| | |  | SHONEN JUMP ADVANCED | Home » » » » Death Note, Vol. 13: How to Read | | | | | | | Description: | | An encyclopedic guide to the Death Note manga series, including character bios, storyline summaries, interviews with creators Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata, production notes and commentaries, and bonus manga pages. Light Yagami is an ace student with great prospects--and he's bored out of his mind. But all that changes when he finds the Death Note, a notebook dropped by a rogue Shinigami death god. Any human whose name is written in the notebook dies, and now Light has vowed to use the power of the Death Note to rid the world of evil. But when criminals begin dropping dead, the authorities send the legendary detective L to track down the killer. With L hot on his heels, will Light lose sight of his noble goal…or his life? | | | Features: | |
• ISBN13: 9781421518886
• Condition: New
• Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
| | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Tsugumi Ohba | | Paperback:
| 192 pages | | Publisher:
| VIZ Media, LLC | | Publication Date:
| February 19, 2008 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 1421518880 | | Product Length:
| 8.11 inches | | Product Width:
| 5.25 inches | | Product Height:
| 0.74 inches | | Product Weight:
| 0.84 pounds | | Package Length:
| 8.0 inches | | Package Width:
| 5.2 inches | | Package Height:
| 0.8 inches | | Package Weight:
| 0.75 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 15 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 15 customer reviews )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
42 of 42 found the following review helpful:
 The Official Death Note Companion Would Have Been a More Obvious TitleFeb 14, 2008
By Mister Myst
Officially, this is considered the final book in the Death Note series. However, it's really more of a companion book than anything else. Not that that's a bad thing at all. In fact, it's nothing short of awesome.
Within these 200-odd pages, you'll be treated to all kinds of goodies.
For starters, all the unresolved plotlines (especially the fate of Misa) are addressed. You also get every single piece of Death Note trivia that you would possibly want to know. So not only do we finally learn L's real name, we learn everything he ever ate during the course of the seires (Oh boundless joy!). Also, perhaps to give us a break from how serious the series has been, many of the characters pop up occasionally and break the fourth wall by providing some amusing commentary of their own. At least one even comments on their own in-series death.
However, as good as all this is, there are two places where this book really shines.
First, a lot of this book goes behind the scenes as Ohba and Obata give us a satisfying peak at their creative processes. My favorite part was where Ohba talks about where he got the idea for EACH chapter title. Man, this guy gives a whole new meaning to the term "detail-oriented".
Second, this volume wraps up with the series' pilot chapter, aka the FIRST Death Note manga ever written. It has the same basic concept as the series (a deadly notebook), but takes it in a more "Stephen King-ish" direction. Also, other than Ryuuk, it stars a completely different cast of characters. That said, one of these "newbies" bears a striking physical resemblance to a certain, insane prosecutor-turned-Kira-worshipper. If you're a fan of the seires, you probably know who I mean. Like the series, the pilot was a great read. In fact, I think it would make a great movie (much easier to adapt than the series, I'd think).
The only negative thing about this book was that, on 1 or 2 pages toward the end, Misa was even more exposed than usual. I wasn't quite expecting this and it made me feel somewhat uncomfortable. However, this really isn't enough to cost it a star. It's just a few pages; easy to skip over.
This is highly recommended for Death Note fans who know when to stop taking things too seriously.
Also somewhat recommended for Stephen King fans or Horror fans in general (due to the aforementioned pilot chapter).
11 of 11 found the following review helpful:
Amazing and InformativeFeb 20, 2008
By Heavenly Faye-Faye
"HFF"
I only recently bought this book and read it in a whole day. It's really informative - it tells me pretty much everything I ever wanted to know about the series and the characters! I particularly enjoyed "Ryuk's Human Observation Journal" - it was so funny that I had one of the most cheerful moods I've ever had all throughout the day! :D
I was surprised to see the original pilot to the series in this book; even though it's very different than the series, it's nonetheless entertaining. There are quite a few differences in the two stories...
