Japan is a country constantly beset by natural disasters -- earthquakes, typhoons, tsunami, and giant kaiju. But in the modern age, Japan has used its vast technological resources to ameliorate the problems caused by all these phenomenon. Leading the way is the Japanese Meteorological Agency's Monsterological Measures Department which devotes itself to the tracking and study of kaiju. Whenever a prehistoric monster or mutant crab threatens the Home Islands, MMD is there.

Too bad their PR department isn't as good as they are. Any time a monster makes it into a populated area and kills someone, MMD gets the blame -- and anytime they issue a kaiju warning and nothing happens, they get the blame as well. Mocked by the Japanese populace and paid at civil service rates, the men and women of MMD face a dangerous and thankless job.

MM9 is a fix-up novel consisting of five short stories, each one focusing on a different monster. There's a bit of a story arc as the MMD learns about an apocalypse cult that's planning to commit kaiju-terrorism, but mostly the stories are linked through recurring characters. Unfortunately, they're written with as much personality as Captain Scarlet and half the charisma. It's easier to tell them apart by their jobs -- scientist chick, driver chick, boss man -- than personality. But then, isn't that how kaiju movies operate? Let's face it, out of all the Stomp Tokyo movies ever made, there are only two notable human characters -- Raymond Burr and Kenny, and you only remember Kenny because of MST3K. The real stars of kaiju films were always the monsters.

Unfortunately, we don't get any monsters as memorable as Godzilla or Ghidorah here -- we don't even get Gamera and Gaos. Instead we get things like a giant triffid and a little girl who's grown to hyperfauna size. In a longer series, such outings would be fine, but with just five stories the lack of serious urban remodeling is disappointing. Only the final boss approaches the level of ferocity you'd expect from the premise, but there isn't enough time to draw the story out as needed. After some good Quatermass-style build-up, we get one rushed naval battle and a final show-down that only lasts a couple pages. The story really could've benefited from a full length treatment.

One of the treats of the book is Yamamoto's references to giant-monster movies. Surprisingly, the Japanese kaiju films are given short shrift in favor of Western movies. I suspect this is because the kaiju all have trademarked names while Hollywood and European movies rarely bothered with such things (the Ymir from Twenty Million Miles to Earth is the only one I can think of) making it easier to reference the monsters without getting sued. Any sci-fi movie buff will be able to recognize the films based upon descriptions of the monsters and the mayhem the caused, with an added bonus in their military code-names. A giant spider is named "Arnold," a reference to the great B-movie director Jack Arnold whose many classic sci-fi films include Tarantula (the movie that had Leo G. Carroll over a barrel), and the sea monster from The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms is Ray after Harryhausen and Bradbury.

This is a fine collection of pulp stories, but ultimately nothing more than that.