Monster: The Perfect Edition, Vol. 1: The Perfect Edition Translation Edition
Author(s): Naoki Urasawa (Author)
Publisher: VIZ Media LLC
Publication Date: July 15, 2014
Edition: Translation
Language: English
Print length: 426 pages
ISBN-10: 9781421569062
ISBN-13: 9781421569062
Book Description
Naoki Urasawa’s unforgettable thriller follows a brilliant doctor’s journey into the darkest depths of the human soul.
Johan is a cold and calculating killer with a mysterious past, and brilliant Dr. Kenzo Tenma is the only one who can stop him! Conspiracy and serial murder open the door to a compelling, intricately woven plot in this masterwork of suspense.
Everyone faces uncertainty at some point in their lives. Even a brilliant surgeon like Kenzo Tenma is no exception. But there’s no way he could have known that his decision to stop chasing professional success and instead concentrate on his oath to save peoples’ lives would result in the birth of an abomination. The questions of good and evil now take on a terrifyingly real dimension.
Years later, in Germany during the tumultuous post-reunification period, middle-aged childless couples are being killed one after another. The serial killer’s identity is known. The reasons why he kills are not. Dr. Tenma sets out on a journey to find the killer’s twin sister, who may hold some clues to solving the enigma of the “Monster.”
Editorial Reviews
From School Library Journal
Gr 8 Up—Soviet-era spy mystery meets medical drama in this manga about a young doctor struggling to navigate the world of professional politics and murder. Dr. Tenma is the third son in a family of doctors, who left Japan years ago to work under his idol in a hospital in Dusseldorf, Germany. His brilliance in surgery is matched only by his kindness to his patients, and his sense of obligation to everyone who comes through the door. He’s on the fast track to promotion and power, until he refuses the hospital director’s order to leave the victim of a brutal crime on the table and go help the mayor instead. Suddenly he goes from the cusp of a bright future to a grunt. His fiancée leaves him, his promotion is given away, and his patients are removed from his care. But when the men who took everything from Tenma wind up suddenly dead, he’s set down a path that will change his life forever. This volume will please manga fans who crave history and humans over fantasy and fighting. The art is well done; characters are clearly defined from each other, with exaggerated features (noses, eyebrows, hair) that look perfectly in place in a 1980s flashback. Younger readers should be warned of violence (mostly off-screen), death, and murder. A good supplemental purchase for anime clubs.—Clair Segal, Horace Mann School, New York City
Review
“…[a] juggernaut of the manga world…”
“If you’re itching for adventure, and are craving something to instill your waning faith in humanity, I implore you. Let these works transport you. Fly Urasawa Air.
It’ll get you where you need to go.”
“Urasawa’s works possess such a singular ability to transport readers halfway across the world almost effortlessly…” ―
Polygon
About the Author
Naoki Urasawa’s career as a manga artist spans more than twenty years and has firmly established him as one of the true manga masters of Japan. Born in Tokyo in 1960, Urasawa debuted with BETA! in 1983 and hasn’t stopped his impressive output since. Well-versed in a variety of genres, Urasawa’s oeuvre encompasses a multitude of different subjects, such as a romantic comedy (Yawara! A Fashionable Judo Girl), a suspenseful human drama about a former mercenary (Pineapple ARMY; story by Kazuya Kudo), a captivating psychological suspense story (Monster), a sci-fi adventure manga (20th Century Boys), and a modern reinterpretation of the work of the God of Manga, Osamu Tezuka (Pluto: Urasawa x Tezuka; co-authored with Takashi Nagasaki, supervised by Macoto Tezka, and with the cooperation of Tezuka Productions). Many of his books have spawned popular animated and live-action TV programs and films, and 2008 saw the theatrical release of the first of three live-action Japanese films based on 20th Century Boys.
No stranger to accolades and awards, Urasawa received the 2011 and 2013 Eisner Award for Best U.S. Edition of International Material—Asia, and is a three-time recipient of the prestigious Shogakukan Manga Award, a two-time recipient of the Osamu Tezuka Cultural Prize, and also received the Kodansha Manga Award. Urasawa has also become involved in the world of academia, and in 2008 accepted a guest teaching post at Nagoya Zokei University, where he teaches courses in, of course, manga.
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