With a premise of a bibliophile who can control paper and works for the Library of England recovering rare books, I had high hopes for this series.
Unfortunately, the series did not live up to it. This is the final book (at least in this part. I know there are other RoD series, I'm not sure if there is another installment with this lead.) This one had some issues--what the students were doing wasn't clear, what happened to the student fed to the library wasn't resolved, why Joker was "back to normal" at the end (and what normal was anyway) wasn't clear. The other female in the insertion group didn't get any better. The lead character Yomiko at least pulled herself together -- still a flat character but at least not so much a whiner.
The entire series read like a first pass at a story with "and then this happens and then this" with little transitions that made sense, with limited development, missing parts, and just..not very good.
I was not that impressed. I read V1&V2 then quit (V2 wasn't an improvement--I tend to give manga series 2 volumes). I later ended up with V3&V4 as part of a bulk manga purchase so I gave them a shot--they were better, but still not that good and not worth slogging through the rest.
Unfortunately, the series did not live up to it. This is the final book (at least in this part. I know there are other RoD series, I'm not sure if there is another installment with this lead.) This one had some issues--what the students were doing wasn't clear, what happened to the student fed to the library wasn't resolved, why Joker was "back to normal" at the end (and what normal was anyway) wasn't clear. The other female in the insertion group didn't get any better. The lead character Yomiko at least pulled herself together -- still a flat character but at least not so much a whiner.
The entire series read like a first pass at a story with "and then this happens and then this" with little transitions that made sense, with limited development, missing parts, and just..not very good.
I was not that impressed. I read V1&V2 then quit (V2 wasn't an improvement--I tend to give manga series 2 volumes). I later ended up with V3&V4 as part of a bulk manga purchase so I gave them a shot--they were better, but still not that good and not worth slogging through the rest.
