Karin is a cute little girl who also happens to be a vampire...with a twist. Once a month, she experiences intense bleeding from her nose--we're talking gushers! In other words, she's a vamp with blood to spare, so rather than stealing blood from humans she actually gives her blood to them. If done right, this can be an extremely positive experience that benefits the "victim" as much as the vampire. The problem is that Karin never seems to do things right!(courtesy of Goodreads)
Review
*Warning: Potential spoilers. My manga reviews tend to be more of a summary than a review. I find it hard to review manga in the same way I do regular books.
Intriguing but weird. That's my reaction to the first volume of Chibi Vampire. I love how popular vampires are in manga. Vampires are a universally loved paranormal creature. Quite ironic.
There's a lot about this first volume that is very typical teenager. Girl meets new boy. Attracted and confused by boy. Girl doesn't fit in. Especially not with her family. Girl faced with adversity. Has to make hard choices.
The vampire thing adds quite a twist. Karin isn't a traditional vampire. She is more analogous to a psychic vampire, one who feeds off human energy. Each member of Karin's family feeds off of a different aspect of a human's mental state. Karin is even more unusual in that she has too much blood and gives people blood rather than taking it. This volume explores what Karin craves.
Karin is drawn to Kenta. She tries to fight it and stay away, but they keep running into each other. Kenta is completely puzzled by Karin. He sees her in a compromising position and makes the wrong assumption. He is also drawn to her, although I think it is curiosity as much as attraction.
I'm interested in Karin's family dynamics. She's the only one who doesn't totally accept her vampire nature. Or at least the dark side of it. I love her goth baby sister. I do think it's odd that her mom looks European and her dad looks more Eurasian while Karin and her siblings looks very Japanese.
The manga moves very quickly. Each page is split into multiple segments - more than I usually see with manga. There's not a whole lots of dialogue. it was surprisingly easy to follow despite coming in short little spurts.
I don't know if I love Chibi Vampire, but I'm definitely going to keep trying.
My daughter ADORES this series. Thanks for the review!
ReplyDeleteI didn't love Chibi Vampire, but it was funny and I read it up until the fifth volume.
ReplyDeleteYou're review was good. I know it's hard reviewing Manga, but I think it's absolutely fabulous that you do it. I would love to do it too, but I work all day Monday (I know I've said this before...)
Anyway, great review. Keep at it!
~Trish Just a YA Girl
Oohhh a new manga series! I had no idea vampires were so popular in manga as well:) Hopefully the next several volumes pique your interest a bit more than this one did!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I watched the first anime episode of this one and, I couldn't really get into it. Sounds like the first manga volume wasn't much better. Hope the other ones are more enjoyable!
ReplyDeleteAnother manga! I think its an incredibly sweet manga...I love Anju too! Glad you like it enough to keep going ^__^
ReplyDeleteThanks for the review. It does seem odd that her parents would look different than her and her siblings.
ReplyDeleteWow! A vampire with blood to spare. What an usual premise. I do like the idea of psychic vampires and I don't think they're explored enough. I'll be interested to see what you think of further installments.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing with us.
On The Blog: Retrospective Reads: The Forbidden Game
Hmm..I'm still on the fence about picking this one up. I do like the vampire twist to the story, but I'm not entirely sold. I'll definitely keep a watch on the next volumes that you will be reviewing.
ReplyDeleteIt's so interesting to see that vampires are totally crossed over into manga, too! Fab honest review, Alison! :)
ReplyDeleteHi Alison,
ReplyDeleteI hate to ask this on your comments section but I couldn't find a place to e-mail or message you privately.
I've been interested in your Manga Monday's posts for a while (obviously- I won't stop talk about them) and I was wondering if you were okay with me continuing the meme on my blog? Since you are the creator of Manga Mondays I want to get your permission before I tried it out.
I'm going to do things slightly different. Possibly review manga volume's one through five or just highlight an entire series as opposed to reviewing just one volume at a time.
Like you said, reviewing Manga is hard, but I want to give it a shot. Let me know what you think. Email me at justayagirl{at}gmail{dot}com or comment on my comments section to get me back LOL :)
~Trish