Our sorry hero, his reformed girlfriend, and the amnesiac class president have all graduated from their high school out in the boondocks, and self-described Sapphist and ex-basketball ace Kanbaru, retired by reason of an “injury,” is starting her senior year and the narrator of this volume—her voice far more introspective than the smutty jock’s we thought we knew.
 
Bereft of the company of her beloved mentors, the only other person around her with any working knowledge of aberrations the junior Ougi Oshino, apparently a relative of the Hawaiian-shirted folklorist, she feels a bit alone and blue, and sick with dread that the devil residing in her left arm courtesy of the Monkey’s Paw might act up again while she sleeps.
 
Investigating a rumour that she fears might lead back to her, the former star ends up peering into an abyss of negativity called Rouka. Trapped in a pit the like of which could only be escaped by the one girl who was able to pull off slam-dunks in her basketball nationals, can the penitent Kanbaru, however, still be aggressive?
 
(Source: Kodansha USA)

Second season of the Monogatari Series, part 2/2. Contains the arc Suruga Devil from the Hanamonogatari light novel.
 
Now that Koyomi Araragi and Hitagi Senjougahara have graduated, few familiar faces remain at Naoetsu Private High School. One of them is Suruga Kanbaru, holder of the Monkey's Paw. When she begins to hear talk of a mysterious being known as the "Devil," who will magically solve any problem, she immediately thinks these rumors are about her and decides to investigate.
 
Kanbaru discovers the Devil is actually Rouka Numachi, a former rival who provides free advice to those who seek her out now that she can no longer play basketball due to a leg injury. As a collector of misfortune, Numachi enjoys relieving her clients' stress by giving them false hope. Though Kanbaru sees no real harm being done, she reprimands Rouka for lying and heads home, relieved she is not the cause of the rumors. But the next morning, when she finds that her left hand has reverted back to its original form, she may have a reason to worry after all.

How far does one go to help a lost child? In the case of returning narrator Araragi, the answer is too far, across the veil of time. Dutifully (if unknowingly) following up on Hachikuji’s cheeky foreshadowing, he concerns himself with his young lady friend and her fate in this instalment of the cult-hit series, heroically unable, once again, to find his own way home.
 
Thus the tale is also, or more so, about the journey itself, the dark honeymoon of a trip he takes into the past with the dweller in his shadow, Shinobu. Even among a cast that routinely disrespects chronology with their meta-commentary, she takes the cake, or the doughnut, by rewinding the clock for a perverse road movie, one that by and large goes nowhere, spatially.
 
It’s Kabuki not as in the theatre, but with the character for “tilt”—as in a slanted attitude toward the world, the posture of a bohemian. Or, perhaps, of a legendary vampire who once sought death, and of a high school senior who once tuned out life doing their dandy best to attend to an embarrassing wealth of aberrations in a provincial town.
 
(Source: Kodansha USA)

A certain middle school girl has a fondness for hats, which serve as a line of defence against eye contact along with the overlong bangs she’s worn ever since she was little. Speaking in fits and starts when she doesn’t fall completely silent, her go-to line is “I’m sorry,” and she’s given to referring to herself in third person. Nadeko Sengoku is pretty, and not just cute.
 
(Source: Kodansha USA)

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