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+Anima #3

+Anima 3

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In an alternate-reality fantasy world, four special +Anima beings, who possess animal-like characteristics and are shunned by "normal" society, travel to find others like themselves and seek to gain acceptance in a world cruel to anyone or anything that is different.

208 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2001

7 people are currently reading
320 people want to read

About the author

Natsumi Mukai

67 books91 followers
Japanese Name (迎夏生)
Loves stuffed animals & owns dogs (corgis).

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5 stars
793 (49%)
4 stars
470 (29%)
3 stars
277 (17%)
2 stars
44 (2%)
1 star
16 (1%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 46 reviews
Profile Image for Kira Nerys.
671 reviews30 followers
August 12, 2017
Some of the gender dynamic here becomes clunky and binary in a way that bothers me now that I know how to enunciate it. The whole series casts gender in a comedic light, from Husky playing a mermaid princess and then rejecting it to Nana simultaneously desiring pretty things but not wanting to be called weak. It bothered me on this read-through, though I recognize how the jokes aim toward supporting those two gender identities. The writing's too-quick exposition disappointed me, though I'm sure it characterizes manga and I simply didn't read with such a critical eye last time. People trust extremely quickly; random characters explain the location with astonishing ease; the twist isn't always hard to guess. But I did love this series and its world when I was younger, and I might try to finally finish it.
Profile Image for Mike.
932 reviews44 followers
August 4, 2016
So far +Anima is episodic and the stories stand well enough on their own. Still, the early volumes introduce all of the main characters so it's best to start reading at the beginning.

Volume 3 brings more stand alone adventures of a chapter or two. It begins with the two part Cooro centric tale Wings of the Wind. Cooro wanders off and befriends a young man mocked and ostracized for his obsession to find a way to fly up a mountain. It's a predictable story, but a good one. Cooro is a adorable character and a great lead. His is a perfect depiction of a naive but competent child who takes everything at face value. It's impossible not to root for him.

Next up is another two chapter tale called Guardian Heart. A familiar army regiment tries to get a retired blacksmith to make them swords. There are several great character moments and Cooro in particular really shines again here.

Husky takes center stage in the single chapter Husky's Depression. Nana's imagination exacerbates an old sore spot of Husky's. Kind of meh, but there is some insight added into Husky's character.

We finish with the single chapter Scar. I suppose it was about time for the hot springs chapter. Thankfully since the cast is mostly children this story is about self consciousness and the difficulties of life for the +Anima and isn't played for fanservice at all. Decent enough.

While it would be nice to have some more structure and an overarching plot start to develop, the episodic adventures continuing to be presented are very good. Overall this is a strong volume with the two longer stories being especially great.
Profile Image for Michael Sorbello.
Author 1 book316 followers
December 22, 2021
Cooro and Husky aren't like other boys. They're anima, children with animal features and qualities. After breaking free of their servitude at a cruel freakshow circus, they go on a journey in search of others like themselves. Cooro is a crow and Husky is a fish. As they travel the world doing good deeds, they recruit a bear boy, a cat woman and a bat girl. Together they get into all kinds of wacky antics while fighting against the oppression their kind faces on a daily basis.

The low rating isn't because this series is bad, it's just extremely cliche and childish in my opinion. I think it would be good for young kids who have no experience reading manga. It's extremely light, simple, easy to follow and doesn't contain anything overly violent, dark or sexual in nature. For someone like me who generally reads books and manga with excessive gore, dark themes and adult content it definitely didn't appeal to me that much, even though I was in the mood to read something lighter than I'm accustomed to.

Not a bad manga, just not for me. Even so, it's undeniably cute and wholesome. I think it would appeal to kids and young girls, especially if they have minimal experience reading manga.

***

If you're looking for some dark ambient music for reading horror, dark fantasy and other books like this one, then be sure to check out my YouTube Channel called Nightmarish Compositions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPPs...
Profile Image for The Book Dragon.
2,519 reviews38 followers
April 11, 2019
The adorable journey continues as our crew meets a few new friends. They also reacquaint themselves with Igneous the soldier with a grudge against Senri. Nana starts questioning if Husky really is a 'he'. And they meet up with Rose at a hot spring resort and make friends with a bison +Anima.

I gotta say I love the markings that +Anima have. It's fun to see different ones and imagine what new ones would look like. I wanna design my own now.

