I was unable to review this because it would not open
I am not sure why
i asked for help, but had no contacts
it may be because its past its due date
thank you anyways

Excellent as always. I was excited to read his adaptation of Edogawa Ranpo! I'll definitely be buying this one in print version.

This collection includes my favorite story ever which is The Enigma Amigara Fault and Human Chair. Every story inside was a banger and I would highly recommend gifting this for any fan of the horror genre.

The story that stuck out the most for me was Billions Alone, which somehow was time perfectly with the coronavirus pandemic. Maybe if people read that story, more people would quarantine and self-isolate stop they have less of a chance of spreading the virus. The propaganda in the story also reminds me of the toxic cult qanon stuff happening now too. I wonder how Junji Ito feels about this story having written it a long time ago and how it reflects the world today.

The oneshot from the title of this manga is great too. I've never read it before but it's a glimpse of how sci-fi and delusion of love of an idol can mix with horrifying results.

Overall, this manga is worth adding to your collection because Ito is a master of psychological horror. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you Netgalley and Viz for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Venus in the Blind Spot by Junji Ito

3.75 stars for the overall collection

Hi, this is my first time reading Junji Ito and experiencing his horror manga and I am a fan. Like why did I think his stuff would be so disgusting and traumatizing that I couldn’t read it. Well, I won’t lie the opening story in the horror manga collection will leave some readers traumatized. Think Sally from the Hotel season of American Horror Story when she sews her two lovers to her body because she loves them so much and they die. Yea, the first story is like that but more intense, so if you think that will make you throw up then maybe skip this collection or Junji Ito altogether. I, however, totally am hyped by this new discovery and I’m obsessed. I loved it. The experience was visceral and now I will break down my thoughts on all of the stories.


Billions Alone- 4.5 stars Like I said above this story is like Sally from that season. We follow a guy who has agoraphobia and an old friend reaches out to him and encourages him to come back outside. While this is going on people meeting in organized settings are being kidnapped, murdered, and sewn together in giant intricate spiral patterns all over the city. The main reason I’m not giving this a full five stars is because 40 pages was not long enough and this deserves an entire novel to flesh out the beauty, frustration, and spiraling of a city as well as the main character who is becoming more comfortable going outside amidst the end of the world (at least for this town).

The Human Chair- 3.5 stars This is a chilling story about a story being told to a woman in a shop as she views a chair that once belonged to a famous writer who was being stalked by someone who had sewn themselves into a chair in her home. Horrifying. No, thanks. I liked the concept, but this story was missing a certain something really that makes my horror heart skip some beats.

An Unearthly Love- 3 stars Doll obsessions are not my thing and this one follows a woman married to a man who she thinks is cheating on her. It turns out to be a doll which leads to some complications in their marriage as one would expect. I felt bad for the woman, but like I said, not my kind of story.

Venus in the Blind Spot- 5 stars This story was perfect. It has the allure of being a creepy a UFO story, but it is much more sinister than a simple UFO. This is a story that I barely want to explain because even talking too much about it would give away its brilliance.

The Licking Woman- 4 stars I should’ve disliked this, but it was so weird and tragic. It follows a woman with a giant tongue licking people in the face and causing them to die and the effects this woman has on one woman after her boyfriend and dog die from the encounter. The level of weirdness and that horrifying tongue worked so well for the story.

Master Umezz and Me- 2 stars I didn’t care for the art in this one and I wasn’t a fan of the story. It was a biographical reflection on Juji Ito’s love for the writer Umezz and I appreciated the story, but the art was not good.

How Love Came to Professor Kirida- 3 stars This story follows a writer who is being haunted by a girl who loved and respected his feedback. His constant rejection leads to tragedy and her spirit teaches him love. It’s not as uplifting as it sounds lol. I didn’t care for this one, but I liked the plot.

The Enigma of Amigara Fault- 5 stars This story was so horrifying. I can still see the outline of the bodies being stretched in the fault lines for miles. It follows the story of fault shaped bodies being found in a mountain that are the exact shape of people. Horrifying and creepy.
The Sad Tale of the Principal Post- 3 stars This is the most forgettable story in the collection. The concept is there, but the execution isn’t fleshed out for it to be memorable or groundbreaking in the horror genre.

