Natsume and the book of friends is another slice of life show, but with a twist. Natsume is a young boy just on the edge of manhood who has come to live with distant relatives in a new town. He is wary of trusting people since he see's what most people cannot, and has often been called a liar and excluded because of it. He has one link to his heritage: an old book from his grandmother filled with the names of local spirits. His grandmother is the only other person he knows of who could see what he sees, and while he's never met her he feels a deep kinship with her.
The book, called the book of friends, is mostly made up of contracts his grandmother bullied spirits to make. The names give the holder power over the deamon or spirit that goes with it. While Natsume and his grandmother have much in common, their outlook about the spirits is completely opposite. Grandmother Reiko overpowers the spirits and then never asks for help while Natsume goes out of the way to return the names and give aid to human and spirit alike.
Now I've been calling them spirits but they aren't quite, being an entire pantheon of local mythology. I could use the term demon or monster or such, but I think the closest we come to them are the old versions of the fey. Some are evil and some good, some powerful and some inconsequential, but all are alien to humanity. Natsume and those like him are the only bridge between the two cultures, and that's important because to Natsume both the spirits and the people in the town are new friends. Learning to trust, and to balance his two lives, is what makes this show so good. That and his "pet cat" who's attitude goes something like this: "good night Westley, sweet dreams. I'll most likely kill you in the morning." Something most cat owners are undoubtedly familiar with.
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