Hee-joon Son

This book is, on the whole, a moderately fun read. Unfortunately I felt it struggled to get across what was supposed to be happening, with odd pacing and chopping about between scenes. The protagonist offhandedly decides to get transformed into a vampire to earn a school place, all of which takes place within eight panels and the story then moves on. There's a suggestion that the protagonist has a mysterious secret purpose, and is incredibly powerful, but aside from about 2 panels she acts in every way like she's an ordinary, cowardly-yet-weirdly-fatalistic, ditzy airhead.… (més)

Mara is lost in the world of Oz, where magic might actually exist, people use technology that has effects like magic, and people keep calling her Dorothy. She finds out that she might have visited Oz 10 years ago, but she doesn't remember anything from that time. She learns a little about Oz from a powerful woman named Selluriah, but, before she can learn more and (more importantly) find out how to get home, Selluriah's castle is attacked. Before dying, Selluriah tells Mara/Dorothy to take a few things with her, including a pair of boots that can giver her magic-like powers, and follow the yellow brick road, her best chance to get home. Even if Mara wanted to stay, she couldn't, because Selluriah's people think she was the one who killed her. During her journey, Mara comes across a strange young man tied up like a scarecrow.

I haven't read much manhwa, mainly because my public library doesn't have much in its collection. I always feel a little weird reading everything from left to right, after getting used to the Japanese right to left format. As far as this series goes, if I ever read the first volume before, it was long enough ago that I don't remember it, so I was a little confused by the story at first. Once I adjusted to this world, I started to like the story more.

This volume starts off like a comedic fantasy and soon becomes a bit darker, as several characters are killed off and Mara/Dorothy finds herself alone, with hardly any idea of how things work in this world. Both deaths were a big surprise to me. Selluriah seemed like a character who'd be sticking around for a while and injecting a lot of comedy into the story, and the other character seemed to have a slim chance of becoming a love interest for Dorothy (I'm never sure what to call her, but she seems to have adjusted to being called Dorothy by the end of the volume). I suppose the little snippet from the author in the inside front cover should've tipped me off that something like this was going to happen, but it really didn't fit with what seemed to be the established tone of the series. I mean, some bits are really goofy, like when all the men drool over the naked transformation scenes (it made me think of the stuff you find in magical girl anime).

The first 6 pages of this volume are in color, and Hee-Joon's coloring work is so pretty that I kind of wish that the entire volume could've been in color - I'm sure it would've looked gorgeous. In addition to the color pages, there are also a few extra pages at the end of the volume with extra art and funny comics. I think they were drawn by Hee-Joon and people who are probably Hee-Joon's assistants.

(Original review, with read-alikes and watch-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (més)