Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts Volume 1

Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts volume 1 by Haruka Fukushima, 2004. Pages: 208. Source: Borrowed from library.


Meet Natsumi Kawashima, a homely fifth grader with a craving for curves of her own. One day, after eating a packet of mysterious pink nuts, her wish comes true and she is transformed into a beautiful, sexy woman! Now endowed with a mind for recess and a body for supermodel glitz and glamour, will Natsumi's newfound adulthood and sudden fawning admirers lead to happiness or heartbreak?

When I ordered Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts from my library, I had absolutely no idea what it was going to be about. So when I found out that the main character, Natsumi, was only in the fifth grade I almost didn't read it, but decided since I had it checked out I might as well give it a shot. I'm so glad I did because her crazy antics were just what I needed to lighten up my reading.

While the plot line is fairly (dare I say it...) predictable, I still found myself enjoying reading it none the less. I liked reading about Natsumi and Asuma and the trouble that she kept getting them into. It was as I said earlier a nice light read, but oh so easy to figure out how the whole series would play out without reading all the volumes.

My favorite scene in Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts would have to be when Natsumi finds out that Asuma had taken a picture of her and submitted it to a magazine for a contest. If I'm remembering right, I'm pretty sure she hit him.

While I can usually peg what I don't like in a manga, I don't have really any negative thoughts for this one. The artwork was nice and the story thoroughly entertaining. Though I am sad that my library doesn't have the other three volumes and even worse it's out of print.

Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts, volume 1 earns 4 out of 5 pineapples.