Keepsake- 4.5 stars This story is so gross because it’s about a child who is born from a dead woman and if you get grossed out by SPOILER necrophilia SPOILER then skip this one. I loved the story and how it unfolded. It felt dramatic in the most twisted way.

Overall, this collection is super strong and full of intense and gripping stories. There were a couple that stood out and really stole the show. I think many readers will enjoy this horror short story collection.


Cover Thoughts: OBSESSED. Love it and every time I see it pop up on my Goodreads for an add, I get excited.

Thank you, Netgalley and Viz Media, for providing me with a copy in exchange for an honest review.

Beautiful and eerie illustrations as always, a story that I genuinely can't wait to get to customers.

I've been a fan of Junji Ito since one of my friend's tricked me into reading TOMIE VOL. 1. I had no idea what to expect and was simultaneously disgusted and delighted. When I saw VENUS IN THE BLIND SPOT being marketed as a "best of" his work, I knew I had to read it.

This is a collection of more truly disturbing short stories. It has everything from bodies being sewn together, mad experiments, cruel, twisted love, undead babies(???), and more. It had me going back and forth between wanting to throw the book across the room, and flipping pages to see what the hell was going to happen next. Each story has such an abrupt ending, and I was torn between the comfort of it finally being over, and a strong yearning for more details.

It's full of body horror, speculative story lines, monsters, paranormal events, and more than enough gore. Needless to say, it was exactly what I was expecting, and I loved every minute of it.

Thank you to the publisher, Viz Media, for providing me with a digital copy of this book via NetGalley. VENUS IN THE BLIND SPOT came out on August 18, 2020, and can be purchased wherever books are sold.

TW: Body horror, stalking, corpse mutilation,sexual assault, extreme gendered violence, animal death




Another manga collection from master of horror, Junji Ito!

Honestly, I've yet to be disappointed by an Ito collection, and this one was no different. The stories were all engaging from the get-go and maintained the same visceral imagery that I've come to expect from the author.
The collection is shocking in the way Ito often is, but if you read enough Ito... well. It's expected, if that makes any sense. I went into this knowing what sorts of situations the characters were likely to get into, and while I wasn't shocked, I did really enjoy each individual tale. Because Ito is so consistent in his craft, it's almost... reassuring? For a moment on reading I felt like I'd gone back in time, sent back to a few years ago when I read Tomie and Enigma for the first time. Speaking of which, I was so pleased to have a chance to read Enigma in a collection as I'd only ever read it online prior.

This time around, some of the stories actually felt allegorical to where we are with COVID, particularly
Billions Alone, a haunting tale of horrors put upon people who have chosen to socially interact
and then
The Licking Woman, in which a horrifying being is wandering about infecting people with a deadly sickness using only her tongue.

If graphic imagery upsets you, this book might not be for you
-BUT-

If you've ever been curious about horror manga but didn't know where to start, this is a great stepping stone.

If you are already an Ito fan, well. I've already said this, but you know what to expect... you'll still enjoy it, I promise!

I definitely have a few specific patrons I'll be recommending this title to.

Before Junji Ito, the closest I got to reading horror manga was Kentaro Miura’s Berserk, which is more in the realm of dark fantasy, but it’s not without horrific imagery, from the graphic violence to the incredibly designed monsters. My introduction to Ito’s bibliography was reading Uzumaki, which literally spirals a small Japanese town into a horrific fate, resulting in a work that is both great and silly. In his latest book, Venus in the Blind Spot, it is a compilation of short stories that predominately focused on Ito’s dark and twisted view on humanity.

This idea of humanity at its worst is shown in the first story “Billions Alone”, in which a young boy who has isolated himself from the outside world for seven years, struggles to connect, whilst people suddenly vanish and reappearing, only to be stitched together as “group corpses”. Considering where we are when it comes to social distancing and self-isolation, this story does seem current as the horror is one of unknown origins and which there is no escape.

As if a human connection couldn’t get any creepier, the next two shorts (both based on original stories by Edogawa Ranpo) show how dangerously close we can be with each other. In “The Human Chair”, when a young writer stops by a furniture store, where the owner tells her the story of another writer from years ago and how she was haunted by someone who was secretly living in a chair in her house. In the other short story “An Unearthly Love”, a marriage starts to slowly fall apart when the wife suspects the husband of being unfaithful.

