Customer Reviews

Fruits Basket, Vol. 15

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The fifteenth volume of "Fruits Basket" is one where little happens, yet the repercussions are absolutely staggering. Natsuki Takaya follows up the shocking revelation by giving readers a story that is half tragedy and half comedy -- specificially, Yuki's past and the Cinderella debacle.

The first half of this volume takes place in flashback: Yuki is recounting to Kakeru his lonely, unhappy past. He was only a little child when his parents virtually sold him to Akito, a seemingly pleasant child who suddenly became verbally abusive and vicious toward Yuki.

The poor "rat" boy wanders through his childhood, desperately wanting a friend, but alone because he believes that everyone hates him -- even the outcast "cat" boy. But a chance meeting with a lost little girl changes his life, as he tries to guide her back to her loving mother -- and now Yuki must finally sort out his feelings toward Tohru.

Meanwhile, the school is preparing for a hideously miscast version of "Cinderella," with actors who can't or won't do their parts right, and Ayame arriving to do some rapid costuming. After some hasty rewrites, the curtain rises on "Sorta Cinderella," a neurotic retelling of the fairy tale -- complete with a goth Cinderella, a surly prince, and Uotani taking out her romantic frustration on the audience.

Takaya has always been brilliant at balancing tragedy and comedy in "Fruits Basket," and the fifteenth volume is a good example. She loads down the plot with the story of a boy who is still emotionally stunted by a complete lack of love growing up, and then plops down the most absurd version of "Cinderella" imaginable.

Not much actually happens here, except for the play. But it feels like a lot is happening, though the biggest present drama is Tohru desperately trying to play "mean" with little success -- really, what kind of wicked stepsister bursts into tears when she's being nasty? Takaya's knack for offbeat dialogue comes in handy during the much-rewritten play (when the fairy godmother offers Hana a single wish, she replies, "Burn the palace down"), and her art is wonderfully polished.

Even though little happens in this volume, Yuki receives a lot of character development, obviously, including the introduction of a new love interest for him. But Kyo also gets some development, as he realizes that Yuki's life hasn't been the charmed existance he thought.

The fifteenth volume of "Fruits Basket" illuminates one character's past, hints at a future for him -- and then Takaya lightens the whole thing up with a lump of pure comedy.

Finally poor Kyo gets to put his tragic back story on hold while we spend half of the manga learning about Yuki's back story. Again, this manga never stops making me teary eyed. I won't give anything away but be prepared to feel depressed for poor Yuki. On top of that we get comedy thrown in with the "Cinderella" production, or I guess I should say "Almost Cinderella" production. It may not appear to be that significant but something critical happens at the end of the manga for all those who are rooting for our favorite misunderstood bad boy kitty :) Loved this volume, but of course, I always do!

I love hearing the sad, horific history of yuki. Throughout the whole series you hear little slips about his life, and finally in the first half of book 15 it finally all comes out. From his relationship with his family to the link between him and tohru's mysterious hat, you will cry, cringe, and scream in anger. After that, though, the book was a little disapointing, but still deserves a solid 4 stars. I can't wait for book 16 to come out in april!

There was no damage to this book which I was really happy about and it was what it says it is. I love the book and series.

Fruits Basket is my favorite manga series, and one of my favorite series of books. Volume 15 is a wonderful example of Takaya's comedic and dramatic abilities. The first half of this volume tells the story of Yuki's heartbreaking childhood. The drawing of a young Yuki sobbing while holding Kyo's hat chokes me up every time. There are very real emotions in this section of the story that all of us can relate to, traumatic childhood or not. Yuki's longing to be included, wishing to be like the other kids, and his desperate loneliness are all conveyed very nicely and are felt deeply by the reader.
The second half of the volume takes a decidedly lighter turn with Tohru, Yuki, and Kyo's class production of Cinderella... or Sort of Cinderella. The play is hilariously miscast with Tohru as a wicked stepsister who cries every time she has to be mean to Cinderella, Kyo as the prince who would rather die than ask Cinderella to dance, and Hanajima as a Cinderella more interested in food than Prince Charming. I laughed out loud several times while reading.
The combination of emotion and silliness is perfect in this volume and is a testament to Takaya's immense talent.

After reading through the first fourteen volumes of the Fruits Basket manga series, I was hooked enough that I had to keep on reading.

This volume starts out with Yuki sharing with Kakeru about his lonely and unhappy life; for the reader, this is shown through flashbacks. After getting through this serious section, it's followed up by Tohru's class putting on a play called "A Sorta Cinderella," with Kyo being cast as Prince Charming, as well as other odd casting choices. Hilarity ensues as the class performs the play for the school.

While the Yuki flahbacks were good, and gave us more backstory for him as a character, my favorite part of this manga was "A Sorta Cinderella." This is one of the sections of the later manga volumes that I wish could have somehow been animated for the anime, because the way this section is written, it would work perfectly for the animation medium. While this particular volume may not progress the plot much, it still is a good read. I would highly recommend it to any reader that enjoys the Fruits Basket manga series.

I wrote this review after checking out a copy of this manga volume through the King County Library System.

I own this series in Japanese, and it is a wonderful read! It has all the important elements of a good shoujo manga: it is romantic, twisted, with a shoujo (in the traditional meaning of the word) involved in finding a new family and love triangles galore. It is just a very fun read, no matter the language!

I like how this book continues right where vol. 14 left off, just like how books 10 and 11 were connected. I like how a bit more of Yuki's complex and horrific history is revealed, and I like his growing bond with my buddy "Nabe". Takaya-san knows how to balance this tragedy and the moments with Tohru, Haru, Kyo, and Arisa with the school play. From Aya's and Mine-san's entrance (yay, she's back), to the audience's awe of Yuki as the fairy guradian, to the rewritten lines, and even the bossy narrator, the school play was hilarious. Oh yeah, seeing Kazuma and Megumi again is great, and like the references to various other characters (i.e. Rin) not in this book. Don't forget to read the sidenotes and to check out the fanart and original art!

This book was as awesome as the rest of the series. The plot thickens in this one and the play the students preform is wonderfully whimsical, while retaining the books renown amusmant. In short, it rocked my socks!

This volume lightens things up a bit as we witness the preparation and execution of the school play, complete with Saki's goth Cinderella, Aya and Mine arriving to tailor the costumes, Haru needling Kyo by tipping Kazuma off that he's playing Prince Charming, and Momiji gleefully capturing the whole debacle on glorious videocam. Amidst the humour we are set up for some future developments in some of the subplots, though, as Momiji figures out why Tohru wanted to see Kureno and continues his budding career in Akito defiance by taking it upon himself to try to play cupid for Arisa and Kureno; and an outburst from Hiro starts to clue Tohru in on what's going on between Haru and Rin.

Above all this is Yuki's volume, as he starts to come to grips with the pain of the child abuse he endured, wrestles with the question of whether he's really attracted to Tohru or simply profoundly grateful to her, gets a hint that Tohru might not be the only girl who understands him - and slowly makes a tentative attempt to try to call a truce with Kyo.

A volume in which nothing yet quite alot happens, it's a welcome breather - in spite of Yuki's heartbreaking history - from the rather painful last installments before Tohru and her friends continue dealing with the struggles facing them.