Menkui!, Volume 2

By Suzuki Tanaka

Kotori and Akaiwa are continuing to keep their relationship a secret from everyone, but their one confider, Chikage, is running out of patience. Before they can figure out what's got their friend in such a bad mood, Kotori finds himself captured by a beautiful ancient ghost in one of the school's bathroom mirrors.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1598163590
• ISBN13: 9781598163599
• Release Date: August 2006
• Publisher: Blu
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 9.4"
• Age Range: 21 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

A good series

Menkui! is a great series for the shounen-ai lover. It's not graphic, it has interesting story segments, and every book comes with one or two short stories in the back. I highly recommend this series.

Entertaining but...

Vol 2 has 3 stories, the first 2 focusing on the young lovers, Kotori and Akaiwa. I agree with the previous reviewer while Vol 2 is fun to read, the development of the plot is not what I was hoping for. In Vol 1, I was given the impression of much more mature content. Remember Kujaku's obsessive interest in his younger brother, Kotori, and Kujaku's friend who seemed an interesting character. Sadly both Kujaku and his friend are missing in Vol 2, though Kujaku did make brief but meaningless appearances. The development of Kotori's and Akaiwa's relationship and love seemed tame too, just the usual BL mood. On the other hand, what did I expect. This manga is labelled "Older teen 16+". My favorite is the 3rd story which centers on the endearing Chihiro (Chikage's younger brother) and Shinobu, a care free "bum". Their love story is much more engaging and has a maturity in it. Let's hope Vol 3 is back to the tone of Vol 1.

Rather fun, but ...a bit off track

In this book we are thrown headfirst with our main characters, Kotori and his boyfriend Akaiwa, into some wacky situations involving a mirror demon and then an over the top old friend of Kujaku (Kotori's brother). The situations were entertaining, and I did enjoy the plot and the interaction of the other characters (and thought there were some very funny touches - especially the mirror demon's end), however I found myself...disappointed in this book as well. The true love and fluffiness that resonated with me so strongly in the first volume (Kotori's insecurity and Akaiwa's feelings) was not the focus of this book. Nor did this book explore the interesting (to me) possibilities of Kotori's best friend Chikage or his beautiful brother Kujaku. My favorite section was actually the tamest of the book, which involved Chikage and *his* brother. To sum up, the book was light, fun and many people will probably enjoy it, however, I am hoping that the plot will get back on the track to true love and characters that need to be explored in the next volume!