Over a hundred pages in, Ito presents the best of the bunch, which is the eponymous short, where a group of young men who are members of the Nanzan UFO Research Society, become infatuated with the leader of the discussion, the beautiful Mariko. However, any time any of the males approach her, she vanishes in front of them, but can only her voice. With the ongoing discussion of UFOs, which may have something to do with the member’s shared predicament, there may be an air of silliness, but how Ito unravels the mystery throughout, which leads to a clever and tragic climax.

Some of the stories don’t land as well as they lean into the silliness that I’ve often struggled with Uzumaki, such as “Master Umezz and Me”, about a fanboy obsessing over the books of horror mangaka Kazuo Umezz. Essentially a love letter to the real-life Kazuo Umezu, who was a big influence on Ito, there isn’t anything here that is really scary and more of an excuse for the author to draw a young protagonist looking sickly obsessive over comic books, which I’m sure some readers can relate to.

As a writer, no matter what ideas of horror he can throw at the reader, there can be some repetition in his narratives, which is usually a young protagonist on a search for the truth, only to consumed by a mental or physical demise. What usually saves these stories is Ito’s detailed artwork, which is mostly presented in black-and-white. Whether it is characters looking like they’re going through a psychological breakdown, or the numerous corpses that are morphed that presents genuine body horror, Ito presents images that stay with you and challenging you not to receive nightmares when you’re next sleeping.

Despite Uzumaki being Ito’s most celebrated work, it has this fractured structure that doesn’t work when telling an ongoing narrative, whereas with a short story collection like Venus in the Blind Spot, he’s better at getting his darkly weird ideas in small chunks.

This volume is a collection of short stories, some of which have been published before, or the first time published for a majority of them. Like much of Ito's other work, these stories are creepy and capitalize on our sense of propriety to give us the heebie-jeebies. In "Billions Alone," there are people being sewn together. "The human chair" has a creepily obsessive love story. "Venus in the blind spot," this volume's namesake, was one of the more creative stories surrounding a woman who disappears when she gets too close to men who adore her. Then, there's "The licking woman," with a monster who has a poisonous tongue. The story of "Master Umezz and me," gives us a glimpse into Ito's own life and his inspiration for writing horror stories. In "How love came to Professor Kirida," an obsessed student violates Kirida's privacy and wishes. "The Enigma of Amigara Fault," tells of weirdly alluring holes that are shaped for specific people. This collection is rounded out with "Keepsake," where a baby is mysteriously born to a dead woman inside her casket.

Some of these stories were really interesting and gave me the heebie-jeebies in the right way. Others had very cliché cop-out endings. I'm not sure if other Ito stories are constructed the same way, but in almost every one of these stories, the twist ending was on the last page. There was hardly any falling action or repercussions to the actions in the story. The "Venus in the Blind Spot" story had a really great set up, but the ending was lackluster and disappointing. The other story that has stayed with me long after reading it was "The Enigma of Amigara Fault," which built up steadily and delivered a creep-factor that was satisfying.

The art is really detailed and definitely embodies the horror. Some illustrative pieces are repeated - several of the women characters look the same across several stories.

This volume is definitely more suitable to mature audiences. There is necrophilia, agalmatophilia, implied rape, adult situations, and some graphic illustrations. VIZ rates this as Teen Plus.

Sara's Rating: 6/10
Suitability Level: Grade 12

Junji Ito is simply one of the best creators of horror comics in any language. These are creepy, disturbing stories, that don't rely on twist endings or sudden shocks to create their horror (although he does use those tools well). Venus in the Blind Spot is a "best of" type collection, which means there are no losers in this bunch. Plus you get "The Enigma of Amigara Fault" which always twists my spine the wrong way whenever I read it. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free copy of this ebook in exchange for an unbiased review.

Review for publication elsewhere.
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The latest work by Junji Ito is the short story collection, Venus in the Blind Spot. This collection features ten short stories by the horror master that range from personal collections about Ito’s own life to the grotesque horror that he is known for. It also features two adaptions from the Japanese writer, Edogawa Ranpo. Although this collection does have exclusive colored pages that are not normally featured in Ito’s works, the whole collection fell short for me. Some of the stories felt up to the quality that is normal for Ito but some of them were uninteresting and ventured into territories that are not his strong point. To put it bluntly, some of them were plain boring compared to his previous works.

