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cornerofmadness 's review for:
ヴァニタスの手記 1 [Vanitas no Carte 1]
by Jun Mochizuki
I picked this one up thanks to the cover art and blurb (not realizing at the time it was by the mangaka who did Pandora Hearts.) I’m a sucker for vampires and then I saw inside the front cover that Hiromu Arakawa loves it, so I bought it.
The story is a lot of fun. There’s a touch of steampunk (another fave of mine) to go along with the vampires and I was hooked. It opens on an airship following the main pov character, Noe (who I thought was an albino but is something more). He comes across as a naive and excited country bumpkin going to Paris to look for the book of Vanitas, a blue leather, black paged grimoire that is rumored to have power over vampires.
In this world all vampires are born on nights of the crimson moon but Vanitas was born under the light of the blue moon, making him different, cursed and it’s believed he can and has cursed the vampires. At the opening of the story the vampires and humans have lived side by side in peace for some time but the peace is breaking down. The vampires are attacking out of control.
Noe finds this out the hard way being attacked on the ship, an attack stopped by a young man, a human calling himself Vanitas and in possession of the tome in question. Noe learns a few things quickly a) Vanitas calls himself a vampire doctor b) that the book does have power over vampires but not in the way he thought c) people are out to get Vanitas and d) Vanitas is annoying as hell, potentially crazy, and wants to work with Noe to cure more vampires and prove that there is in fact something wrong with the ones attacking humans and they don’t all need put to death.
Noe and Vanitas set up an uneasy alliance by the end of chapter one framed with the idea that Noe is telling this story at some distant time (and that Vanitas may no longer be around). There are a lot of elements coming together in the narrative and it draws you in. I loved the art. It’s detailed and beautiful. I’m looking forward to the next volume.
The story is a lot of fun. There’s a touch of steampunk (another fave of mine) to go along with the vampires and I was hooked. It opens on an airship following the main pov character, Noe (who I thought was an albino but is something more). He comes across as a naive and excited country bumpkin going to Paris to look for the book of Vanitas, a blue leather, black paged grimoire that is rumored to have power over vampires.
In this world all vampires are born on nights of the crimson moon but Vanitas was born under the light of the blue moon, making him different, cursed and it’s believed he can and has cursed the vampires. At the opening of the story the vampires and humans have lived side by side in peace for some time but the peace is breaking down. The vampires are attacking out of control.
Noe finds this out the hard way being attacked on the ship, an attack stopped by a young man, a human calling himself Vanitas and in possession of the tome in question. Noe learns a few things quickly a) Vanitas calls himself a vampire doctor b) that the book does have power over vampires but not in the way he thought c) people are out to get Vanitas and d) Vanitas is annoying as hell, potentially crazy, and wants to work with Noe to cure more vampires and prove that there is in fact something wrong with the ones attacking humans and they don’t all need put to death.
Noe and Vanitas set up an uneasy alliance by the end of chapter one framed with the idea that Noe is telling this story at some distant time (and that Vanitas may no longer be around). There are a lot of elements coming together in the narrative and it draws you in. I loved the art. It’s detailed and beautiful. I’m looking forward to the next volume.