If your a huge Death Note fan, I definatly recommend that you get your hands on this book as soon as possible!
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
 A little something more.Jun 12, 2008
By S. Darrow
I was very sad to finish the last installation of the Death Note manga series, and How to Read filled a little bit of the void for me. It was terrific to learn more about my favorite characters, to enter the minds of the author and illustrator, and just spend a little more time in the world which I grew to love through the manga. Highly reccomended to Death Note fans.
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
A must-have for the hardcore fan, a luxury otherwiseMar 27, 2008
By A. Stephenson
"Alexei Stephenson"
On the whole, an attentive reader of all 12 volumes will already know nearly all the information in this book. As such, the main reasons to buy it are the new elements:
The interviews with the author and artist are fantastic. Which well-known Tim Burton character inspired Ryuk's design? Which ubiquitous piece of Death Note iconography turned out to be a red herring which the artist took seriously? What deeply meaningful statement by L, on which entire interpretations of his character have hinged (including mine, alas) was actually a barefaced lie? This sort of information is both genuinely interesting and otherwise inaccessible.
The rest of the bonus material is either for completists only (like finding out characters' birthdays and skill evaluations), for people who weren't paying total attention in the first place (like step-by-step breakdowns of the storyline) or just for fun (a list of all the sweets L eats over the course of the manga; a series of 4-panel omake comics; a guide to the shinigami one barely sees, and their ranking system).
And by the way, the L name card is very neat, but poorly thought-through. Over the course of the storyline, two characters (but not the reader) find out L's name, and in one case, if it had been this, the story would have gone very differently from that point.
Overall, Death Note 13 is definitely worth buying if you're a fan of the series wanting to find out what its creators were thinking, and to fill in every gap in your knowledge (which the book does admirably). Just don't expect a revolution in terms of new material. Or to find out about L's background (one of the main reasons I bought it, but the subject barely gets a mention).
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Not Just for FanboysSep 21, 2010
By gassnake
Death Note is an amazing comic. Not only that, but unique, fresh. Before I recommend this "volume 13" to anybody, I recommend the actual comic, 12 volumes of Death Note.
Now, if you are a fan, if you've read all 12 volumes, if you care about the authors: this book is for you. If you haven even heard about this series, are a creative mind, an artist or writer: you will highly value this book. This book is two things in one.
When v13 was first released I saw it in bookstores and immediately pulled it off and scanned through it. What is this?! To my ignorance, I put it back thinking it was just a bunch of random "death note" facts and fanservice tossed into a book to rake in the money off of the fanboys and girls. And this is true, this is one of the two things this book is: a product to make money off of the fans. This book includes all sorts of "facts" and character bios, in depth ideas and surface analyzing of the twists. All of which are not written by either of the authors. If this is what you want, go ahead, waste your money on this book.
Now, for the rest of you, for the comic-artist, the writer, the creative, or the curious, buy this book. The second thing this book is, is a... bible almost, a box of knowledge and intrigue.
This book is literally divided in two. If you look at the book from the side you can see that there are alternating patches of black and white pages. Everything black is part of the first thing, fanservice, pointless analizations. Everything from the white part is the gold. It's the raw stuff, straight from the authors. The toro of tuna guys. I can not tell you how much this book is valued to me as a comic artist. There are interviews with both of the authors, and each. There are "questionnaires" which I believe the questions may have come from fans, but are still greatly interesting. The last section includes the "pilot" chapter of Death Note. One part has Ohba explaining each character, why he choose them and the issues regarding their creation and/or death. This book, the second part of it pays for the first part, maybe a few times over. You will learn about how each author thinks, insight into the Japanese style of publication and serialization, how the authors interacted throughout, what surprised the authors, what they cared about, and more. Rarely do we have such raw data right from such amazing artists and writers all in one spot. This is the case with Death Note Volume 13 "how to read". Check it out.
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