NISIOISIN

There's a girl at their school who is always ill. She routinely arrives late, leaves early, or doesn't show up at all, and skips gym as a matter of course. She's pretty, and the boys take to whispering that she's a cloistered princess. As the self-described worst loser in her class soon finds out, they just don't know what a monster she is. So begins a tale of mysterious maladies that are supernatural in origin yet deeply revealing of the human psyche, a set of case files as given to unexpected feeling as it is to irreverent humor. So begins the legendary novel that kicked off the MONOGATARI series, whose anime adaptations have enjoyed international popularity and critical acclaim. This first of three parts introduces Senjogahara and Hachikuji, and fans of the blockbuster prequel KIZUMONOGATARI will be delighted to meet their favorite crazies again: the weirdly reliable narrator Araragi, class president among class presidents Hanekawa, shady problem-solver Oshino, and a certain pale, blonde former vampire.

Monster Tale

BAKEMONOGATARI, Part 2

Fake Tale

NISEMONOGATARI, Part 1

From the best selling novel series by renouned author NISIOISIN, comes the manga adaptation of the Monogatari Series! Artwork by Oh! great. One day, high-school student Koyomi Araragi catches a girl named Hitagi Senjougahara when she trips. But -- much to his surprise -- she doesn't weigh anything. At all. She says an encounter with a so-called "crab" took away all her weight... Monsters have been here since the beginning. Always. Everywhere.

BAKEMONOGATARI (manga), volume 1

A college aged aspiring author witnesses a horrible car accident. An elementary school girl was hit by a car as she walked home with her classmate. The other child was traumatised by the event, but that was to be expected given the circumstances. But her troubles only begin there. When the author is summoned to the child's home he discovers that she has many more horrors at home to overcome. The child lives alone in a large home. No one cares for her. She hoards food from school to feed herself. She spends her time waiting for her parents to return, but there are no signs of them anywhere.

Imperfect Girl, 2

Mitsuru Hattori

Legendary novelist NISIOISIN partners up with Mitsuru Hattori (SANKAREA) in this three volume graphic novel adaptation of one of his more recent mystery novels. An aspiring novelist witnesses a tragic death, but that is only the beginning of what will become a string of tramatic events involving a lonely elementary school girl. The mystery unviels in the third and final chapter of the series. A young author is being held hostage in the home of a grammar school girl. Held there by knife-point, and partially by his own curiousity, the author hopes to uncover the mysteries behind the child's torment. He know she lives alone in this huge home. But where are her parents? And what was her life like before the accident and this "kidnapping"?

Imperfect Girl, 3

NISEMONOGATARI, Part 2

A dropout from an elite Houston-based program for teens is on a visit to a private island. Its mistress, virtually marooned there, surrounds herself with geniuses, especially of the young and female kind—one of whom ends up headless one fine morning. The top-selling novelist year by year in his native Japan, prolific palindromic phenomenon NISIOISIN made his debut when he was only twenty with this Mephisto Award winner, a whodunit and locked-room mystery at once old-school and eye-opening. Previously published stateside by Del Rey, the translation has been retitled and revised just in time for the long-requested animated series based on illustrator take’s character concepts.

Kubikiri Cycle

Decapitation

Twelve warriors enter a death match, but only one can survive to win the ultimate prize. Rampage. Weep. Kill. Every 12 years, the 12 signs of the Chinese zodiac take the form of warriors and engage in the ultimate battle royal. They face one another in battles to the death, using all the powers of their star signs, and the sole survivor is granted the ultimate prize—a wish. Any wish.

Juni Taisen: Zodiac War

How far does one go to help a lost child? In the case of returning narrator Araragi, the answer is too far, across the veil of time. Dutifully (if unknowingly) following up on Hachikuji's cheeky foreshadowing, he concerns himself with his young lady friend and her fate in this installment of the cult-hit series, heroically unable, once again, to find his own way home. Thus the tale is also, or more so, about the journey itself, the dark honeymoon of a trip he takes into the past with the dweller in his shadow, Shinobu. Even among a cast that routinely disrespects chronology with their meta-commentary, she takes the cake, or the donut, by rewinding the clock for a perverse road movie, one that by and large goes nowhere, spatially. It's Kabuki not as in the theater, but with the character for "tilt"--as in a slanted attitude toward the world, the posture of a bohemian. Or, perhaps, of a legendary vampire who once sought death, and of a high school senior who once tuned out life doing their dandy best to attend to an embarrassing wealth of aberrations in a provincial town.