A short look at the stories:

Billions Alone- This story was easily one of the best of the collection. It relies heavily on the plot points and drawings that usually make Ito’s work so horrifying. The image of bodies sewn together was tough to see and the double page color spread was a great visual to kick off the story.

The Human Chair– This is one of the manga adaption that Ito did of Edogawa’s works. Although it was one of the stronger ones of the collection, it seemed almost comically that a chair had a person in it. I was waiting for a twist but it truly was just a chair with a dude in it.

An Unearthly Love– Nothing like a creepy doll story to really make you feel weird.

Venus in the Blind Spot- The titular story left me wanting more. This was one (as far as I can remember) of Ito’s first dips into medical horror and it just didn’t hit quite like his other works have.

The Licking Woman- I wish this one made more sense. It is truly horrific to think about a woman’s tongue licking you and killing you but the ending was not quite what the story built up to.

Master Umezz and Me- This is a personal story by Ito about how much Umezz’s work has influenced his own. A short, sweet read.

How Love Came to Professor Kirida– A grumpy old man gets haunted by the nice girl that he told to buzz off. Nothing too significant here.

The Engima of Amigara Fault– Although I liked this story, it was technically in another collection of his. Can that still be considered a new story for this collection? Ito is able to create the fear of claustrophobia on his pages which truly takes talent.

The Sad Tale of the Principal Post- Another story that appeared in a collection before. Short and perhaps insignificant.

Keepsake- Another one of my favorites of the collection. It really seems that Ito does well at making character designs that have you feel like you need to look away but you also have to see them for yourself.

Although it’s a good collection for his fans, I would not suggest this work as an intro into Ito’s works. However, 2020-21 is seeing quite a few of Ito’s work being produced so keep an eye out for more!

Ito has done it again. This is a fantastic dive into horror with some definitely spine tingling tales to read. Some of the stories were a bit more tame, but ones like the Human Chair and the Enigma of Amigara Fault make up for that ten-fold.

I absolutely loved this collection. I had chills down my back, I was afraid to read it in the dark. Junji Ito absolutely never fails with the fear factor is his graphic novels, the drawings go so well with everything in the story making it super impossible to put them down. The stokes hook you in and make you wonder what happens next. I honestly can’t pick a top favorite because they were all well written and all hooked you in some way. I can’t wait to continue reading collections from him. Honestly the king of graphic novel horror without a single doubt.

While most Americans see Stephen King as the master of written horror, those of us who follow manga have a different master that we look to: Junji Ito. Now with Venus in the Blind Spot, published by VIZ Media, English readers get the chance to be reintroduced to Ito’s work. Venus in the Blind Spot is a “best of” collection of creepy tales from the Eisner award-winning mangaka.

With 10 short stories, Venus in the Blind Spot is a striking collection that presents some of the most remarkable shorts featuring an adaptation of Rampo Edogawa’s classic horror story “Human Chair” and fan-favorite “The Enigma of Amigara Fault.” In addition to these, the eight other shorts include “Billions Alone,” “An Unhealthy Love,” “Venus in the Blind Spot,” “The Licking Woman,” “Master Umezz and Me,” “How Love Came to Professor Kirida,” “The Sad Tale of the Principal Post,” and “Keepsake.” These 10 stories come as a deluxe presentation, including special color pages and showcasing illustrations from his acclaimed long-form manga No Longer Human.

It’s hard to review this volume of collected stories because each and every story deserves its own spotlight. The terror and body horror begins with “Billions Alone” were bodies of couples and groups of people are being sewn together like quilts and left throughout the city and hits an apex with “The Licking Woman” which you can google to see the absolute terrifying images in that one. But then there are more subtle moments of dread and creeping terror like “An Unhealthy Love” where a man is in love with a doll to his wife’s displeasure or the slow-burning unease of “Venus in the Blind Spot.” There is even a small comedic autobiographic short, “Master Umezz and Me,” which details how Ito became the master of horror we know and fear today and a few adaptations of works by other writers, with my favorite being “Human Chair.”

