Ookami to Koushinryou
Spice & Wolf

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Me and Holo.. Oh sorry, I mean 'Spice and Wolf' manga has been said to be the worst version of the story. This is perhaps true, but it contains countless, polished artwork of Holo eating, sleeping, drinking, smiling, bathing, smirking, hugging, sitting, and---apples, and therefore, it's perfect and flawless in every way. Not really, but it's exactly everything a fan of the franchise could wish for.


The art of this manga is fantastic. I have lost count on how many light novel series and already produced anime series have received a manga adaptation with beyond lackclustery art. Spice and Wolf looks rough and almost sketched, ... but at the same time being incredibly detailed and soft. Its world has very realistic and atmospheric feel to it thanks to the artwork alone which serves the settings of the series and does magnificent job delivering everything from backdrops to character's behavior and reaction faces. Overall the art is memorable and the main reason why this manga adaptation works so well.


The story is based Spice and Wolf. The series centers around two characters called; Holo The Wise Wolf of Yoitsu, who is a Goddess of the Harvest, taking a human form -- and; man named Lawrence Kraft, a travelling salesman aiming for business and riches. The driving motion in the story from Holo's part is visiting Yoitsu, while Lawrence aims to make business while travelling from town to town. These two partner up and decide they will head to Yoitsu while visiting towns and doing business. From its core, the story centers around economics, but on the surface level it's a life story of two people interacting with each others and the world around them.


While the more arc-based stories center around money-creed corporations, curses, scammers and talking-hares even, they are all essentially spiced with the our two main characters just being there for each others, learning about one another and deciding what they really want from life. The characters are the selling point of the series from the light novel to the anime, and their personas along the strong art are the reason why the manga is of high quality.


Holo is in generally among the best written female characters this industry has to offer. Due to her old age and hundreds of years of solitude, she has developed a personality and wisdom which come not only with insane character depth and complexity, but behavior and waifugame so strong she alone could be criticized for Japan's dropping birth rate as real women can't compete. However, the chemistry of our main couple from dialogue, intimacy and more serious plot-related sides can only work because of Lawrence. 25-years-old man who seems to be able to adapt to any situation. He is calm person with big heart and personality. Knowing his head-pats are enough to make the wolfie happy should be enough of a prove of his superiority.


The character development practically equals with relationship development as there are approximately 300 hugging scenes in the series. This is close of being the most wholesome thingie created since the invention of the word itself, reading the manga for these scenes is worth of it alone, even though it has much more to offer than just that.

Biased opinions aside.(as this is my favorite manga/anime series)

I would like to say that I lent my friends this manga, and they don't read anything 18+ because of their own personal choosing.
I was still able to convince them to read the First volume as long as i stickynoted/censored all of the Mild Nudity, or anything that was in the least bit suggestive.

So i did, and after 10 minutes of "censoring" the first volume, and about 3 seconds of "censoring" the second. They decided to read it.

After reading the first novel they almost didn't want to read the second, I convinced them otherwise, and they both ... finished the second volume by the next day, saying that they liked the second one a lot more than the first, and would continue reading it.
-----
On to the Review(This is somewhat loosely based off of me watching the anime as well, but there are no spoilers, and the manga is almost a direct translation of the anime).

Story 10: The story is original. The world's setting and style, is just one that isn't seen or touched upon much in anime. Its also very realistic, other than Holo being a Wolf-Deity, The rest of the world seems extraordinarily real and active.

Art 10: I really enjoyed the art, and even the "Mild Nudity" is more like the kind of stuff you would see in a college figure drawing class rather than anything overly explicit. After the initial volume, there isn't anything to worry about, if you are even concerned about that kind of stuff at all.

Character 10: My favorite part about the entire story is Holo and Laurence. Holo is a "Wise" wolf. Laurence is a intelligent merchant, not so much of a ladies man, but Holo makes up for that for being the female equivalent and poking fun at Laurence's inexperience.

Enjoyment 9.75: I had to give this one a -0.25 deduction. My friends had a point, the first volume was really over the top in explicitness, and even though i didn't mind myself, it slightly brings the manga into the realm of adult/late-teen reading. Because of that, i wasn't able to share this with all of my friends without explaining why they should skip the first volume, or the first episode in the anime if they didn't want to see any mild nudity.

