Shiver: Junji Ito Selected Stories

This is my favorite Junji Ito read right next to Tomie. This book is basically the shows best stories put into Manga form if you’ve ever seen it. Even watching the show before has read the book, knowing the stories, I still really enjoyed this!!

A selection of some of Junji Ito's best short stories! Need I say more? Ok fine, they're all great! True to Ito's style they're full of deranged and through-provoking concepts mixed with evocative and terrifying imagery. Sure the characters are somewhat underdeveloped and thin, but that's easy enough to overlook in favor of all the nightmare-inducing imagery. It's hard to pick favorites in a collection this good, but here are a few that are really burned into my brain: "Hanging Blimp" - a rash of suicides that quickly escalates into a full-blown apocalypse of giant floating heads with nooses; as wild in concept as it is hard to explain. "Marionette Mansion" - a family who have built a house allowing them to be fully controlled like marionette dolls by strings and people in the ceiling; also a creepy demon puppet that causes excruciating havoc in the end. "The Long Dream" - a frightened hospital patient whose dreams continue to increase in length (though his sleep time remains the same) and whose body begins to transform because of it; a really interesting concept with some shocking images. There's also one story, called "Greased," that I won't ever read again just because it was so effectively gross. And not like in a gory way or anything, I just can't handle greasy pimple stuff (you weirdo pimple-popping video watchers will love it :P).

This book gave me the perfect amount of creeps. I have been binge reading Junji Ito books and i have to say this has to be in my top three. Would definitely recommend if you like creepy books like “Tomie” or “Uzumaki” both by Junji Ito.

Great art

So Junji Ito ... my wife is addicted to his writing and manga ... so when he was at SDCC ... I knew I was in trouble. So we went to his speaking engagement and the man is really brilliant (honestly I had no idea who he was prior to this) ... I felt bad for him because his hands are very badly gnarled because of years of drawing. But no one can take away the horror he inspires with everything he writes and draws. He creates horrors that give nightmares horrors ... the things he writes and draws is amazing and terrifying and beautiful at the same time. The stories are all enthralling and tell tales that will give you nightmares but you will soon realize that even your nightmares pale in comparison to the nightmares he is writing. It's truly awe inspiring to be honest. One day we will lose this horror genre master but for now, I recommend everyone buy his books and be both inspired and terrified.

I completely intended to read this one slowly, spacing the stories out, but once I started, I just couldn’t put the book down. Junji Ito is a more recent discovery of mine, but I’ve become addicted to his work in recent months. This is a great selection for those new to Ito. It features nine of his favorite stories, plus one bonus new story. I was already familiar with many of these due to the Junji Ito Collection animated series, but it was still enjoyable reading the originals. The collection even featured two of my favorite segments from the show, “Fashion Model” (about a deranged and frightening looking model) and “The Long Dream” (about a man whose dreams last for years at a time). My other favorite stories in this collection include the surreal story, “Hanging Blimp” about giant balloons bearing people’s faces attacking their human lookalikes. The bonus story was also super spooky, featuring the same freaky model from “Fashion Model.” The only story I didn’t personally like was “Greased.” It was well done but just a little too gross for me. This is a great collection for both those new to Ito and long term fans of his. Each story is followed by a note from Ito explaining the origins of the story, so even if you’re familiar with these tales already, Shiver is worth checking out for those interesting bonus author notes.

Few horror cartoonists—if any—elicit the shudders that I feel when I read a tale by Junji Ito of Japan. The current widespread availability of his work in the United States shows an increasing interest here, and it’s not hard to fathom why this is so. My favorite stories by this mangaka are his short, standalone tales. His drawings are fairly realistic with simple clean character designs, but when he adds texture or renders a “shock panel,” his art gets significantly darker, more detailed, and quite vivid. The Ito collection entitled Shiver is my favorite of what I’ve read so far, though Fragments of Horror has some gems in it as well as well. In the former, Ito contrives a series of interesting weird fiction scenarios that grow more unsettling as the stories progress, and his shock panels leap off of the page and are truly unsettling. These are not “fun” images of zombies munching on a victim or some vampire’s sanguinary sucking, but genuinely disturbing nightmares that put a bad smell in the air that hangs between the tip of your nose and the open book. I have read (and watched and written and filmed) a lot of repellant stuff, but the acne-centric story ‘Greased’ is a truly repulsive wonder, as are the revelations in the story “Shiver.” In addition to these and other repugnant morsels, nonsensical but engrossing nightmares that seem stolen straight from Ito’s id are explored in ‘Hanging Blimps,’ and the premise of ‘Marionette Mansion’ is a very bizarre original about a family that chooses to give control of their limbs over to unseen controllers in the crawlspace above. Clever premises, engaging mysteries, malodorous shock panels, and nightmare wanderings combine in the uniquely unsettling and uncommonly vivid work of Junji Ito, which I highly recommend to horror fans.

For anyone who may be familiar with Ito’s previous work, you will not be surprised to hear that this is yet another amazingly horrific stories. The mundane panels make it seem cam and safe, until one quick page flip reveals a terrifyingly detailed work of art. As with any of Ito’s work, this is a must read for any horror and/or manga fans!

La copertina rigida è bellissima. Il libro è ben rilegato e ogni storia è più bella dell’altra. Junji Ito è un grande artista e che riesce a creare un’angoscia senza precedenti! Se siete fan di Ito è da avere! Il pacco è arrivato puntuale, perfetto e senza danni.

Good quality of paper. Nice art

This book arrived in almost perfect condition and was amazing to read