This series has 10 volumes.
Profile Image for R.
2,256 reviews6 followers
November 16, 2017
I love reading this series and seeing the amazing illustrations. It is such an interesting concept and you really start to care about the characters!
8 reviews6 followers
May 2, 2019
I love this book so much! It is so cute and fun!
Profile Image for Noelle.
476 reviews4 followers
March 30, 2024
This series continues its comedic and light episodes following the group of +Anima. Not much is still known about their pasts. I am enjoying this series.
Profile Image for Esther.
111 reviews8 followers
September 26, 2025
Sweet light read in tough times - but still holding political value of showing those excluded from society no matter their nature, and the misconceptions around exclusion.
Profile Image for Lanie.
1,055 reviews71 followers
August 27, 2016
I like the art. The character designs are really good.

& the general idea of the story is good. People with animal powers cast out by society.

Except they really don't seem all that outcast, do they? :/ I mean, even the army guy who clearly hates the mountain tribe doesn't seem all that upset? I suppose you could argue that it's for preteens... Except I've read way better mangas for kids & preteens. ("Hollow fields" and "recast" are excellent.)

I think my main issue with this is just how juvenile it is. :/ it could be something really sad and dark and epic. The basic plot is perfect for a darker old teen type manga. (Like my favorite, "black butler").

But instead, we're given a very simplified, goofy version. To me, it feels very dumbed down from what it could have been, you know? It's cute enough, & kind of entertaining for the hour or so it takes to read this. Cause like I said, the art is nice to look at. & the idea really is cool.

It's just the execution that ruins it for me.

Plus, we've seen very little in the way of world building, like explaining where the anima+ actually come from and why they are so "hated". & very little character development. We got an attempt at fleshing out Husky, which was nice, I GUESS I can understand now why he's not a fan of girls. But it simply wasn't enough.

I want to know more about these characters! Their world! Their desires!

I want more plot then just them having goofy little adventures every few chapters. Cause while the stories are kinda cute, they have a very episodic feel to them, like most manga/anime of course. but specifically "anima+" seems very lacking in an over arching plot. :/ kinda like the writer had no basic idea as to what would happen to these characters over the course of the series. It feels like they just had a bunch of random ideas and threw them together with this wold. It shows and it really effects the plot.

:/

I think I'll finish the series, to see if it gets any better. They are kinda cute & super easy to read. Plus, the whole series is at my library. I'm not one to pass up on free manga.

But it's definitely become a series I know I'll never read again. Or recommend. :/
Profile Image for Rhapsody.
451 reviews
May 5, 2009
I'm liking this story more with this volume. The four friends keep on traveling.

Cooro meets a boy who is developing a kind of air-glider so that he can come down from the mountains for medicine when the rain has washed away the roads. The boy and him become friends until Cooro exposes his wings. The boy is resentful and tells him to leave, but Cooro returns to help him fly his device when another rainstorm hits.

In the next chapter, they come across an army official who is trying to force a local blacksmith to make weapons. The blacksmith stopped making weapons when he married a +anima. The groups stays with him and his wife for a while and inspire him to make farming and kitchen implements with the metal instead, which the soldiers really like despite the official's anger. Cooro gets a small axe for his trouble.

Nana becomes convinced that Husky is a girl, but he finally proves her wrong at the end when he gets sick of her antics.

The group go to a hot spring in the area and learn that it's being harassed by a +anima. They offer to handle the problem in exchange for not having to pay. The +anima turns out to be an injured bison who has been using the springs to heal. He's surprised to see that they're +anima and promises to leave since he's already healed.

The last story I found sad. For some reason, I got curious about the bison. I would have liked a slightly more optimistic resolution, like him meeting the innkeeper and working out an arrangement. As it was, he was basically told to get lost.

It's episodic, but charming, and we heard from the blacksmith's +anima wife that her powers went away when she married him, which makes me think that maybe there's more to being a +anima than we know about yet. Also, the army official has a friend who knows about Cooro. Probably that's going to be part of the main plot, which really hasn't started as of yet.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for kuristina- tabreez.
1,013 reviews
March 4, 2014
Cooro and company have arrived in a seemingly normal town inhabited by sheepherders in the mountains, and normal townsfolk on the lower land. The first person that Cooro befriends from this village is the somewhat outcasted dreamer Shadow, who is trying to create a flying machine to fly up and down the mountain to carry medicine whenever needed if ever the only rode up the mountain were to be blocked in a storm again like the night a loved one of his passed away...
Later, Cooro, Senri, Husky, and Nana stumble upon a swordsmith and his wife while looking for work. This particular swordsmith was the very same one that forged the series of swords called the Guardian Heart that Astaria used to beat back the Ki-mun-kur in a previous battle, and now they want him to forge another! The swordsmith refuses, because he can no longer put his heart into something that he knows will be used unjustly, but that night the Astarian soldiers find Nana trying to steal an axe from them and take her hostage...


