Since then, the kittens have a travel case so lovely that they doze in it all day in the house and enter it willingly for any journeys out. They've also been to the vets and had their first immunisations, plus flea and worm treatment, and an appointment made for them to be micro-chipped.  Two thirds of that was paid for in Mello and Matt fan-fiction commissions (give or take the couple about EHC members).  Thank you all!

(And this is still on-going.  There's still the neutering/spraying to happen, and the boa constrictor needs a larger vivarium. *sobs*)

I've also been really touched by how many people, in donating to the cause and providing me with a remit for their tale, wanted it set in my own Mello/Matt universe.  I didn't expect that.  I'll be honest and say that it made things a lot easier in terms of speedily getting these stories written and out.  But I anticipated all kinds of AUs and/or alternatives from the canon.  Not so much Matti!Canon, coupled with (so far) unanimous permission from all commissioning tales, for those stories to be shared with everyone else.

Lots of happy tears here.  Reading compliments and requests, feeling so honoured to be entrusted with long-treasured plot bunnies and witnessing readers of my work wanting to add their own chapter in my voice to the MelloxMatt Matti!canon.  Absolutely thank you all. 

Shadow Riso EHC symbols, inspired by MRSJeevas One-Shot Laughter in the Darkness

These stories belong to those who bought them.  However, everyone so far asked that they be shared.  They are supposed to be drabbles (or one-shots), but since when was I able to be that succinct.  One is currently in the process of becoming a novella. 

As one-shots, they usually first appear in the relevant sub-forum at He Moves Me Differently:  Matti!Canon Mello/Matt One-Shots  Those with an account registered at the forum can subscribe at the top, in order to be notified of any post updates.

My stories eventually turn up in the library too.  That may be located on my MRSJeevas fan-fiction website, also called He Moves Me Differently.  It could be practically simultaneously.  It could be days later.  All depends on when I log into my ftp server and upload them there too.

However, I will link you directly here to the most recent additions, as posted onto the forum:

How would you like to celebrate New Year with Death Note?  Lara Sizemore from Squad Six Cosplayers has been in touch to announce that attendees at North Carolina's Ichibancon anime convention can do just that.

Squad Six Cosplayers are celebrating ten years of Death Note with a panel hosted at Ichibancon 2016.  Resurrecting L: Death Note 10th Anniversary Panel will take a look back over the whole series, review its updates, chuck around some Death Note related trivia and much more for the fandom to enjoy.

Squad Six Cosplayers are a well-known collective upon the US Eastern board anime circuit.  They've been around since 2003 and create all their own costumes from scratch. Their signature panel is Undercover with Kuroshitsuji, which also provides much inspiration for their most famous cosplay. The group ensure that their Kuroshitsuji cosplay is high on historical accuracy, which is fabulous for a qualified historian like myself to hear!

And now they're turning their attention to Death Note.  Happy days.

Ichibancon 2016 will be held at the Embassy Suites Hotel Concord, in Concord, North Carolina, USA, between December 31st-January 3rd 2016.  Resurrecting L: Death Note 10th Anniversary Panel will happen in the convention's Events 4 room, at midnight on January 1st 2016.

Remember three years ago, when none of us could get Gangnam Style out of our heads?  Well Death Note fans are in for another bout of that. 

How can we help it upon placing Psy, after hearing that he's bringing Death Note actor Xia in on his long-awaited Gangnam Style follow up Dream.

Xia, aka Kim Junsu, played L in the Korean version of Death Note the Musical. Which is how this collaboration came about.

Psy went to see the Death Note Musical, and decided there and then that Junsu was the man to sing with him on Dream.  As he revealed to fans on Psy Little Television  - an app broadcast by Napper V - on November 25th 2015.

Dream is described as a 'sad song' (so not at all like Gangnam Style really) dedicated to KPop performer, musician, producer and Ghost Nation radio DJ Shin Hae-Chul. He was the man who brought techno music to Korea, and who died in October 2014 due to medical malpractice.

Psy claimed that Xia's 'heartfelt' performances as L, in Death Note's 'heart-breaking scenes', made him the perfect choice to add vocals to Psy's homage to Shin Hae-Chul.  "The song is full of sadness," Psy wrote about Dream. "And I thought long and hard about who could convey that." 

