The Café Terrace and Its Goddesses is a harem comedy that focuses on the theme of a found family. Spoilers ahead for both the anime and manga, by the way. Hayato Kasukabe returns to Miura to close his recently deceased grandmother’s cafe, Cafe Terrace Familia. But he discovers his grandmother had taken in five women…
Should You Read Musui’s Story: The Autobiography of a Tokugawa Samurai?
I had hunted for a cheap English copy of Musui’s Story for several years. Finally, I stumbled across a copy buried in a used book store for $5. Katsu Kokichi wrote his autobiography toward the end of the Tokugawa period. Musui, to use his retirement name, wasn’t a scholar, administrator, or a samurai of any…
Not All Heroes Draw Their Swords: Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth in Modern Anime
The journey story stands as one of the oldest types of stories, although the Cinderella story is likely the oldest story pattern. The journey pattern involves a hero of some sort traveling across various places, facing all sorts of challenges, and, at the same time, delving into their own psychology. This story archetype remains popular…
This Monster Wants to Eat Me: the Guilt that Drives Someone Toward Death
I enjoy a good yokai story, having studied yokai stories and even reworking versions of them for modern readers, freeing them from their late 1800s English and Latin (which were often the first time these Japanese stories were written down). If you are curious, I collected all of these into my Tales from Old Japan…
15 Years of JP Writing
The year 2026 marks a milestone anniversary for JP. I’ve been writing at least one post a week for 15 years, totaling well over 1 million words. That’s hard to believe! Of course, I’ve studied animation for even longer, well into 25 years now. Over that course of time, I’ve seen animation in general and…
Meandering Musings I: A Selection of My Poetry
I’m a prose writer, but I dabble in bad poetry. Most of it are wordplay experiments and free writing that isn’t worth showing to anyone. Although I’ve read Robert Frost, Shakespeare, and many Western poets, Japan’s poetry resonates with me more. Japan favors succinct, symbol-coded poems that follow differing syllable patterns. The musical nature of…