Overall 10: This is my favorite anime series, the characters are just brought to life, and the world is so active, that it brings the fantasy into a quasi-reality due to the historical references. I am eagerly awaiting the rest of the manga.

Final note: If you haven't read it yet, or if you haven't watched the anime series, please do so now, you won't regret it. :)

Without a doubt, Spice and Wolf is one of the more recognizable and loved series of the decade. Originally based on the brilliant light novel and followed by an amazing yet sadly unconcluded anime, now comes a Spice and Wolf manga. But is it really necessary?

The short answer is... yes!

The quality of the manga does not fail to impress! A must read for any fans of the series, and especially those of the anime. Every scene shown in the anime is expanded upon in the manga with much detail and often with very high quality art making it a very worth while to read.

This ... added detail however, does come at a cost. The manga feels much slower (and is much slow paced) compared to anime. It often takes several volumes to feel like the overall plot has gotten anywhere. Especially at the early volumes, making the manga intimidating to start.

Not surprisingly, this gives the mangaka much more time to develop and flesh out Holo's and Lawerence's romance and fortunately, it works in the manga's favor. The Romance is what makes this story so great. From every giddy moment, to the ups and downs of their romance this story will play with your heart. If you want to indulge more in this romantic duo, than the Manga should be on your to read list.

To conclude, the manga is a very worthwhile read for both those new to the series and those who come here seeking more. It's also worth noting as others have, the art in general seems fairly unimpressive in the first volume, however from the second volume on it really gets its act together. As if if the mangka found his grove then.

Spice and Wolf Manga Review - Non Spoiler
Chapters: 100
Genre: Adventure, Seinen, Fantasy, Romance, Drama, Supernatural, Historical
Mangaka: Isuna Hasekura

This is a review about a very unique manga that's way too UNDERRATED IMO, where most fantasy themed manga are about swords and magic this takes on a more trade and economic route and adds in witty dialogs, great story, amazing characters, plot twists and WHOLESOMENESS.
You might think that this manga being about trades and economic in the medieval ages would be boring but here I am reviewing this masterpiece.

PLOT:
A traveling merchant Kraft Lawrence meets the Goddess of Harvest Holo in her human form (also known as ... Holo the Wisewolf). A contract is formed between the two that Lawrence will help Holo reach her homeland while she'll lend him her wisdom in his day to day trading. And here starts a beautiful journey where they face many challenges, obstacles, meet new people, visit new places all the while getting to know more about each other and growing affectionate about each other (not that they show it openly and while reading you're dying on the inside and screaming CONFESS ALREADY DAMMIT! *breathes*). While the main goal is finding Holo's homeland, our merchant also has a wish to establish his own business, buy a store in a popular town and live off it. While traveling to many new places they try to acquire knowledge about where Holo's from and make some profit as well after all he is a merchant.

ARTSTYLE:
The artstyle was decent and simple yet felt so in-sync with the manga's theme. The thing that really caught my attention was the amount of effort put into the backgrounds to make them more appealing and to make the setting more accurate to the medieval ages. The characters well drawn (didn't find any lazy drawings anywhere). All from Holo's angry to playful expression were masterfully drawn.

CHARACTERS/CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT:
The characters especially the main are extremely well made, we have the intelligent experienced merchant Kraft who at times is as naive as a baby and then there's Holo one of the BEST if not the best female leads in manga history, her wisdom, personality, charms and quick thinking to read and adapt to situations accordingly literally puts her at the top. The chemistry of the two is so good that you'll grin like an idiot each time they have a conversation (at least I did)
As far as character development goes, you can't perfect already that is perfect aside from their growing feelings for each other and compatibility that grows with time.
Holo is undoubtedly the PERFECT Waifu. Ranked in god-tier waifus.

MY THOUGHTS:
This manga is indeed a masterpiece, the very definition of WHOLESOMENESS and as I've always said a very REFRESHING read. The flow of the dialogs especially between the main characters Kraft and Holo is amazingly done, like when they're teasing each other or throwing quick hilarious comebacks or brainstorming for ideas all are wonderful to read and you'll even get a laugh out of it. But one thing, the amount of details about old age trading and economics was surprising, the gain/fall of currency and profit/loses of trade all were easy to understand but some took some understanding. And all this was added beautifully with the main goal that is the journey to Holo's homeland.
All-in-all, I can simply summarize the entire experience in this that it was...
                             REFRESHING

FAVORITE QUOTES:
“Stories are better when they have an ending, are they not?” – Kraft Lawrence
(and this one was certainly great, sad that it's ended though)
"If you change your perspective, a situation right in front of you, can reverse itself.” – Holo The Wise Wolf
Honestly it's hard having a favorite quote when this manga is a gold mine for them.