This was awfully cute. I remember reading this volume too. This was during the end of the period where I would do absolutely nothing but read, so much so that I never turned in a bit of my homework and almost failed two grades. Around this time, however, I was trying hard to get my mind off of my boyfriend whenever he was absent (except for a few days to a week after I would last talk to him because even then, his presence lingered <3) and it succeeded! Until I would finish a volume, anyway. I was able to shut off almost everything around me and imburse myself in the story as if I were right there inside of it. But now... I can't do that, and because I can't, it makes everything seem much more bleak. What could that be..? Has my outlook on life just become that dreary and so it affects even the way I read now..? How very depressing...
Profile Image for Brianna.
145 reviews23 followers
March 25, 2012
I love these books! They are so adorable and lovable. They are well-thought out and interesting and wonderful. Her characters all seem so real. They all have problems and really specific and personal histories that go back pretty far. Her characters aren't perfect, and she is able to make them come to life and feel like real human beings.
I love the idea behind this manga. I love the idea of being able to transform into an animal and have cool powers and be special. (I wish I could do it. That would be so cool!)
My best friends gave these to me to read. They were the first manga I ever read in my entire life and I didn't get it at first. They had the books and I tried reading it, but I couldn't figure out how to read it backwards, and so the first book they read it out loud to me <3 Aren't they sweet? Anyways, I decided that I wanted to continue reading them online, and I was just planning to just look at +Anima a little bit and I ended up reading like the first 7 books in two days (It would've been sooner except I had school and sleep and whatnot, stupid distractions!)
Senri is my favorite!! He is so adorable! I definitely recommend these books to those who love mangas, and to those who love animals, and to those who love interesting stories. This is a very good series with wonderful writing and amazing art!
Profile Image for Smaileh.
111 reviews1 follower
July 27, 2008
Cooro helps a young man use his glider to save his family when rain washes the road out and medicine needs to get through. Our little gang is given shelter by a blacksmith and his ward, Margaret. Interesting tidbit--she used to be a + Anima (a deer) but now that she has a home and feels safe, her deer aspect vanished. So being a + Anima is not a permanent thing?

Anyway, good old Igneous (the commander from the previous volume) shows up and demands that the blacksmith repair all the swords for his company. The blacksmith refuses--he hasn't had anything to do with swords since he rescued Margaret. Then Cooro has an idea, and the swords are all tranformed into tools such as knives and axes.

Nana becomes convinced that Husky is really a girl, so he finally strips off to convince her. Of course, he makes Cooro strip off too. Finally, the group encounters Rose again at a hot springs which is supposedly haunted. A buffalo + Anima was injured and has been coming to the healing springs at night. Now that he has been healed, he agrees to go on his way.
Profile Image for Sarah Maddaford.
913 reviews11 followers
February 10, 2011
I was a bit disappointed with this volume. The story is still pretty disjointed with nothing really connecting each chapter other than the characters. Also, I can't tell if the last half of the previous volume happened or if it was some kind of alternate universe. For another thing, we still don't know any of the characters very well other than the fact that they are +Anima and basically one trait per character. We know nothing or very little about their back stories and side characters tend to only appear for one chapter. I am intrigued by the military guy and his scholar friend, but we didn't see very much of them either. Hopefully, the story becomes more cohesive or I may just give up on it. There's a little bit of violence in this one, but not much at all. The only "sex" or sexual situations are a bathing scene (where nothing shows) and a scene where Husky proves to Nana that he's a boy (where only butts show). There may be a couple of minor curse words, but nothing terribly traumatic.
Profile Image for 78sunny.
2,338 reviews41 followers
September 24, 2013
Meine Meinung:
Für Mangaleser, die gern Fantasy lesen und auf niedliche, total alberne Charaktere stehen ist das hier ideal – für mich eher nicht. Mich hat hier die Story überhaupt nicht angesprochen. Es geht um ein paar Kinder, die alle Eigenschaften von Tieren haben und gemeinsam durch die Gegen streifen. So einen richtigen Sinn konnte ich dahinter nicht entdecken, aber ich habe auch mit Band 3 angefangen und kenne die Vorgeschichte nur aufgrund der Zusammenfassung am Anfang dieses Bandes. Die Dialoge fand ich nicht nur kindlich sondern kindisch albern. Das ist ja gar nichts für mich und auch der Grund warum ich nur wenige ausgewählte Mangas richtig gut finde.
Was mir allerdings absolut gefallen hat ist der Zeichenstil. Hier mag ich die niedlichen Charaktere und auch den Fantasyanteil. Absolut süß!