But above them all is “The Enigma of Amigara Fault.” As one of Ito’s most renown stories, it is crown jewel of the collected stories. However, with it placed near the end of the anthology, it feels like it was built up to by the previous shorts instead of eclipsing them. Coming third to last, “The Enigma of Amigara Fault” serves as a climax to the collection and as one of Ito’s most acclaimed stories. It’s worth picking up Venus in the Blind Spot for this alone. But trust me, the other short stories are still worth is.

If you haven’t heard of “The Enigma of Amigara Fault,” it was originally included in Gyo, another Ito work. In it, people are being unnaturally drawn into a mountainside fault. A story of compulsion, a boy named Owaki and a girl, Yoshida, meet on Amigara Mountain where they make an unsettling discovery: Human-shaped holes are scattered across the mountain. It soon becomes clear that the holes are “calling” to the people they are shaped like, and, of course, people answer.

Each and every one of these stories should be entered into with as minimal spoilers as possible, read in a dark room, and embraced for the pure horror they are, of the psychological and the bodily kind. But, while Ito’s stories and art are phenomenal as always in his pulpy style, the additional colorized pages and sometimes single-page panels work to bring a dramatic effect that emphasizes the emotions of the scene and ultimately the delivery of the scare, which is particularly true for “The Enigma of Amigara Fault.”

Overall, Venus in the Blind Spot is a must-buy for any and all horror fans. Whether you’ve ventured into Ito’s twisted sense of horror in the past or you’re new to his work entirely, this is the perfect place to start. While Tomie and Uzumaki stand as horror classics, Venus in the Blind Spot is here to show new readers exactly why Junji Ito is the master of horror.

Venus in the Blind Spot is available from booksellers August 11, 2020.

This is my first ever manga (which showed as I tried to understand how to read backwards and turn the pages backwards), there were a few stories that I didn't really understand or would have liked more closure at the end. However I think this is just a personal preference. I can definitely see why Junji Ito is so well known, the stories are incredibly creepy, the art style is amazing and some of the stories are just deeply unsettling. I would definitely recommend this book for both fans and newbies alike. If you like Junji Ito's work you'll probably love these stories, if you're new then this is a good way to dip into the style and see if the stories are for you. 

I will say that if you are new to these works be warned they definitely have adult content, its creepy, unsettling, a bit gory and some parts outright weird. However this is what makes the stories so intriguing because they're all so different. Just be warned that if you don't like creepy stories then you probably might want to give this one a miss - it's definitely an adult book. However give this one a go if you think you can handle the creepiness

There is only one word I can think of to describe Junji Ito's Venus in the Blind Spot and that is classic. Everytime I sit down to read one of Ito's works I know I am going to be terrified. The addition of color to select pages adds a whole new disturbing element to the stories. I did enjoy the short autobiographical story that showed how Ito discovered the world of horror manga.

Ito has a lovely way of illustrating established stories and creating ones of his own - all of which are delightfully disturbing. I'm claustrophobic so that bit about the holes in the mountain, if that doesn't give me nightmares, I don't know what will.

he's just too brilliant.

I'm a little biased, because I came into this already knowing and loving Junji Ito's work, but this collection didn't disappoint. Story after story of the creepy, crawly, sticky, icky weirdness we all know and love from the master. There were some reprints of his previous works that I knew and loved to revisit in this new collection, and there was a lot of new Ito for me to get fully grossed out and horrified by. If you don't know Junji Ito, this is a great place to start, it has one of his most famous works (Amigara Fault) but also includes some deeeeeply unsettling new stuff before that (the licking woman?? The human chair???).

A dark and twisted anthology that is sure to leave a lingering impression.

This was my first time reading Junji Ito's work. The vivid and detailed art along with the shocking and graphic stories were captivating. Many of the stories were engaging from start to finish, with the exception of the final few which were too short to really compare to the others. The characters were well developed and the art reflected the dark moods and gory detail. The transition from color to black and white worked well, drawing readers in and allowing them to imagine further detail in color. I was not expecting the stories to be as nearly erotic as they were. Only a few stories actually were sexual but the others were on the cusp of being sexual.

Stories that left a lasting impression that will leave me looking over my shoulder were "The Licking Woman" (seriously tongues are disgusting and Ito captured that well!), "The Human Chair" (I don't know what I would do if this ever happened to me >_<), and "Billions Alone" (because it has a Black Mirror feel that it could happen...)!

I would cautiously but readily recommend this anthology to readers interested in horror and thrillers.