Dream will be released on December 1st 2015.  Psy will debut it at the MNET Asian Music Awards staged the following day, though it's uncertain whether Xia will be joining him.

Mello Festival.  Can you imagine it?

A bunch of cosplayers amalgamating in one place to create a sea of blond bobs and feathered leather coats.  Appreciative Mafiosi staging a mass event to honour their most famous son. Or the boy Himself organizing a convention whereby the world's chocolatiers meet together to display their best and favoured products.

Sadly none of the above, though the reality does look rather wonderful!

Mello Festival is a real thing.  It's a brand, new music festival being staged at Throckmorton Airfield, in Britain, during the 2016 May Bank Holiday weekend.  Its first headliners are The Levellers, The Blockheads (of Ian Dury and the.. fame) and Lemur.

Nothing here of more than passing interest for Death Note fans, though it does an almost unceasing source of amusing webpages and articles for those deliberating blurring the festival with the character.

Take, for example, the information page (screenshot on November 20th 2015):

There was you thinking that the best way to find Mello was to check for large chocolate orders in the vague vicinity, then follow the delivery van home.  Poor Near.  He just had to do an internet search and the address was right there.

And if only Kira had read that last part, he could have found Mello quickly, thus negating the entire second arc!

Though both parties might have been a little confused to find 'Mello - the biggest chilled festival' rather than Mello - the most incendiary firebrand to ever march out of Wammy's House (and surround himself with Cosa Nostra) in pursuit of detective prowess and megalomaniac serial killers.

Rather than this one.  Who was in LA.

2016 looks to be a big year for Light Yagami actor Nat Wolff.

In addition to starring in the American live action Death Note adaptation, he will feature in two other movies that year.

Nat Wolff is playing Jim Nolan, the idealistic leader of a 900 strong workers' rights movement rising up in 1930s California, in James Franco's dramatization of John Steinbeck's 'desperately honest' novel In Dubious Battle.

Finding the 'courage never to submit or yield', Nolan took on landowners with an impassioned zeal that saw him elevated to almost Christ-like proportions among the starving Californians  he inspired fight back.  Like Christ, he was ultimately doomed - sacrificed to the cause of maintaining the hegemony and demonstrating their overlord's might.

Based on a true story, In Dubious Battle describes the real world struggle of striking apple and peach pickers in Tulare County. 

It was called 'courageous' when Steinbeck wrote it, and subsequently highly suppressed. (Probably in case it caused the good folk of Visalia remember their history and take it upon themselves to fight injustice again. But mostly because it was perceived to 'promote' Communism.)  Nevertheless - and as a definite point in his favour insofar as I'm concerned - President Barack Obama cited In Dubious Battle as his favourite Steinbeck novel.

The movie is currently in post-production, due for release sometime in 2016.

Also just announced is Nat Wolff's casting in Jessica Manafort's Rosy.  He will be taking on the role of Doug, a lonely, young man who abducts an actress named Rosy.  He expects her to bow to his every whim, but she proves a much more difficult prospect than that.

The  part of Rosy is as yet uncast in this indie thriller. 

The appearance of tarot cards in Death Note is heralded by Near's shopping list, presented to Anthony Rester, of things that he requires in order to investigate the Kira case. Amid items such as 'plastic models', 'inflatable pool', 'secret base set', 'radio controlled rubber duck' and a 'Christmas tree', Near asked for 'Tarot cards... $250'. That's a pretty expensive deck of tarot!

It's to Near we return, time and again, to see how tarot is used in Death Note.

The deck of tarot cards used by Near in Death Note appears to have been invented by Takeshi Obata (or prompted for him to draw by writer Tsugumi Ohba). At least it's not one that I've ever seen outside the Death Note universe, nor have any fans apparently found a real world set.  Surely a marketing opportunity lost right there.

Anthony Rester's tarot purchase on behalf on Near was first revealed in the manga: Death Note Chapter 78 Prediction.  Those scenes later appeared in the anime: Death Note Episode 30 Justice.

In both the Death Note anime and manga, Near lays his tarot cards out in a very specific way.  They are arrayed in a circle around himself, with most of the cards used in this manner, while a small pile remains to sit inside with him.

