 space. The final frontier. I'm not gonna do the full quote. Instead, let's talk about the manga, Break of Dawn, from Tetsuya Ibai. Hey everybody, welcome back to the manga geekdom. Like I said at the intro, we're doing another review this time for Break of Dawn. Now I have to be honest with you, even though this book came out in 2011, I had no idea about its existence. It was only until recently when I was doing a solicits video that I'd learned about it and was genuinely intrigued. It's in the not too distant future of 2038 and we follow the character of Yuma who is obsessed with the return of the SH3 Arville Comet. And on a particular summer day, which is super important and we're gonna circle back to that in a bit, Yuma and his friends, along with the Autobot Nanako, stumble upon a marooned alien ship that is disguising itself as an apartment building. And if that's not crazy enough, the ship's AI crashes Nanako and takes over her system so that it can communicate with the boys, asking for help to get back into space. I love a good sci-fi story, but more than that, I love a good coming of age story. And that is what Break of Dawn is. It's this beautiful mashup with these kids that are coming into their own, finding more about themselves through the course of this one summer and how they're going to move forward after making this epic discovery. The 10 chapters that soon follow are about how they're going to make this happen, the secrecy behind it. Suddenly there's an importance to that summer and that adventure that these boys are in that nobody else can know. There's also a morality question when it comes to AI. The character of Yuma is not necessarily a fan of the Autobots, this case Nanako, has a really rocky relationship with her, but as the story progresses, seems to change as he is perceiving things differently thanks to this alien AI ship. This book has a very wholesome feel, normal Down to Earth characters that are suddenly thrown into this adventure thanks to our main protagonist. Also there's a subplot of bullying that happens between two characters. It's not a huge part of the main plot of the book, but it's nice that it's there because you see them work out those differences bit by bit and the end result is you have a tighter niche group of protagonists on this quest. Unlike other alien stories, Break of Dawn deals more with artificial intelligence and the future of it. Even though these robots and programs and in this case alien ships don't live and breathe like us, are they still sentient enough that we consider them part of the ecosystem? Do we consider them part of our circle of life? They are capable of expressing emotion, they are capable of understanding and reasoning and all that stuff. So the book kind of dwells in that it doesn't go too in depth, but it's an interesting topic nonetheless. There's a point towards the end where Yuma is asked a very difficult question and his answer sort of ties everything back together to the themes of the book. The art style for the book wonderful, I really enjoyed it. I think that was my favorite part of it. I like the cartoony aesthetic for the characters and how well they interact with the fantastic landscapes. There is the fabled apartment building rooftop that is integral to the plot. That looks great. It's not your typical sci-fi story and I like that about it. And one thing I said at the beginning that I wanted to talk about here before we wrap up is the sounds of Break of Dawn. The actual book is written as an auditory experience. There are a lot of kanji written throughout the book that specifically point at sound effects that occur in every scene. It's a summer story and it's so uniquely Japanese and the sound effects reflect the birds and bugs like the cicadas for example and how prevalent they are throughout the story and you constantly see the sound effect for the cicadas for example as they are outside. So you can imagine how nostalgic and rather wholesome it is that it brings back those feelings of summer and adventure and growing up school. So if you want to get a better experience for that I do suggest if you do have the book in hand find one of those summer birds and cicada loops that you can find on YouTube and play that on the background while you're reading the scenes and it totally enhances the experience and you sort of get it. Now the ending mostly sticks to the landing. It does have a somewhat predictable outcome. There are a couple curveballs thrown at you that I wasn't expecting at first glance. I thought I was gonna go on a different route. However there is an epilogue chapter towards the end that I thought was just weird and insanely abrupt. There are no plans to continue this story and I felt like oh they totally want to set up a new story but no this was back in 2011. We would have gotten something else by now. This is a one and done thing. It's over. It brought some elements to this all ages book that I don't feel like it mashed well with what we had just read. But the overall book I thought was nice and it's a manga that I wholeheartedly recommend as in all ages read for families and young kids that want to read something different that's not shown in Jump Magazine or something like that. I do recommend Break of Dawn. But what about you guys? Did you read Break of Dawn? Let me know in the comment section down below and if you haven't what are some of your favorite coming of age stories in manga and anime or some of your favorite sci-fi stories as well. That about wraps it up. Thank you so much everybody for tuning in. I truly do appreciate it. Consider subscribing if you're new here. I talk about all the manga that I'm reading and all the anime that I'm watching. This has been another video for the manga geekdom. Thank you so much. God bless, stay safe out there. I will catch all of you on our next video.