Dementia 21 (DEMENTIA 21 GN)

Yukie Sakai is a sprightly young home health aide eager to help her elderly clients. But what seems like a straightforward job quickly turns into a series of increasingly surreal and bizarre adventures that put Yukie’s wits to the test! Cartoonist Kago, who is well known for combining a more traditional manga style with hyper realistic illustration technique, an experimental visual storytelling approach, and outrageously sexual and scatological subject matter, has single-handedly created his own genre: “fashionable paranoia."

Publishers Weekly

"Showing influences from Salvador Dali to Katsuhiro Otomo, the combination of Kago’s precise, expressive, and kinetic line work with his wacky storytelling is at turns engrossing and repulsive. Mature fans of unconventional manga will appreciate the surreal spiral of body horror, tragicomedy, and dark humor."

Broken Frontier

"Charming, hilarious, and thought-provoking. Dementia 21 proves that Kago is a cutting satirist with a deft touch for black comedy."

PopMatters

"As much as I admire Kago's oddness as a writer, his artistic pen is even sharper. [His characters] retain a realistic edge that intensifies their horror-tinged universe."

Intima

"Part social commentary and satire, part menacing story colored by greed and selfishness, part narrative on thankless work, Dementia 21 is a transgressive form of graphic medicine."

Kitty Sneezes

"Dementia 21 is a great way to introduce the world to Kago’s brilliant work. If you’re looking for amazing manga, look no further."

Run Spot Run

"Dementia 21 revels in bodily irreverence and pushes corporeality to the limits of the imagination. It is a fine introduction to the strange world of Kago."

Adventures in Poor Taste

"Kago deftly combines realism and absurdity for a manga title that’s equal parts joyful, evocative, and jarring."

About the Author

Shintaro Kago is a manga artist who has gained a cult following for his transgressive work marked by horror, sci-fi, psychedelic erotica, and a keen sense of the grotesque. His comics include Fraction (2009), Super-Dimensional Love Gun (2019), and Dementia 21 (2020). He lives in Tokyo.

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