but unfortunately this book had none of the hair-standing-up in end moments that I wanted. The stories were bland, and the one redeeming part were Ito’s illustrations, which make me feel unnerved by their sheer existence. The only reason why this got a 3 star is because I think Ito’s art can just do no wrong. // Face: A couple moves to a remote island and one day the wife seems possessed with another man’s face coming out of her neck, but a priest is able to get rid of it. That’s all that happens?? Very anticlimactic. // Library: A girl sees a young girl at school running through the halls in the library but then disappears; it appears she is a ghost and the library has to close for a ritual to remove her spirit but then her face appears on the ceiling in a stain. I wish we could have learned more about who she was.. otherwise this is just boring. // From the Sea: These girls follow these weird balls of light to the side of a mountain. the balls of light had weird faces on them. Creepy, but boring. // Festival of the Dead: A girl witnesses various spirits during the festival of the dead. Some of them seem to be omens for things to happen.// The Play: A school puts on the play of Pinocchio and the girl handling the puppet is doing it really well, only to find the puppet was haunted by a different stagehand. // Folk Dance: University student take part in this folk dance at camp and there’s a beautiful girl there that they all want to dance with but when they develop photos later she doesn’t show up in any of them. // The Kimono: A woman finds a girl in her daughter’s room with a kimono, but when she goes to grab her she vanishes. Turns out it was the woman’s sister who died long ago.// Snow Day: This one was freaky because of Ito’s drawing of a hanging woman. A girl meets a woman on a snowy day who is wearing a dress and barefoot. Later, the woman’s hanging body shows up in the girl’s house. But we don’t know, once again, anything about the woman or why she hunt herself, making the story less scary than it could be. If we don’t understand, we have a hard time caring and it’s just shock value. Also what is the tie to the snow day? What am I missing? // Summer Graduation Trip: This was the creepiest story in my opinion and it was written by Junji Ito I’m pretty sure. Two friends go on a trip where they go to these baths but they seem to have to walk down a very dark long stairwell to get there, and when they get in there are a lot of people but they’re all facing away from them and not speaking. The visual drawing of all of the heads turned away in the water is so creepy. We never find out exactly what it was, and that’s creepy too. But unlike the other story, the unknown in this case is different because it’s pointed out by the main characters that they didn’t want to know the truth. In the other stories the characters don’t question the weirdness. That was why it worked in this story to me. At the same time… I wanted to know! I wanted it to go further!

harrie11's review against another edition

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dark fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.0

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