Kizumonogatari: Wound Tale

This light novel, the prequel to Isin's popular Monogatari series, explains how series protagonist Koyomi Araragi met the vampire known as Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade. After Kissshot is dismembered and left for dead by vampire hunters, Araragi offers himself as a meal to save the vampire's life, becoming her thrall in the process. In order to become human again, Araragi is forced to battle each of the hunters to retrieve Kissshot's limbs, and he's unprepared for the cost of purging the vampire blood from his body. Fans of the Monogatari series will be intrigued to learn the strange backstory of several major players in the later stories, but the journey to that end is a rough one, due to Ransom's peculiar translation. There's little, if any, attempt made to localize Isin's prose, which contains phrases that make little sense in English and obscure cultural references without benefit of explanatory notes. The frankly pedestrian plot hits all the expected beats (and contains all the casual fan service objectification) of the average shonen book. For Monogatari fans only. (Jan.)