While I can't claim to know every single tarot card spread in existence, this one is a new configuration on me. It's difficult to know how it would - or indeed could - be read in a predictive context.

There are roughly 40-44 tarot cards precisely placed in a circle around Near.  As there are seventy-eight cards in most packs, this constitutes the majority of them.   They appear even more densely packed in version shown in the anime of how Near lays out his tarot cards.

Circular tarot spreads tend to use far fewer cards. The most I've encountered are sixteen piles, with thirteen or twelve (or zodiacal spreads of tarot) being more common.  This isn't to say that Near hasn't invented his own, or else knows a way that I haven't seen before.  Just that it's rather surprising and probably for visual effect only.

The question being - for whose?

The titles of the Death Note scenes where tarot cards are featured contain hints of their usage.

In the manga, this is Chapter 78 - there are usually 78 cards in a tarot deck.  The chapter is entitled Prediction. Fortune telling is how tarot is most famously employed, though by no means the only way in which they might be used.

Moreover, in Death Note 13: How to Read, author Tsugumi Ohba claimed that he chose the title based upon the predictions given by Near and Light respectively.  Namely that there is a fake rule (Near) and that Mello would contact the Japanese Kira Task Force (Light).  No mention of tarot in this context at all, though it would seem the obvious source.

In the anime, the scenes in which Near reads tarot cards occur in Episode 30: Justice.  There's nothing particularly meaningful about the number 30 in tarot, but there is a card usually labelled Justice.

Absolutely the most clichéd use of a tarot card in popular culture comes with the misuse of the Death card.  The problem is that viewers, or readers, think they know what it means. You don't have to be a tarot reader to interpret that Death is bound to translate into a fatality. It doesn't look good for the person whose fortune is being told, which is why it works so well for dramatic effect.

Unfortunately for the storytelling plot, the Death card in tarot rarely means actual, physical death for any individual uncovering it.

As an aside, a group of us tarot readers once challenged ourselves to come up with a configuration of cards which would genuinely denote an imminent loss of life. As in unequivocally could not be read in any other way.  It was hard work, with much toing and froing and debate, but we eventually arrived at something. Every card was one of the minor arcana.  They did not feature the major arcana card Death.

So how did Death Note do with its use of the tarot Death card?

At first glance, quite badly.  Near waves the Death card about whilst discussing Shinigami, rules of the Death Note and finally focuses upon it as he tells Light and the Japanese Task Force that he plans to murder Mello. None of which are particularly covered by that card's tarot meaning.

At least not in isolation.

Though, of course, Near could just be using the Death tarot card as a symbolic prop and not reading it at all. In which case, it very nicely indicates a Death God, an instrument of death and a vigilante brand of enacting capital punishment upon his erstwhile foster brother.

However, that's not precisely how and when Near links events with his Death card.

In tarot, the Death card signifies an ending of something - usually a situation or circumstance, rather than a life. It might just as well have been called a breakthrough card or closure of a chapter, than the more evocative Death.

Near doesn't turn over  his card until the moment when he's found a rule which can't be proven true given the known facts of the Kira case.  Unless, of course, Light Yagami really was innocent, which Near doesn't believe.

Therefore the appearance of the Death card in Death Note marks a watershed moment whereby Near's investigation genuinely threatens Kira's security, and Light's previously watertight alibi.  It's also the first fruits from the beginning of a new arc, in which Mello and Near (not entirely willingly) work together to defeat their mutual adversary.

Death Note's creators may have employed this tarot card in a purely symbolic way or not, but it also fits the plot.

A second card gets flicked over, as Near realises that the second L - à la Kira - can see and speak with a shinigami. Bringing another of the major arcana into play seems to denote that some progress has been made.  Two cards to signify that they've taken a step forward.

It could also be seen very symbolically without recourse to knowledge of tarot cards.  If Kira is Death, then he was tempted into it by a supernatural force, i.e. the Death God.  (Who was no doubt seen as demonic anyway, especially in the Western mind, amid all that Christian imagery dotted throughout Death Note.)  Who better then to represent Ryuk in tarot than The Devil?

However, as it happens, The Devil in tarot is exactly the right card for Ryuk, particularly in this situation.