Dandy Tale

Kabukimonogatari

Vofan

End Tale

OWARIMONOGATARI, Part 02

In this latter half of Calendar Tale, a set of journeys into the past that have been revisiting the “case files” feel of the series’ origins starts to catch up to the present moment until we are violently spliced back into the overarching plot, just in time for the final quartet that is the End Tale (in three volumes) and End Tale (Cont.). Continuing with the motif of ways, paths, roads, and streets, and wrapping up sundry other topics and quasi-philosophical concerns, the vignettes for the months of October to March deal with six ladies who are either not quite human or older than titular narrator Koyomi Araragi, bless his bantering soul. In this installment, see how he handles—or is handled by—aberration of a little sister Tsukihi, enigma of a freshman or -woman Ogi, shadow of a legendary vampire Shinobu, corpse of a tween girl Ononoki, psychopath of a monster expert Kagenui, and know-it-all of a Machiavellian fixer Izuko Gaen.

Calendar Tale

KOYOMIMONOGATARI, Part 2

Just when we thought the darkness menacing the town had been identified, named, and tamed, clear and unclear mysteries of seasons past looming or surfacing, then resolving, not without tears, not without bittersweetness, of course, but satisfyingly, in a tripartite finale, all loose ends tied up into, or at least with, a bow… The End Tale continues—if only for one last time, in a bonus stage for the ages, as our softie of a protagonist who wished for all parties involved, including himself, maturely enough, to end up happy, sees his reflected image freeze in a mirror and regretfully, regrettably, reaches for it to find himself through the looking glass. In an alternate reality where bits of the world have been flipped around, the hero comes face to face with the hidden side(s) of familiar faces, along with author NISIOISIN, whose bravura attempt to reimagine character possibilities concludes, with signature flair, the MONOGATARI series proper—thank you for reading.

End Tale (Cont.)

ZOKU OWARIMONOGATARI

From the best selling novel series comes the latest book of the final season of the Monogatari Series. Before we witness the series’ climactic showdown in the third volume of the End Tale—each part of which forms its own cohesive whole—narrator Araragi wrestles with a crucial bit of history that had turned him into the loner we met at the very beginning, who opined that friendships only lowered his intensity as a human. What initiates his pilgrim’s progress of a reckoning is his first encounter, at school, with the mysterious freshman Ogi Oshino, self-described niece of the equally enigmatic aberration expert Mèmè, and the book’s opening chapter is a harrowing standalone novella of a who-dunit involving a locked room of sorts. Our increasingly well-adjusted hero kept on beingdecent at one thing even when he was just hanging on, but this forte, an unlikely aptitude for math, of all things, becomes the focus of a cheating scandal and a web of recollections that forces him to come to terms with, what do you know, his capacity to connect to people.

OWARIMONOGATARI, Part 1

From the best selling novel series comes the latest book of the final season of the Monogatari Series. No good deed goes unpunished, they say, and so does friendship and lowering your intensity as a human, they don’t say—alas, for all his literally painful hustle and inveterate need to save others, our brave fool of a hero ends up in hell, a conception of the inferno in its full Buddhist glory, and muses (lol) if there’s a return ticket. Told in three chapters, the final part of End Tale concludes the story proper and resolves the series’ panoply of ongoing mysteries: the dues of a do-gooder for relying on a power not his own, the identity of a shady transfer student, the outcome of a class president’s questing abroad, and even the true name of a park. Araragi, indeed, is the one who knows, but along the way he meets old faces, really every last one of them, who aid him on his journey for understanding, and perhaps for salvation, and you for one might not be surprised if he had another rendezvous with an erstwhile “cloistered princess” before it—guess what it is—sees an end.

OWARIMONOGATARI, Part 3

When NISIOISIN, Japan's bestselling novelist, writes a murder mystery, it won't be like anything you've ever read before. Now in a new English translation! Whether you're already a fan of Japanese phenom NISIOISIN, or a mystery reader looking for something unusual and compelling, don't wait to get your hands around STRANGULATION: Kubishime Romanticist. This follow-up to Decapitation, and the second part of NISIOISIN's debut Zaregoto series, presents a puzzling murder mystery that tells the story in the voice of a narrator who's trying his hardest to stay out of the action. Now that he's a cool college student, our anti-hero Iichan thinks his crime-solving days are behind him. Cynical, sarcastic and minimally engaged in his studies, Iichan is much more interested in his own feelings of disaffection and isolation. But despite his resolve to remain aloof, he's pulled into the narrative when he encounters and bonds with a serial killer named Hitoshi Zerozaki - a homicidal maniac with the soul of an artist whose talent is on display at the grisly scenes of his crimes. Written by Japan's prolific and top-selling author NISIOISIN, STRANGULATION: Kubishime Romanticist blends a tale of suspense and detection with an edgy eploration of the nature of talent, violence, and ego. This Vertical edition features a revised translation and new art by acclaimed illustrator take.

