Review: Blood Alone Volume One

[Jason]

Title: Blood Alone Volume One
Mangaka: Takano Masayuki
Serialized in: Dengeki Comics (Media Works)
Genre: seinen, supernatural, romance, slice of life, mystery
N. American license: Infinity Studios
Rating: 13+

Blood Alone revolves around a shoujo vampire (about 10 - 13 years old) named Misaki, and the man she lives with, Kuroe. His age is indeterminate so far, but he's clearly past school age, a writer and part-time private eye. Despite this rather obviously lolicon situation, their relationship is a chaste one, even though they sleep in one bed together. Compounding the oddness of their arrangement, she has not made him into a will-less slave, a "Renfield" -- which makes them unique in this milieu.

There is a lot more to Kuroe than meets the eye, however. Mysteries in his past and regarding his abilities are revealed slowly throughout the chapters. Although Misaki is "newly-turned", a young vampire, she is protected by Higure, another child-vampire but one who is extremely old and powerful. Sainome, a police pathologist, is an old friend of Kuroe's who sometimes asks him for help with odd or difficult cases.

This story is fun because it doesn't focus solely on the action, nor does it sacrifice the action and mystery for the love story. Both are used effectively, sometimes one side in one chapter, sometimes the other, and a couple of times both are wound together in the plot.

Takano's artwork is obviously influenced by shoujo style, but unlike some shoujo it is graphically clean, both when it confines itself to panels with borders and when it shifts to border-less pages. I thought this shifting quite innovative. Too often in shoujo manga, I find some scenes -- especially action scenes -- drawn too densely to see clearly what is happening. This is not a problem here. Misaki is always shown with a hint of her fangs, never letting the reader forget what she is. I would likely continue with this manga for the art alone, even if the story weren't interesting.

Infinity's production of the book is quite good, with no typesetting problems that I could see and the binding is top-rate -- they didn't skimp on the binding glue! I also appreciate that Infinity took the trouble to make a dust cover like the Japanese tankoubon have. The full-color cover and frontispiece add delightful touches. Blood Alone employs one break with manga tradition: black background borders do not indicate the past or flashbacks, but rather nighttime. Those borders fade from white to grey to black as the sun sets and vice versa in the morning, highlighting the danger to Misaki when she is inevitably caught outdoors.

I recommend Blood Alone highly. If I have any complaint, it's perhaps that the 13+ rating might be a bit young -- not due to violence or sex, but simply the subtlety itself. This runs in a seinen magazine, after all -- college-age men's publication. The story is delicate and most issues are handled subtly. Despite the lolicon situation, it is not played up at all, with zero use of fanservice whatsoever, which I appreciated. The action is actually exciting and Misaki is completely adorable.

Reviewed by: Jiji
Proofed by: Highlord & anitra
Edited by: Firedog