If you're reading from an Abrahamic background (Jew, Christian, Muslim etc.), then please put aside all you know of The Devil/Satan. This tarot card skirts about the edges of that persona, but it isn't an exact fit. For that you need to reach further into the inspiration for the modern Devil - Pan, Bacchus/Dionysus etc.  This is a deity/demi-god who exists for hedonistic pleasure. He will grant your every desire and give you tools to satisfy your greatest craving.  Thus teaching the individual the meaning of the old adage: be careful what you wish for, it might come true.

You only have to see the addict in thrall to their next hit, or those crushed beneath debt because they really couldn't afford all those things that they bought, in order to see how instant gratification and receiving all that you wanted might go badly wrong.

In the case of Kira, it was that Ryuk presented him with power usually beyond the scope of any mere human. Light Yagami's wish for a better world made him reach for the Death Note.  His use of it ultimately controlled him, rather than the other way around.  Ryuk has frequently stated that he's on nobody's side.  He's there for the lulz, as it were. But here he is providing Light/Kira/2nd L with the lie required to continue satisfying his need to remain in power.

That is The Devil of the tarot, and the Death God of the manga/anime alike.  At any time, Light could have stopped. Ryuk doesn't force him into this course of action.  He just facilitates it.

That Near turns over The Devil card at the point whereby Ryuk lies on Kira's behalf is exactly right. That was the moment of facilitation, not merely that of being present. 

In both the manga and anime, Death Note's tarot scenes with Near aren't so much fortune-telling - nor the Prediction of its chapter title - as seeing the cards used as commentary upon what's already occurring.  Near isn't 'reading' tarot cards per se.  He's providing illustrations to highlight the important clues unfolding.

If he'd merely picked those cards at random from the tarot pack, then they really were worth the $250 in precision, and Near is undoubtedly the most intuitive character in manga history.

But he didn't pick either of them at random.

Look again at how the sequence with The Devil tarot card in the Death Note anime plays out to witness how Near selects his tarot cards quite purposefully.

Step One:  Near sits in the midst of his circle of tarot cards. He's selected just a handful - five or six at most - and flicks through them overlooked by Hal Lidner and Anthony Rester.  As his conversation with Light Yagami goes on, Near's index finger pauses upon a single card among the tarot in his hand.  His fingertip strokes back and forth along its rim.

Analysis:  Near hasn't yet reached a firm conclusion upon what's occurring with the Second L (Light/Kira). Each tarot card in his hand represents a possibility.

Step Two:  Near suddenly whips the card free of those in his hand. But he holds it away from himself, with its picture aspect concealed from his own view.  His gaze is actually upon the Death card upturned on the carpet before him.  Meanwhile, Near tells Light that he knows there is a fake rule in the Death Note and asks his opinion upon which it is.  Light - in the guise of (second) L - answers that it's the 13 day rule.

Analysis:  Until now, The Devil card has symbolized one of a final handful of strong contenders for what's going on. Near has promoted it to most likely scenario, but cannot acknowledge it as fact until he's tested his theory.

Step Three:  As Light asks Ryuk to confirm whether or not there is a fake rule in the Death Note, Near smiles and turns The Devil card towards himself.  He does so at the moment that Ryuk asserts that there are no fake rules, thus lying to maintain Light Yagami's prior alibi against accusations of being Kira.

In that pose, Near clarifies that there is indeed a shinigami present, and confirms that the answer was that all Death Note rules are truly stated.

Analysis:  Near has already deduced that there should be a shinigami present, as he suspects that Light Yagami is Kira.  What he was testing was whether the relationship between Kira and Ryuk is akin to that state of affairs governed in tarot by The Devil card.  Near knows there is a fake rule, so Ryuk's denial of the fact confirms Near's favoured theory.  

From a pack of 78 tarot cards, Near has now homed in on one - The Devil - to describe Kira's inner sanctum and mindset, and Ryuk's position within the scenario too.  This sets the tempo for what will later play out in the Yellow Box warehouse.  In short, Near just nailed Light Yagami's psychology; Ryuk's facilitative indifference; and his own end game.  All with a single tarot card to provide context.

Step Four: Near might hold his card close to his heart, but only physically.  In actuality, he's crowing his victory - repeating to Light precisely what just happened.  That the confirmation wasn't that the Death Note rules aren't fake, but that a shinigami will lie in capitulation to Kira's will.