RATINGS: 9.5/10
Though personally it's a 12/10 for me, because I loved the characters, the feelings, the excitement and the story.
If you haven't read this then this is my top manga recommendation. Especially if you've watched the anime.

Spice and Wolf is a very non-comum manga, and I guess that's what called my attention.

This manga tells about a merchant named Lawrence, that travels around the world selling and trading things, it's based on the european medieval economy, the exchange, and the begining of the money. And I guess I've never read a manga about economy before. So, this Lawrence find a girl with a tail and wolf ears called Horo, and she said that she is a godness, the wheat godness, but the people don't need her anymore, and shes far away from home, so Lawrence decided to help her to ... back home.

Now it's the part that you think "oh, another romance manga", but you're wrong, even with some romance subtended, the whole manga is based on the economy of this time, with a lit bit of fights, and drama, that makes the story even more real, like for exemplo the church running after them because in that time, a girl with ears and tail os problaby something possessed and need to be finished.


Another good point of this manga is the art, the scenarios are really good, and clean, the cities, the field, everything is really beautiful.

The only flaw is that everything take so long to happens that makes you tired of reading sometimes

tl;dr: A manga adaptation that has some weaknesses, but is overall a very good blend of romance and economics.

This manga is an adaptation of a light novel that was also adapted into a pretty popular anime. It is primarily centered around two core aspects. The first core aspect is the story of Holo and Lawrence, their relationship and their growth. It's an incredibly slow burn romance. A lot of their interactions stem from them both constantly teasing each other, with Holo generally being the one to start things off, but they're both also very cool headed and able to respond well to such teasing, and ... thus it's like something of a game between the two. There's some very subtle shifting in this which shows their relationship progress, but it's really subtle and thus overall, the relationship does feel quite slow. There are moments in the story that break from this and have more intense and honest moments, but for the relationship buildup things are very rarely explicit.

They do eventually properly become honest with each other and their relationship fully clicks, but that felt like it was a bit weak in that the transition wasn't handled that intensely or with enough impact, even though their relationship did clearly change afterwards. Them properly in a relationship was handled quite well too, where they properly consider together various things like what's most important to them and what they want to do and how that's changed from how things were before. Though it felt like there was a lot that was touched upon but not discussed in that much depth, such as Holo's immortality. This aspect also ended incredibly well with a pretty lengthy epilogue dedicated entirely just to it that finished off the manga perfectly, though I believe the novels continued past this and are still continuing.

The second core aspect is the various economic schemes and such that Lawrence gets involved with. I'm certainly not an economist, and know pretty much nothing about medieval economics, but what was shown and described felt pretty believable and consistent. The schemes themselves felt pretty well thought out and told pretty well in that they had good pacing with twists that worked well. Still, it did feel like it wasn't explaining things in that much depth. This was fine for most of the schemes, because they weren't too complicated, but the last couple were on another level and felt like they definitely could have used more explaining because I had to think about parts of them quite a bit, rereading portions in the process, in order to understand them and certain parts still don't completely make sense to me.

These schemes are episodic, in that very little from earlier ones affect later ones. I should note thought, that it is very clear that parts were definitely skipped, and that felt a bit jarring at times. All but the last episode also have very little to do with Lawrence or Holo personally, but rather are them simply being involved in situations where they may make or lose a lot of money. There are pretty solid stories behind each of these schemes, and the side characters that are involved with them are pretty decently fleshed out as side characters, though only to the level of side characters. Still, their relationship with Lawrence and Holo, and just as importantly their effect on the relationship between Lawrence and Holo, was substantial and well worth reading. Each of these episodes is self contained and has a pretty solid ending in their own right, but the ending of the manga overall does a good job of bringing them all together in that it doesn't involve any sort of scheme of it's own but it does bring everyone from all the episodes together which is a great way to end things as it makes the impactful ending focused on Holo and Lawrence even more impactful.

