出版社 / 著者からの内容紹介
▼第1話/うずまきマニア:その1▼第2話/うずまきマニア:その2▼第3話/傷跡▼第4話/窯変▼第5話/ねじれた人びと▼第6話/巻髪▼あとがき
●登場人物/五島桐絵(黒渦高校の生徒。本作の主人公)、斎藤秀一(桐絵の元同級生。隣町の高校に通っている)
●あらすじ/女子高生の五島桐絵は、隣町の高校に通う斎藤秀一を駅に迎えに行く途中、路地に座り込んで壁をじっと見つめている秀一の父親を見つけた。彼は桐絵のあいさつにも気付かない様子で、壁にはりついたカタツムリの殻を見つめ続けていた。駅で秀一を出迎えた桐絵は、彼にさっきの出来事を話すが、秀一はその話題を避けた。公園で秀一は、自分の住む街、黒渦町に嫌悪を抱き始めていることを打ち明ける。帰り道、秀一はつぶやく。「渦…渦だ…うずまきだ…このまちはうずまきに汚染され始めている…」(第1話)。
From Publishers Weekly
The townspeople of Kurozu-cho are being haunted by a strange infection of spirals. When corpses are cremated, the smoke forms a black spiral in the sky, and the clouds form swirls like those in Van Gogh's The Starry Night. Soon, things intensify: a lighthouse throws out spiral beams at dusk; babies are born, only to sprout spiral-capped mushroom-shaped appendages from their stomachs; one man becomes obsessed with spirals until he goes completely mad. The spirals even begin to infect people's bodies, leaving grotesque spiral voids. Readers witness these chilling disturbances through Kirie, a wide-eyed schoolgirl with a pixie cut, whose world is drawn in typical, lighthearted teen-romance manga style. When she's at home or school, things seem normal, but the sudden contrasts between the ordinary events of everyday life and this mysterious invasion of chaotic, threatening spirals makes the horror all the more shocking. Ito knows how to make readers' hearts drop and stomachs turn, but once the scare factor wears off there's not much more to the book .Characters enter the story only to become part of the town's body count, and Kirie, a constant survivor, is no more than a vehicle for the next spooky outbreak of deadly spirals. She reacts to each ordeal with fear and manages to escape before the spirals show up yet again. She doesn't attempt to find a solution, and there's barely any character development or plot. Ito's b&w drawings are well done and scary, but the book's essentially an empty thrill.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the
ペーパーバック
edition.