April Read: Spy X Family Vol. 10 by Tatsuya Endo

Hey everyone! I’m back with my book review for April, and it’s a book in one of my favorite series, Spy x Family. I love this series, but I don’t believe I’ve ever done a review on them.

Anyway, this is Volume 10 in the series, so there may/will be spoilers in this review. As always, my content review comes first, then my personal.

Since I haven’t done a review on this series before, I’ll start by explaining some things. Twilight is the main character and a spy, and his fake name, which I will be using for this book, is Loid. He is a spy for the West, known as Westalis, and is currently doing a mission in the country of Ostania, with which Westalis has a shaky peace with. He has a marriage of convenience with a woman named Yor, who, unbeknownst to him, is an assassin, and his adopted daughter, Anya, is a telepath, unbeknownst to them both, but who, due to her powers, knows both their identities. Loid also has an informant named Franky who helps him on some missions.

The Synopsis (taken from Goodreads)

An action-packed comedy about a fake family that includes a spy, an assassin and a telepath!

Master spy Twilight is unparalleled when it comes to going undercover on dangerous missions for the betterment of the world. But when he receives the ultimate assignment—to get married and have a kid—he may finally be in over his head!

As a child, [REDACTED] lived a peaceful life with his parents, playing war games with his friends and having minor quarrels with his father. It never even occurred to young [REDACTED] that the life he’d taken for granted might one day end…

Content Review:

Positive Messages: As a kid, Loid’s father tells him he should hope for peace, not war. He also makes the statement that Loid has never met, talked to, or heard their enemy’s (the Ostanians) side of the conflict. Loid lies to his father in order to get money, but afterwards feels guilty and works hard to earn money to pay back his father and plans to tell him and apologize.

Loid then talks to a lady who is always nice to him, and she reveals she is an Ostanian, and he starts to realize they’re people just like them. Loid’s mother takes care of him, and its clear both his parents do love him in their own ways.

Loid fishes to provide food for him and his mother.

Later in the war, Loid meets Franky for the first time, and Franky talks about war and how silly it is because they don’t even know what they’re fighting and they’re only fighting because the higher ups tell them to hate each other. He also reveals to Loid the Ostanians’ side of things, and how neither of them really know the truth. This, among other things, prompts Loid to want to get information–truth–so he knows what’s going on and can stop conflicts and save lives, not just do something mindlessly because the government tells him to.

Back in present day, Loid tells Anya to cherish her friends, thinking of his old ones.

Yor truly loves Anya and does what she can to be a good mother to her. She also saves a woman from falling down the stairs and rescues her boxes too. The lady, to thank her, invites her to play volleyball with her and a bunch of other moms. This lady is Melinda Desmond, Loid’s target’s wife, and when Yor asks if he thinks she could go back to their mommy-get-togethers, Loid says she deserves to have some friends (while also counting on perhaps getting information) and determines to protect Yor if this is something the Desmonds are planning against him.

A good message in this book is not to jump to conclusions because you hear something about someone or a group of people, but really look into things before casting judgements and acting, since innocent people can be hurt.

Rating: 4.5/5

Spiritual Messages: None.

Rating: N/A

Romantic Content: Just as a note, if you didn’t know it, this series is comedy, so much of the romance stuff is comedic. With that in mind, it will affect my rating.

When Loid captures Franky, he says he doesn’t want to die “having never been with a woman”. Tabloids emerge about a pop figure claiming he had extramarital affairs, but it turns out they were all lies.

Anya tells her (rather boy-crazy) friend, Becky, that she wants to get closer to Damian Desmond (for Loid’s mission). Becky thinks Anya has a crush on Damian and advises her on how to get him to “love” her. It fails, epically.

Anya watches a spy cartoon where the spy basically rescues all these women and leads them all on. In the end, they slap him and beat him up. Anya thinks she understands romance now, but Loid, watching it too, says the spy was definitely NOT a gentleman.

Franky and Bond, Anya’s dog, meet a female dog walker and dog respectively and try to impress them. They both fail, especially Franky who confesses his love on the second meeting and gets slapped.

Rating: 4.5/5

Violence: War is a major part of this book, especially the first part, telling about Loid’s childhood and the war which made him hate war. A bomb blows up a shop near Loid, injuring him and presumably killing the woman who worked there and many others, including Loid’s father. Him and his mother are forced to evacuate their home, and the bombings that happen later frighten him. In another bombing, Loid’s mother is killed.

This prompts him to go to war when he gets older, which include scenes of gun firing, throwing hand grenades, and talk of corpses. Loid is hit and injured. Loid later hears a mission some of his friends were sent on was ill-planned, and all he ever saw of them again was their dog-tags.

A man prepares to assassinate a pop figure, but Handler, Loid’s/Twilight’s spy boss, whacks his hand with her belt, then his head when he goes for a knife. Someone says she broke the guy’s jaw.

Yor mistakes a makeup tool for a weapon that pierces eyeballs.

Rating: 4/5

Language: Three d words, and three h words are scattered throughout.

Rating: 3.5/5

Other Negative Content: Loid’s father slaps him just because he talks about killing the enemy (Ostanians) when he grows up. In his father’s defense, he makes a good point but still, he could have and should have been more gentle. Loid’s parents also fight a lot. He also lies about needing a schoolbook so his dad will give him money to spend on toys, and lies about his name and age to enter the military.

Loid starts his military career because he is bitter at the Ostanians for killing his family and friends and ruining his home. He almost kills an unarmed, surrendering soldier, and hates the enemy just because they’re the enemy and he’s told to hate them.

Anya, being a typical kid, passes on the opportunity to study so she can watch cartoons (but then changes her mind later). She also only helps someone out because she gets something from it.

Melinda is a little odd… I think she may have some sort of mental illness, but I’m not sure. She goes from happy to dangerous very quickly, and it seems to be surrounding her family situation. She and her husband have a “hands off” parenting philosophy, which explains a lot of the issues her son Damian has had in the series up to this point, wanting his parents’ love and affection. She is also supposedly estranged from her husband at this point.

Rating: 3.5/5

Total Content Rating: 4/5 Stars

Personal Review:

So I really love this series. It’s probably my favorite, what with the cute found family dynamics, the interesting spy missions, the characters, and the comedy. It’s totally awesome and adorable, and I love almost all the main characters, which is super surprising.

This volume was more serious in the beginning with little Loid’s past, which was super sad, but I liked the message it was sending and how it changed him as an adult. I hope we can see some of the other character’s backstories eventually too.

Of course, the comedic elements were spot on for the rest of the book, and Melinda’s introduction is going to make things fun, especially with Anya’s Friendship Scheme with Damian, which is one of my favorite parts of the series. However, Melinda’s characterization as of now seems a little off, so maybe in the next books it’ll be explained why she acts rather odd and she’ll grow on me.

Personal Rating: 5/5 Stars

Have you read this book/series or seen the anime? Who is your favorite character? Your favorite scene? If you haven’t, do you want to read/watch this series? Let me know in the comments below! ~ Kay