Junji Ito's Cat Diary

It's absolutely no secret that Junji Ito is my favorite manga artist & writer. I mean, it's insane to be able to say you have a favorite manga artist OR writer and the fact that I am CERTAIN given all the manga I've consumed and that both those qualities sit within one person... That's amazing. He's amazing. Anyway, I recently acquired my own copy of Cat Diary (which I had hoped to achieve on release but was unable to).

This is the horror author's first complete stab at humor. Honestly, I wasn't sure how I'd enjoy the book. The story starts with Junji, his wife affectionately referring to him as J, buying a new home! To his absolute horror his wife intends to bring her family cat into the new home. As if that weren't enough, she plans to adopt a second cat!

The story is told with a great deal of humor and drawn very much like he's drawn any other manga. The difference is that the contorted faces, pupil-less eyes, and exaggerated facial expressions have taken on the almost self mocking quality. The horror artist sees horror everywhere and pokes fun at himself in the process.

The book itself has some Q&A with the manga artist in between the chapter breaks. It's noted that he draws the cats in this manga in a more realistic fashion where they appear cute, rather than sinister as in his horror manga. The cats in Cat Diary are dare I say, cute!?

As a whole, the book can only be described as absolutely charming.