Scary Book, Vol. 3: Faces

Scary Books #3

by Kazuo Umezu

Kazuo Umezu, the grandmaster of horror manga, returns with the third chilling volume of his Scary Book anthology series. In "Fear," Aiko is always ignored and neglected when compared to her beautiful older sister, Momoko. But when Momoko is horribly disfigured in an accident and goes mad, it's up to Aiko to bring home young girls her sister can use... to make a new face! And in "The Coincidental Letter," a young girl named Yoko, in a fit of mischief, sends an insulting letter to a made-up girl at a made-up address warning her of a horrible fate. However, by incredible coincidence, both the girl and the address are real, and everything in the letter starts coming true!

Genres: Manga, Horror, Comics, Fiction

232 pages, Paperback

First published September 6, 2006

About the author

Kazuo Umezu or Kazuo Umezz was a Japanese manga artist, musician and actor. Starting his career in the 1950s, he is among the most famous artists of horror manga and has been vital for its development, considered the "god of horror manga". In 1960s shōjo manga like Reptilia, he broke the industry's conventions by combining the aesthetics of the commercial manga industry with gruesome visual imagery inspired by Japanese folktales, which created a boom of horror manga and influenced manga artists of following generations. He created successful manga series such as The Drifting Classroom, Makoto-chan and My Name Is Shingo, until he retired from drawing manga in the mid 1990s. He was a public figure in Japan, known for wearing red-and-white-striped shirts and doing his signature "Gwash" hand gesture.

Reviews

[Estibaliz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Umezu is a master of the horror manga, as proved here once more.

'Scary Book: Faces' is comprised of two stories, both with some themes in common: faces, as the title of the volume states, sure, but mainly they are stories about beauty, envy, and petty revenge.

But whereas the first one, 'Fear' is mostly dark and gruesome, and with a spooky dark final twist (even if not entirely surprising), the second story, 'The Coincidental Letter', has also a silly and absurd air to it, and offers a very encouraging and almost fairy tale ending.

Overall, a really fun read, with a little bit of everything.

[Orrin Grey · Rating 3 out of 5]

In spite of the title, not really very scary. The first (and shorter) of the two tales was a sort of re-tread of Orochi: Blood, although more gruesome and more vicious. It would've made a good giallo. The second story was much longer and not really a horror story at all, although still interesting, involving a letter and a string of coincidences.

[Flora · Rating 4 out of 5]

These Scary Books are very formulaic and melodramatic, but the stories are fun and the art is wonderful to look at.

[Mara Cee · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fear: (Rating: 3) An interestingly dark story with an evil twist. I must say that while at some point I deduced how it would turn out at the very end, it still managed to give me a thrill. An intriguing little story with a nice sense of dread throughout--Umezu is adept at establishing atmosphere, and "Fear" also bears similarity in plot to a story in one of his other works, Orochi.

The Coincidental Letter: (Rating: 1.5) I have to say that I'm really disappointed in Kazuo Umezu for what I feel was a tacky, cop-out ending. It started off as a very interesting plot, with a young girl venting her frustration at life by writing a spiteful letter and sending it off to a made-up name and address--only it turns out that the address and recipient are real, and that all the nasty things said in the letter are coming true.

I liked the fact that the plain girl's handsome fiance loved her in spite of her own glaring lack of self-esteem, but at the introduction of the plastic surgeon character, I felt a sense of dread. Even then, I held out hope that it wouldn't take the path I thought it would. When the surgeon spoke to the victim about inner beauty, I thought that the twist would be that you don't need to change your physical appearance--that if you have confidence and self-worth, then you can be beautiful. Unfortunately, Umezu took a route so predictable that the moment the possibility of such an ending occurred to me, I denied it because it seemed so pathetically obvious.

Despite the great buildup and interesting concept of this story, the deus ex machina resolution to all of the problems--in addition to the disappointment of the ending--just didn't do it for me.

[Magenta Cooly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay, this one creep'd me out! Well, the first story anyway. It was really scary. O.o Anyway, the second story? Not so much. It was more...I want to say science-fiction, but not really. It was more like an amazing phenomenon than a horrifying happening. I liked it anyway.

[Buffy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This volume was definitely better than the first two, but still not incredible.
I found the characters boring and it was really more funny than scary. The second story was interesting and could have been really good if the characters weren't so flat, but I still enjoyed it.

[Babs]

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