{"id":32465,"date":"2025-03-20T09:00:34","date_gmt":"2025-03-20T09:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=32465"},"modified":"2025-03-18T17:16:53","modified_gmt":"2025-03-18T17:16:53","slug":"limit-book-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2025\/03\/20\/limit-book-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Limit Book 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Keiko Suenobu<\/strong>, translated by Mari Morimoto<\/strong> (Vertical)
\nISBN: 978-1-93565-456-8 (TPB Tank?bon edition)<\/p>\n

Travelling a little off the traditional Shōjo (\u201cgirl\u2019s comic\u201d) path, Limit<\/strong> is a marvellous thriller by Keiko Suenobu, brought to English-speakers by New York publisher Vertical. In Japan it ran from October 13th<\/sup> 2009 to September 13th<\/sup> 2011, ultimately filling six collected volumes.<\/p>\n

Born in Kitakyushu, Fukuoka in March 1979, Suenobu graduated from the University of Tsukuba before beginning her creative career with the school romance Happy Tomorrow<\/strong>. She gravitated towards darker themes of conformity, social pressure and bullying in Vitamin <\/strong>and the moving, controversial and multi award-winning Raifu<\/em><\/strong> – translated as Life<\/strong> by TokyoPop in 2006 and later assumed by Kodansha for a20 volume run. This was followed by 2019\u2019s ongoing It\u2019s Over If You Fall<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

In 2009 the author took her interest in social issues and the nastier side of school life to imaginative extremes when Limit<\/strong> began serialisation in Kodansha\u2019s Bessatsu Friend<\/em><\/strong>. Dark and exceptionally grim, it\u2019s another minor classic inexplicably out of print and hard to find but which will definitely appeal to a readership far beyond the general Shōjo target-market if it ever gets re-issued…<\/p>\n

Mizuki Konno<\/em> is lucky – and savvy – enough to fit with the \u201cIn-Crowd\u201d at her all-girls school. Acceptably cute and suitably smart, she\u2019s learned to make no waves and accept that the ways things work is the way things should be. The popular girls – like undisputed teen goddess Sakura Himezawa<\/em> – make the rules, and the rest conform. It\u2019s a simple matter of survival…<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re physically different or interested in odd things, like dumpy manga-fan\/tarot reader Arisa Morishige<\/em>, life can be hell. Only the strongest personalities, like bookish, decent and determinedly wound-tight non-conformist Chieko<\/em> Kamiya<\/em> have any chance of standing up to the constant pressure to comply, accept and keep your place in the hierarchy of \u2018A Perfect World\u2019<\/em>…<\/p>\n

However, everything changes when Sakura\u2019s class drive off for an extended visit to an Exchange Camp in the wilderness. Each class spends a week roughing it with nothing more than a communal scythe and their ever-present cell phones to hold back the horrors of nature, but with this last trip of the semester things go tragically wrong. High in the mountains the coach driver has a heart attack at the wheel and the vehicle, packed with excited girls and their harried teacher, plunges catastrophically into a wooded hidden valley.<\/p>\n

Only five girls survive, and undisputed queen of the modern world Sakura isn\u2019t one of them…<\/p>\n

As Konno drags shell-shocked Haru<\/em> Ichinose<\/em> – Sakura\u2019s subordinate and deeply devoted deputy, and utterly unable to function without her – out of the wreckage sometime later, she sees smoke from a fire. Tracking the signal they find middle-ranking Chikage<\/em> Usui<\/em> with her leg splinted and bandaged outside a cave. The wounded survivor has been saved and succoured by coldly efficient Kamiya, who has also scavenged everything potentially useful from the crash site.<\/p>\n

At the back of the cave, Morishige sits inside a pentagram, casting the cards. Kamiya has brusquely taken charge, organising resources and outlining options until they can be found and rescued, but introspective Konno can barely grasp the strange situation and new rules of survival. Events take an even nastier turn when the Tarot reader suddenly explodes in jubilation, claiming her prayers have been answered and her tormentors all punished…<\/p>\n

Indifferent, ambiguous pragmatist Konno is forced to confront a new world order in \u2018The Strong vs. the Weak\u2019<\/em>, wherein increasingly unstable Morishige takes control. After panicking and unsuccessfully failing to climb out of the box valley, Konno returns to find bereft Haru attacking the former class pariah, but Morishige\u2019s big and burly frame – which brought her such cruel treatment in school – is now the most valuable asset in this new hostile environment. Moreover, she has found that wickedly lethal scythe…<\/p>\n

The new queen easily defeats her attacker and then regales the horrified girls with a litany of all the cruel acts she saw their perfect princesses constantly inflict upon each other during their wonderful school days. Haru is unable to accept the change of status and even refuses Konno\u2019s overtures to become allies, just as ascendant Morishige casts the cards again and sees a future where only the strong will survive…<\/p>\n

With food already running out, events spiral towards deadly conflict as Konno recalls better days that weren\u2019t actually all that great, only to be dragged back to reality when Morishige decides to split the remaining rations four ways. The clearly unstable would-be witch has established her own social hierarchy with pragmatically compliant Kamiya as Royalty, Usui a Commoner and the roles of Servant and Slave still to be determined by her under \u2018The Empress\u2019 Rules\u2019<\/em>…<\/p>\n

Haru is provisionally Slave but since they don\u2019t get food she must fight Konno to determine who gets the final privileged – and elevated – role of Servant\u2026 To the death, naturally…<\/p>\n

To Be Continued…<\/p>\n

Rather inaccurately likened to Michael Lehmann\u2019s 1988 cult black comedy Heathers <\/strong>(although perhaps influenced by Koushun Takami\u2019s novel Batoru Rowaiaru<\/em><\/strong> or Kinji Fukasaku\u2019s filmic adaptation Battle Royale<\/strong>) Limit<\/strong> certainly derives much of its energising concepts from William Golding\u2019s landmark Lord of the Flies<\/strong>. This bleak, viciously introspective and absolutely chilling tale marries lavish illustration to fearsome examination of what civilised folk consider acceptable behaviour and asks many entertainingly challenging questions.<\/p>\n

This lost book – which also includes a charming glance at the author\u2019s methodology in the mini-feature My Workroom<\/em> – is printed in traditional Japanese right to left, back to front format, but surely we\u2019re all used to that by now?
\n\u00a9 2012 Keiko Suenobu. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Keiko Suenobu, translated by Mari Morimoto (Vertical) ISBN: 978-1-93565-456-8 (TPB Tank?bon edition) Travelling a little off the traditional Shōjo (\u201cgirl\u2019s comic\u201d) path, Limit is a marvellous thriller by Keiko Suenobu, brought to English-speakers by New York publisher Vertical. In Japan it ran from October 13th 2009 to September 13th 2011, ultimately filling six collected … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Limit Book 1”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[239,216,25,377,254],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drama","category-lifestyle","category-japanese-comics","category-shujo","category-young-adult"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-8rD","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32465"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32465\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32470,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32465\/revisions\/32470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}