Whilst speaking, Near throws down The Devil card, so it lands upturned upon the Death card.

Analysis:  Thus Near is able to finally play his card - The Devil previously selected - whilst spelling out to all listening (the remaining SPK, plus the entire Japanese Task Force, in addition to Light and Ryuk) that the shinigami's presence confirms Kira's presence too.

Moreover, Near's just shown that the Death God will lie for Kira, inserting fake rules to provide him with an alibi. Therefore Light Yagami's innocence is no longer proven.  He could still be, and almost certainly is, Kira.

He never once mentions The Devil, though Hal, Anthony and the unseen Stephen would be able to see Near deal his tarot card.  Nevertheless, Near has tripped Light up by triggering the weakness inherent to all in that state of being highlighted by The Devil in tarot.

Conclusion:  Near uses the tarot in Death Note as psychological profiling tools.  Not fortune-telling at all, just props for his own thought processes and theory categorization.

I love Japanese actor Maeda Goki. 

We know him as Touta Matsuda in TV's Death Note drama, wherein he delighted, charmed and downright became our character.  I mean look at him!  Can you imagine anyone else now being Matsuda in live-action adaptations of the story?

We've been spoiled.

But more than that, he's the kind of celebrity who constantly reaches out to fans, letting us share in his experiences and his world.  Throughout the drama's run,  Goki was forever Tweeting, Tumblr-ing, Instagramming and whatever other word I've probably just made up to describe his fabulous ubiquity online.

He's been a great source of behind the scenes Death Note sneak previews and fun.  Like ninja-ing in to take pictures of colleagues between takes, then apparently copying their stance for his own photographs:

Or giving us close up images of props from Death Note TV drama:

Occasionally even lifting items from the filming lot and sneaking them out to present to fans at promotional events.  As with whatever this was here - *checks Google Translate* - a marshmallow apparently.

You may find, follow and interact with Matsuda actor Maeda Goki here:

• Maeda Goki on Twitter
• Maeda Goki on Instagram
• HoriPro profile for Maeda Goki
• Maeda Goki on Facebook

Light  and Soichiro Yagami are both first viewed head on, but from a few feet away, framed by their environment and with the reader positioned above left. Father and son are each sitting behind desks - one at school, the other at Interpol - with their arms crossed before them.  They are in rows, surrounded by others all seated the same, facing towards a single frontal focus point.

Even the shapes of things on their tables mirror, in polar opposite colours, objects on the surface before the other. 

A microphone bisects our view of Soichiro's  desk.  A pen apes its short straight line and direction on that of his son.  What is that black rectangle in front of Light Yagami?  Is it a pencil case with a white pattern upon it?   Its contours and colour is mimicked in the white name-plate identifying his father and colleague as representatives of Japan.  Complete with their nation's flag - seen without hues as fundamentally a white square with a black sun.

Practically Ying Yang - black with white for Light; white with black for Soirchiro.

See what I mean?  Much more to look into, while inspecting the first Death Note manga panels for major characters, than might be supposed.  Perhaps hidden bits of sub-plot in where Tsugumi Ohba directed, or Takeshi Obata just draw, correlations between certain individuals.

As Neil Gaiman wrote in Sandman (and I'm fond of repeating to readers of my fan fiction) - Always trust the story, never the storyteller.  There's always more to see in the subtleties and the little things, the links and what's left out. 

And today I learned that artists are just as bad.

Discover more first sightings in the manga of Death Note personae in Kyoko Kikuchi's Death Note blog. Then keep on reading, because also found and ready for the analysing are the panels wherein we see each character's face for the first time.  Plus, if they survived the time jump, then Kyoko also digs out the picture introducing us to that individual's older self in the second arc.

We could be here for hours.

However, the collection did miss out Matt's first Death Note manga appearance, in chapter 83, page 10.  Let me make good that omission.  And oh!  Look!  Just like Mello, Near, L, Ryuk and Misa, he's looking away with his face concealed.  Interesting.

It's possible to read too much into things, when you're starved of information and the snippets are too few and far between. 

However, when strongly rumoured US Death Note movie casting for Light Yagami actor Nat Wolff has kept a resolute silence on the subject, then suddenly tweets a story linking himself and Margaret Qualley both with the project...

