PANDORA

by Hagiwara Rei

PANDORA, The Receding Sound of Footsteps is Hagiwara Rei’s masterpiece. Rei is a comic artist based in Japan who has self-published their work at Comita through the domestic indie manga scene since 2018. Born in 1993, Rei first become more widely known to English language readers Fall of 2020 through the Glacier Bay Books publication of their sparse and emotionally resonant debut Ripples. PANDORA expands on this with their second long form work, a lyrical, full color 264 page collection of five stories. Painted in delicate watercolors during 2020/2021 and the initial throes of the covid 19 pandemic, PANDORA simultaneously reflects on current events as well as the 10th anniversary of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.

Genres: Manga, Comics

264 pages, Paperback

Published April 1, 2023

Reviews

[Urbon Adamsson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew this was going to be a sad story. The whole tone of the book is about sadness and grieving and in fact, it was.

This book contains 5 stories, in which "Pandora" is the main one. It revisits the theme of Pandora's box and how it brought suffering into the world. But it also tries to leave a message of healing and hope.

This should be definitely a contemplating reading. It has very little text. Most of the narrative is through the beautiful water paintings.

These stories are going to put you in touch with your deep (and not so deep) grieving but in the end it will leave you with a "it's not so bad" feeling.

At the end, I wanted to read everything again. Definitely a book to revisit in the future.

[Pamela · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

The Receding Sounds of Footsteps, Surfance and Prayer, and To the Forest To Those Handswere great depictions of grief. The art style is beautiful, soft, and hazy, but used in an impactful way.

Unfortunately, Pandora and Seaside Song (the two longest stories), weren't up to par with the other ones. Maybe it was the length, but I felt like there was too much 'silence' with graphics not being as impactful.

I would definitely recommend you to pick it up if you want to explore grief in different POVs and up close and personal.

[Rick Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of five short stories that aren't quite connected by narrative, but are definitely connected tonally and atmospherically. Each story tie together with their quiet sense of melancholy and loss, and are gorgeously rendered in soft watercolors reminscent of other noted painters in the medium like Hayao Miyazaki, Kent Williams, John J. Muth, etc. The quaint quality to the storytelling also reminded me a little of Linnea Sterte's A Frog in the Fall, though this one is signficantly more sadder to read. While none of the stories had enough meat to them due to the minimal use of words to really connect with me, I was pleasantly surprised by how much emotion Hagiwara Rei is able to convey with art alone.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Coming immediately off of Mothers this is just too much ethereal art manga about loss, grief and death. But you're here for the beautiful moody watercolour art and in that respect Hagiwara doesn't disappoint. While I was thematically overloaded, I was touched by the short author statement at the end and the fact that this is clearly a COVID-era work.

[Kumasama · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very solid collection of short stories, with great surreal art. The common theme across all is dealing with grief of losing someone due to sudden events. It has minimal text and relies on images more to convey its messages.