Kubishime Romanticist

Strangulation

A certain middle school girl has a fondness for hats, which serve as a line of defense against eye contact along with the overlong bangs she’s worn ever since she was little. Speaking in fits and starts when she doesn’t fall completely silent, her go-to line is “I’m sorry,” and she’s given to referring to herself in third person. Nadeko Sengoku is pretty, and not just cute. When a jealous classmate tried to hex her with a fraudulent charm, Miss Bangs went and got cursed in earnest all by herself, having done her homework wrong and performed a gruesome ritual at a forgotten shrine. Thank goodness Big Brother Koyomi noticed and rescued her that time, but chopping up snakes at a place of worship that was dedicated to a serpent… It might come back to bite her again, hmmmm? Hoping to be saved by someone, but unable to ask for help, the shyest member of the cast explores a running theme of these tales in her own halting voice this round: While self-reliance is well and good, beware of its debased counterfeit minted from a mere reluctance to connect with others. You know what I mean?

Decoy Tale

OTORIMONOGATARI

It, like the dark that makes up most of the cosmos, is not an aberration. Nonbeing can swallow you whole, yet if anything, it’s the anti-aberration. Darkness, in fact, is the Law, an executioner from whom a mark can try to run and hide, but only for so long. When it comes calling, the fortunate just might have the time to say goodbye. And the Darkness is—here now. Before ever visiting Japan to find a place to die, four centuries, indeed, before her failed suicide attempt, the legendary vampire Kissshot literally stepped foot on the land of the rising sun with an epic jump that ended a lonely sojourn in Antarctica. It was back in those days that the proud noble created her first thrall. It was then, too, that she first met the Darkness. Having messed with a more recent past with her help, and returning to the present to reunite with two more characters that look like little girls but are actually his elders, Thrall No. 2 Araragi reclaims the mic only to cede it in large part to the bloodsucking demon who goes by “Shinobu” these days. Her story, though, may not even be the most poignant one told herein.

Demon Tale

ONIMONOGATARI

Officially the start of Monogatari's second arc, Nekomonogatari (White) is written in Hanekawa's perspective. It is the first story in the series that's told from a different perspective than Araragi. After months since her last time turning into Black Hanekawa, Hanekawa finds a new oddity problem in the form of a white tiger that burns down buildings she had slept in the night before. The tiger is an oddity Hanekawa accidentally produced herself after years of domestic abuse that kept her from having her own room.

Cat Tale

Nekomonogatari

From the renowed author NISIOISIN, the creator of BAKEMONOGATARI, Zaregoto Series and KATANAGATARI. Comes a new, innovative mystery series, Pretty Boy Detectives Club! Mayumi Dojima, a second-year student at the exclusive Yubiwa Academy middle school, has lost something - a star she glimpsed just once, ten long years ago. But help is on the way, in the form of the unofficial, secretive, and thoroughly mysterious Pretty Boy Detective Club! Rumored to solve problems within the school (most of which they themselves may well have created) for reasons aesthetic rather than financial, these five gorgeous boys sweep Mayumi into their world of excitement, danger, and overwhelming beauty. So begins the thrilling new mystery series from renowned author NISIOISIN!

The Dark Star That Shines for You Alone

Pretty Boy Detective Club

From the renowed author NISIOISIN, the creator of BAKEMONOGATARI, Zaregoto Series and KATANAGATARI. Comes a new, innovative mystery series, Pretty Boy Detective Club! Mayumi Dojima is finally a full-fledged member of the Pretty Boy Detective Club, known to her compatriots as Mayumi the Seer, she of the beautiful eyes. Summoned suddenly to the disused art room that serves as the club's headquarters, Mayumi is pressed into service to assist with an ambitious redecorating project. But when they discover a secret room containing thirty-three mysterious canvases, the Pretty Boys are faced with their most perplexing puzzle yet. Who is responsible for these strange paintings, and are they connected to an impossible kidnapping that took place at Yubiwa Academy seven years ago? The third installment of the Pretty Boy series offers a beautiful mystery with an even more beautiful solution! Best-selling author NISIOISIN (Monogatari series, Decapitation, Katanagatari) brings his trademark blend of wit, wordplay, adventure, and cracked philosophy to a new mystery series for fans of all ages.

NISIOISIN

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