Well I'm sure I'm not the only one drawing conclusions in the sand.

 The Variety magazine Tweet that Nat Wolff  - or possibly brother Alex - shared with his followers linked to its news report entitled ‘The Leftovers’ Star Margaret Qualley Joins Nat Wolff in ‘Death Note’ (by Justin Kroll, Nov 12th 2015).

Assuming that Nat knows things that we don't know (i.e. the reality and status of those 'final negotiations' concerning his casting as Light Yagami); also that he knows the truth at the heart of all those news articles citing his own girlfriend as the 'leading lady' in Death Note's US live action movie adaption; and furthermore that Nat Wolff wouldn't want to spread disinformation amongst his fans on Twitter.

I conclude that everything written in the Variety piece about the Death Note movie is true insofar as Nat Wolff knows. Fair enough with everyone else?

So what do we know from it about this American Death Note film remake?

Therefore nothing that we didn't already know, but this time we know it with a touch more certainty.

Can't get enough Hal Lidner?  Sick of hunting in vain for some Misa/Takada yuri?  Wish you saw more fan love for Shoko Himura?  Your time has come.

For the second year running, Death Note Ladies Appreciation Weeks will be hosted on Tumblr over the Christmas period. It aims to throw a spotlight on those under-rated female characters from Death Note.

Under the heading Expect the Unpredictable!, Tumblr user ComplicatedMerary announced the site wide event, and highlighted the guidelines for those who wish to participate.

Beginning on December 13th 2015 (Mello's birthday!),  Death Note Ladies Appreciation Weeks spans the holiday period to end on Boxing Day, the day after Christmas.  Until then, the Tumblr event will be divided into distinct halves.

Week One (Dec 13th-19th) is given over to Death Note yuri.  Each day is devoted to two bespoke pairings, with the final one a yuri wild card for the female Death Note couple of your choice.   Week Two (Dec 20th-26th) similarly features a daily focus. This time the limelight falls upon individual Death Note women. Two named in any given day, before that too ends with a wild card.

Dec 26th is the day for highlighting your favourite female Death Note character.

Hop on over to Tumblr to learn more about it.  Contribute, or merely sit back and watch the ladies of Death Note fill the website in glorious array.

A new Death Note reference book was issued by Shinigami Press on October 26th 2015.

Penned by Brad A. Yamaguchi, it's entitled Death Note: Unofficial Guide.

The clue being in the title, this isn't anything published by Tsugumi Ohba, Shueisha, Nippon, Viz Media nor any of the Death Note copyright holders. Nevertheless fair usage applies there - just as it does with our Death Note news site - and anyone can write about a subject.  It's all good.

Yamaguchi's guide to Death Note covers all media in which the story is told - including the 2015 Death Note television drama, hence very up-to-date.

Just about everything you ever wanted to know about Death Note is there.

Yamaguchi's Death Note guidebook contains 90 pages. Which are split between five sections, featuring information packed chapters - each with their own focus within the Death Note universe.  Delve even more deeply into the nitty-gritty of Death Note via all the sub-sections keeping things tidy.

The book's contents list is highly impressive.

Beginning with an introduction to Death Note, we get a summary of the story itself, plus much background and contextual information. Yamaguchi covers everything from conception to reception, then moves on to legacy too.

Each major character gets a chapter devoted to them in Part Two. For each one, we hear about how the individual was created; where they appeared in the story; how they were received by the readership/audience; and other links regarding them. References support every snippet told.

Another chapter highlights the supporting personae; further divided into those only known from one telling of the tale (for example, secondary characters seen only in a Death Note film). 

Part Three of Death Note: Unofficial Guide takes us through an in-depth examination of every manga chapter or anime episode.

Part Four does the same for each live action telling of the story - including the TV Death Note drama and all four Japanese movies - then moves onto associated novels, primarily Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Case, and Death Note original soundtracks too.

There's an especial chapter taking in New World - the Death Note finale - plus others dealing with real life murders associated with the show.  Part Four finishes with a close look at the story's author Tsugumi Ohba.

The final part of this guidebook for Death Note merely lists all references and sources for further information within the universe, franchise and genre.