The art was decent, in that it could definitely be good at times, and consistently was with covers and full page illustrations as well as in both the beginning the end, but for the most part it didn't feel like it was trying all that hard and though there were panels that stood out, for the most part it looked kind of dull.

I start this review by saying that spice and wolf is, for me, one of the few Japanese works that can uniquely describe a medieval / fantasy world, implementing slice of life facets to a solid and interesting story.

Moreover, unlike many lovers of spice and wolf, I believe that the manga is a work that has nothing to envy to the anime and the light novel, since it presents the engaging story of spice and wolf, adding however the fantastic drawings of koume sensei, which give peculiar details to Holo (in particular), and make Lawrence a character who demonstrates many more emotions.

Now I ... finish giving my personal judgments and list the reasons why I highly recommend reading spice and wolf to lovers of the genre, or to those who know this work but are reluctant to read the manga transposition.

Story (8,5/10)

The story follows the travels of Holo and Lawrence, respectively a divine wolf, who would like to return to his native land after a long stay in the village of Pasloe, where she is no longer respected by the inhabitants; and a merchant, who would like to open his own business and stop wandering, settling in one place and staying there for life. The story of the manga sometimes differs from that of the light novel, as it ended first, and the light novel still continues. However, in any case, the adaptation of sensei Koume is still enjoyable, sometimes it presents very long dialogues, but they're are very well chosen, and make perfectly understand the problems and adventures that gravitate around the economy.

Characters (8,5/10)

Characters are one of the strengths of spice and wolf. The imagination and effort put into creating main characters like Lawrence and Holo are remarkable. Moreover, even the secondary characters are very interesting and unique in their own way. The characters fit perfectly into the story, and never feel boring or underdeveloped. Indeed, in each narrative arc it is possible to discover interesting secondary characters useful for the resolution of the specific economic problem, who come into contact with Lawrence and Holo (who always find themselves in the midst of events and must resolve conflicts between cities or commercial companies). Sometimes these characters help the protagonists and sometimes they get in the way, but they are never bland or badly characterized.

Art style (9/10)

The art style of sensei Koume is elaborate, but at the same time it almost seems like a sketch at times. The expressions of Holo are priceless, as are the rural and medieval landscapes that are drawn by the sensei. Koume was really the right mangaka to draw this genre of manga, even if most of his works are h-manga, I must say that he is really talented and I would be happy if he could also adapt other works like spice and wolf.

Enjoyment (9,5/10)
In this section there is not much to say ... The manga is relaxing from start to finish, and its medieval atmosphere makes it even more enjoyable. Moreover, the alternation of serious and happy moments, with the continuous and inevitable company of the divine Holo (best waifu) make it one of my favorites.

Overall (9)

To finish this review, I recommend you to also read the original source and watch the anime, as they are worth all the time and money you will invest in watching / reading them.

Spice and Wolf is a romance manga with touches of drama with power dynamics and intrigue, but let's break it down.

The central characters are Lawrence accompanying Horo in search of his homeland, both protagonists are very charismatic and with a chemistry that makes the romance engaging. In that sense, see how their relationship blossoms along the journey and how one influence on the other is not only fun but rewarding.

The story is surprisingly cool, focused on being an adventure where to find the location of the land of Horo they need to investigate manuscripts and collect information. However, knowledge has power and especially value for ... merchants who hold the documents, so Lawrence often ends up being swallowed up by the commercial dispute that is taking place between those who have the material in possession.
In this sense, it's really cool to see how the conflicts are constructed, being more strategic than really physical, where the antagonists have a great presence and malice that makes the protagonists feel pressure in a suffocating way.... However, unfortunately the author doesn't close as much well the conflicts in the same way that it builds them so it is very common the plot has an ending that borders on the innocent and easy.

The characters in the manga are one of its greatest qualities, it's a power game so the enemy at the beginning can become an ally along the way and that's good because it conveys the human complexity that the merchant profession requires. This is even why simplistic endings weigh heavily at the end of arcs, because the author is very careful in passing characters off as something more human to end up as something shallow.

The art is pretty average, there are moments where it can take pages to be mesmerized and impressive. However, in general, it is more common to be weak in passing movement and expression.

Ultimately, Spice and Wolf is an enjoyable novel with engaging arcs and, unfortunately, a simple ending. Having an average art that rarely delivers anything of impact, at least it has its perfect ending for those looking for a good romance.