Confession by Kaiji Kawaguchi, Nobuyuki Fukumoto

TL;DR: A dark and twisty story, very atmospheric and dark.
Source: NetGalley, thank you to the publisher!

Plot: Two men are stranded together after a mountain climbing accident. One confesses a dark secret to the other, but circumstances change…
Characters: You aren’t in this for these characters, both of them are horrible, but a well done horrible.
Setting: Cold and snowy, it’s well drawn and it feels cold reading it. I do not want to be there.
Mystery: This was great because I genuinely had no idea where or why the story was going and doing what it was doing. This one had me guessing.

Thoughts:

I love a well done one shot manga, and this one is that exactly. My only real complaint is just that it’s not my usual genre so I wasn’t completely floored or loved it unconditionally. Ishikura thinks he is about to die after an intense injury while climbing a mountain. In those moments he confesses he’s greatest and darkest secret to Asai. Unfortunately circumstances change and the two are left at an uneasy standoff. Can and will Asai keep Ishikura’s secret? Can they trust one another?

This one has a very simple premise but I felt like it was very well executed. I was surprised by the depth of the characters in the page length we got and by the end I was genuinely thinking ‘Wow, I hated both of those men. What just happened? Should I be happy with this or upset?’ I sat on it for a week, and it lingered. It had me turning the pages very quickly and the tension was drawn out perfectly.

If you want something cold and a bit thrilling, this is the pick. I’d definitely recommend this for fans of murder/thriller style stories. It could possibly be a bit predictable if you read this genre frequently but it worked perfectly for me. A great story with beautiful art and horrible people. What’s not to love?