All told, a fabulous resource and wonderful gift idea for Death Note fans, with an eye on Christmas just around the corner.   However, there is a strong reservation attached.

It doesn't take long in sitting down to read this unofficial Death Note guide to realise that Brad A. Yamaguchi didn't actually write the content. He merely copied it wholesale from Wikipedia and formatted as a real world book.

That doesn't make it any less informative and fascinating to read, but you could do that for free on-line.

Perhaps handy as a reference book for Death Note to carry with you, when there is no access to the internet. Or as an archive edition to record the information on Wikipedia on the day he copied it.  Yet otherwise nothing new here as concerns the Death Note fandom, and nothing that cannot already be found digitally.

Check out Brad A. Yamaguchi's Death Note: Unofficial Guide to complete your collection, or see what other Death Note guides are available through our store.

There's good taste on show in Nebraska, as students are urged to watch Death Note on Netflix.

Writing for The Daily Nebraskan - independent student paper for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln - journalist Wade Ronspies wrote that the Death Note anime is 'truly one of the most tense and harrowing offerings on Netflix'.

This is after he dismissed anime's apparent local reputation as being just 'for nerds'.  It's a fair cop this end, but is that a deserved statement throughout?  And if so, do we think that's necessarily a bad thing? 

Nerd and proud!  Assuming nerd means the same in dreary, old Blighty, as it does in the windswept plains of the USA's Nebraska.  What does nerd mean to you?  And does enjoying anime, and by extension Death Note, fit into that category?

And more to the point, why do labels apply to our own persona based solely on what we watch, read, listen to or otherwise enjoy?  And should we take notice of them, let alone take care to tag upon ourselves only those labels incurring an identification with which we might live?

The sociologist in me is fighting at the bit to answer, but I'd be more interested in what you'd have to say.

Ronspies finished with extolling the virtues of new experience for his student readership, 'It may be different from what you normally watch, and that’s exactly why you owe it to yourself to watch “Death Note.”'

Read more at Netflix Pick of the Week: 'Death Note' by Wade Ronspies (The Daily Nebraskan, November 18th 2015) and catch the anime Death Note at Netflix, or indeed check out our Death Note anime selection right here at Death Note News.

Ever wanted to see what MRSJeevas would do with your plot bunny? Or how she might write your pairing, if she could ever be persuaded to slip off the Mello/Matt 'ship? Well, here's your big moment!

For a limited time only, MRSJeevas will write to your specification in return for your contribution to her pet fund.

Call it a dollar a drabble; more for a story; riches for research; you'll need to take out a mortgage for a full-length novel. Send your donation and idea(s) for delivery of your very own Death Note fan-fiction. It's yours. Post it where you will, or keep it private, just for you. Stick your own name on it, if you wish. Your personal ghost-writer will never let on that you didn't write the poem, prose or whatever else resides inside.

And it's all for the good cause of needful kitten torture and the rehousing of a boa constrictor.

Tinkerbell is a teenage boa constrictor, currently going through a growth spurt and plagued by kittens.

She's precisely the same height as Matt from Death Note, according to How to Read, only Tinkerbell does it horizontally. (If we're insisting upon vertical, then she's about 2 inches, with a 5ft 5" waistline. At the same level as her head.)

She's also got much the same interests as Death Note's Matt. Here she is joining Anonymous.

Though perfectly fine just now, she'll need a new vivarium early in the new year. Just so she can stretch out and do snake-y things. Like parties. Or preparing for her part-time job as a boa worn during lounge-room renditions of Shirley Bassey songs. (It's been known to happen.) Or whatever else Tinkerbells do. Flutter to Neverland and stuff.

Or, as she's doing right now, curling up, blind and asleep under her basking lamp, while she sheds her skin in order to grow some more.

New vivariums to fit - as she heads upwards towards 6ft and over - cost between £200-£345, depending upon how fancifully it's fitted, and if it includes a fully stocked bar, high speed laptop, en suite bathroom etc. One mod con that we would love is a stand to get her off the floor, where it's cold and prone to kittens.

Talking of which.

Yow needs his balls cut off. Probably to a given value of 'need' and not one subscribed to any male, least of all Yow. But apparently its fashionable to do so to baby boy kittens before you let them play outside.

