belle_fiction 's review for:

Erased, Volume 1 by Kei Sanbe

5.0

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WOW! I am in love with the opening volume of what promises to be a hugely gripping series.

Erased follows the life of 29 year old Satoru Fujinuma whose dream is to become a mangaka but in reality is a pizza courier. He often experiences deja vu (which he terms 'Revival') whereby he relives the same scenes over and over again until he prevents the bad thing from happening. However, when he comes home to find his mother murdered one evening, his revival doesn't take him a few minutes back into the past, it takes him back to his 11 year-old self (18 years in the past).

His mission is this: to prevent the disappearance and murder of his classmate, Kayo Hinazuki.

Kayo is a sweet and introverted child who we later find out is suffering at the hands of her abusive mother. Slowly, Fujinuma is able to befriend Hinazuki and the two grow closer (much to the amusement of the former's friend group). Having changed his actions second time around (to avoid repeating history and condemning Hinazuki to her tragic fate) he believes that he has changed the future and therefore saved Hinazuki.

However...volume 1 ends on a bombshell - Hinazuki fails to arrive at school the next day despite Fujinuma's best efforts to change the future. These last concluding pages really affected me and I ended up crying. Not only is the quality of the storytelling superb but the artwork is very dramatic and gothic which I think really emphasised the sheer tragedy the readers are faced with at the end.

Quite simply, one of the best mangas I have ever read!

5 stars