Meine Wertung:
3 von 5 Sternen
Profile Image for Rena.
1,193 reviews
January 7, 2014
Yeah. These kids just bounce from town to town doing odd jobs to pay for their food. Still no idea if they are actually heading to a certain destination. I think they just want to roam around with the company of each other who are just like them. I can understand why. There are so many towns that seem to have at least one person who despises +anima. Not even to mention that military commander who has a special grudge against Senri. Oh Senri! It is really hard not to love a big, loving, protective bear. Cooro is such a sweet, clueless crow. Nana is the slightly stealth, fashion-loving, girly bat. Husky is a grumpy, stubborn fish who amuses me greatly. Rose is desert cat. No explanation needed on that one. They come across some spare +anima, but for the most part that is the group.
2,047 reviews20 followers
August 18, 2016
This 3rd volume of +anima is still very episodic although we are getting recurring background characters suggesting this may well get plotty (I hope so!)

The first story deals with a boy who makes mechanical wings to get medicine across some mountains. Crow hybrid Cooro ends up helping him out.

Next we have a story about a swordsmith who learns that there is more to life than forging weapons.

Then there's a very silly gender bending story in which Nana is convinced that Husky the merman must be a girl because he's so pretty.

Lastly we have a tale about a hot spring terrorised by a bison +anima.

+anima is shonen manga with super cute artwork and hybrid children with hearts of gold - it is a tad moralistic and sweet, with less attitude than things like Saiyuki, but its fun nonetheless and worth checking out for the art alone.
Profile Image for Sandra (Page by Page).
128 reviews33 followers
October 19, 2013
One tiny bitty thingy I don't like is when Cooro flies away away just like that, leaves his friends and ends up forgetting to come back. Err, not cool but tolerable because, yeah yeah he's a kid.

I found this volume is funnier than the two volumes before. Nana thinks Husky is a girl is hilarious, and Husky reaction is just more hilarious than ever. Still cute and such awesome drawings. I like just staring at it. Love love love!
110 reviews2 followers
February 17, 2015
This book swept me away to this other wonderful world. The setting was brilliantly set. I could totally see it in my mind. But the characters were definitely my favorite part. They are all so colorful, interesting, exciting, and hilarious. The main character is just perfect. The plot moved fast enough that I couldn't stop reading lest I miss something, but the author still took the time to flesh out the details. The details are what really make or break a story.
Profile Image for Ravyn.
84 reviews
April 1, 2015
I really liked the character development in this volume. It was a bit interesting to learn a little more about Husky's past, and I'm glad that Rose decided to join the group. I think that in this volume a clear long-term plot line is starting to become more visible, and the chapters are becoming less like individual short stories and more like connected chapters in an overall story. I can't wait for the next volume!
Profile Image for Anna.
137 reviews4 followers
October 30, 2014
This book felt really juvenile. And Husky's a misogynist, it appears. And I don't really get the plot yet. That's one of my main problems with manga in general. It seems that there's never really a clear, concise plot. A lot of the plots are just based on a concept, and then a cast of adorable, emo-looking characters doing shit.

Mediocre. Extremely mediocre. But the art is AMAZING.
Profile Image for Philipia .
22 reviews19 followers
December 12, 2012
Still cute, but a good portion of this one was about Nana trying to find out if Husky's a girl... Soo... That was sort of weird. v.vU Still liked it, though, because we learn a bit more about Senri, Rose, and Husky. :)
Profile Image for Rici.
546 reviews
August 14, 2016
Diesen Band mochte ich schon mehr, wir bekommen noch mehr Einblicke wie die Menschen zusammen mit den +Anima existieren oder kämpfen. Zudem etwas mehr Hintergrund von Husky, aber dennoch bleiben es Kinder die reisen und die manchmal kindisch sind.
Profile Image for Mariah h..
8 reviews
November 9, 2007
the 3rd one^_^ this is were it starts to get in to alot but is still funny. with a glimps in to huskys past and y he hates grils so much ull denfinitly want to read it.
Profile Image for Classified:p.
34 reviews
April 4, 2009
They meet someone new in the last book, not by simply meeting this new person..but..anyway. And this is the next part in the series. Still wierd, funny, adventure filled but cool.
Profile Image for Kira.
46 reviews
May 15, 2009
Rose is amazing and really cool!
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