He also - along with his sister Jiji - needs to have all his inoculations, and be dewormed and deflea-ed (if such things are necessary), before Christmas. So he can come on a nice car ride to Matti's Mum and Dad's house, where turkey and being spoiled rotten will be a thing.

They also need a travel box/cage/thingie, so they don't run wild around Matti's car in a wild panic over moving so fast and far from home. Thus forestalling an horrific car-crash when they claw the driver to death.

In addition to the above vaccinations, travel kit etc, she needs to have her uterus ripped from her body. Coz babies. Brother. Coming of Age. Things like that. I don't know. I'm just told these things by Orangepunch and really should question them more.

Either way, all this costs money for the vet which we haven't got. So a dollar a Death Note drabble anyone? Contact me privately to find out how.

- All of the owners of these Death Note fan-fiction stories have given their permission for me to make them public. They've all been written by me over the past two days.

* Bubbles, Storm Blown
* Big Sleep at the Speakeasy
* An LA Fantasy Tagged Matty
* Laughter in the Darkness

The internet is currently abuzz with news that the Adam Wingard directed US Death Note live action movie is about to cast its Misa Amane.

Margaret Qualley (Jill Garvey in HBO's The Leftovers) is apparently in final talks to play the 'female lead' - according to an article in The Hollywood Reporter ('Leftovers' Actress Margaret Qualley in Talks to Join Adam Wingard's 'Death Note' (Exclusive) by Borys Kit, November 12th 2015) - though presumably that is Misa.

This relatively unknown US actress also played Raquel in the 2013 drama movie Palo Alto, wherein she co-starred with Nat Wolff - the actor strongly believed to have been cast as US Death Note's Light Yagami.

However, it's a little bit more than that.  Margaret and Nat have been dating since 2012. 

If both of these 'final negotiations' rumours are true, then we will be seeing an established long-term real life couple playing Misa and Light in the live action US Death Note movie.

Born in Asheville, North Carolina, on October 23rd 1994, her full name is Susan Margaret Qualley,

The mooted Death Note actress has even more famous familial credentials.  Her mother is A-list Hollywood actress Andie MacDowell (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Green Card, Sex, Lies and Videotapes, Multiplicity) from her first marriage with male model Paul Qualley. 

Her sister Rainey Qualley is also an actress - recently seen in Falcon Song, Pink & Baby Blue and the TV series Mad Men - as well as a touring musician. Rainey opened for Loretta Lynn earlier this year, while her debut single Me and Johnny Cash is currently making waves in Country circuits.

Margaret Qualley originally trained as a ballerina, performing at the American Ballet Theatre and joining the North Carolina Dance Company.  She was apprenticed at the French Academy in New York, before moving to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London.

Naturally the latter signalled a shift in outlook, whereby Margaret now sought to follow in her mother's footsteps as an actress.

Here she is in her most famous role to date, as Jill Garvey in The Leftovers.

If true, the casting of Margaret Qualley as Misa is bound to cause controversy, just as did the role of Light Yagami linked with Nat Wolff. 

Neither American actors are ethnically Japanese, though they will be portraying Japanese characters. While Hollywood is long past getting away with blackening white actors faces to play other races, the industry stands accused of employing its modern equivalent to endemic proportions.

In short, ethnically Asian actors need not apply for leading roles in Hollywood pictures, not even when the parts up for grabs are Asian characters.  As North American actor Edward Zo discovered, when he sought to audition for Light Yagami.

The furore here is already raging, as regards Death Note's US live action film. Margaret Qualley's casting in the role of Misa Amane is unlikely to help matters there.

Though in fairness, Misa looks less Asian than Margaret.

Looking to debate Death Note with fellow political scientists and sociologists?  If you're a student or associate of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, you can do just that with an event scheduled for later this month.

Death Note is the subject of the first in a month long analysis of anime at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM).  Members of the prestigious university's Political and Social Science Department (Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales) will be meeting to debate aspects of the show.

Their Death Note analysis and debate event will be held on November 17th 2015, at 1pm, in the Lucio Mendieta y Núñez Room, at UNAM's campus in Mexico City. 

It's unclear whether members of the public are also free to attend.  If you wish to participate, then contacting the faculty itself may be the way forward.

If you find out - on behalf of everybody else - please do report back and we'll update this accordingly.