Manga Review: The Apothecary Diaries Volume 2 Story by Natsu Hyuuga, art by Nekokurage
Quick recap: Maomao is a talented apprentice apothecary who lives in a country that’s not quite Ancient China. She’s kidnapped and sold into indentured servitude to the rear palace (harem) of the Emperor. Despite attempting to keep her head low, her knowledge of poisons and deductive skills lead her to intervene and save a baby’s life. This brings her to the attention of head eunuch, the excessively handsome Jinshi. She’s shown her brains, and is made official poison taster for Lady Gyokuyo, one of the Emperor’s consorts and the mother of the child Maomao saved.
At the beginning of the volume, Maomao is directly addressed by the Emperor while he is at the Jade Pavilion, Lady Gyokuyo’s quarters. This freaks her out a bit, as being noticed by people in power doesn’t always work out well for commoners. In this case, it turns out one of his other consorts, Lady Lihua, is seriously ill. The Emperor wants Maomao to tend her.
At first, Lihua’s ladies in waiting are scornful of Maomao and refuse to allow her near their charge, or to feed her the “peasant” food that Maomao prepared based on reported symptoms. This lasts until Jinshi drops by to lend authority to her presence. Maomao soon realizes that not only is Lihua much worse than expected, but the care her servants have given her is actually causing the sickness.
The responsible parties are punished, and Maomao diligently brings Lady Lihua back from the brink. Her patient is worried about losing the Emperor’s favor, but Maomao has some advice that helps, and she parts from the Crystal Pavilion with the respect of its mistress (and the fear of the ladies in waiting, Maomao being tiny but wrathful when she needs to be.)
Then it’s time to prepare for the Emperor’s early spring garden banquet. This is no mere frivolity but a massive ceremonial undertaking, important to the politics of the court. There’s lots of preparation to be done, and we learn a secret about Maomao’s makeup skills.
One of the customs of the banquet is people giving the women of the rear palace jewelry trinkets. Maomao chooses not to learn the full meaning of the custom, but does get a necklace from Lady Gyoukyo, and hairpins from Sir Jinshi, Lady Lihua, and some fellow named Lihaku (we’ll see him again later.)
We’re also introduced to Lady Lishu, the youngest consort. She’s barely pubescent, and was more or less pushed on the Emperor by her politically powerful family. The good news is that the Emperor isn’t into little girls. The bad news is that puts Lishu into a precarious position, the target of jealousy from lower status concubines, but with no protection from above. In particular, her ladies in waiting resent that they have to work for this child and so treat her badly.
This becomes important during the food tasting portion of the banquet. Maomao notices Lishu’s poison tester passing a dish for her mistress that Lady Lishu is clearly uncomfortable eating (but must because of court etiquette.) That moment is overshadowed by Maomao detecting poison in the broth to be served to Lady Gyoukyo. In the ensuing kerfuffle, a minister gets himself poisoned trying to prove Maomao wrong.
Maomao asks Sir Jinshi to summon Lady Lishu and her attendant. Turns out that Lishu is allergic to the ingredients in the dish she ate (gets a bad rash) which comes to a shock to her food taster, who’d assumed her charge was just a spoiled child and picky eater. But the version of the same dish served for Lady Gyoukyo did not have the allergen. In other words, Lishu’s attendant had deliberately switched the dishes to be served to her mistress and the other consort to be cruel…but that means that Lishu was the actual target of the poison!
And that’s the end of this volume, minus the bonus material.
As before, good art, particularly in costume design, and interesting mysteries. We learn a bit more about Maomao’s past and the reasons for her behavior. Sir Jinshi has it driven home to him for the first time just how precarious life is for women in his society even apart from court politics.
And despite her best intentions, Maomao is finding herself getting more and more entangled in those politics. Not a good thing for a commoner!
Content note: Bullying, a bit of non-lethal violence. Discussion of rape and sexual assault. It’s all but stated that the previous Emperor was a pedophile. Maomao gives sex advice to Lady Lihua, but we don’t get details aside from it involving breasts.
If you enjoyed the first volume or the anime, recommended.
