Revisiting an old classic…and still loving it.
Creative Staff:
Story/Art: Natsuki Takaya
Translation: Sheldon Drzka
Lettering: Lys Blakeslee
What They Say:
After a family tragedy turns her life upside down, plucky high schooler Tohru Honda takes matters into her own hands and moves out…into a tent! Unfortunately for her, she pitches her new home on private land belonging to the mysterious Sohma clan, and it isn’t long before the owners discover her secret. But as Tohru quickly finds out when the family offers to take her in, the Sohmas have a secret of their own—when embraced by the opposite sex, they turn into the animals of the Chinese zodiac!
A perennial favorite of fans and librarians alike, Natsuki Takaya’s beloved bestselling Fruits Basket series returns to print in deluxe omnibus editions with beautiful full-color illustrations that are not to be missed!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
In 2004, in the middle of the manga boom and just four years before the bubble burst on manga’s market in the United States, Tokyopop began releasing Fruits Basket. Then a giant in publishing with a saturation of anything from the quality of Fruits Basket to…things that are better left forgotten, Tokyopop’s manga could be found on the shelves of any Borders, Barnes and Noble, or other bookstores. But it was Fruits Basket that set the market ablaze and, to this day I believe, it remains the bestselling shojo manga in the United States.
Around 2008, Tokyopop largely shuttered its American doors, with every manga it licensed going with it. That included Fruits Basket, which then left it in a large limbo, thought never to be licensed again. Skip forward to 2015 and new volumes of Fruits Basket—now in omnibus form—were being released in Japan and dubbed the collector’s editions. Four months later, in December, Yen Press announced they were releasing these books. I rejoiced heavily.
To say that Fruits Basket molded where my tastes lay now may be an understatement. Fruits Basket was one of the first shojo anime I ever watched; up until that point, I had only been watching Naruto, Bleach, YuYu Hakusho, and the like (throwing in some Cowboy Bebop, Gunslinger Girl, and probably a lot others I’m not really remembering). But it was Fruits Basket (and Kare Kano) that convinced me that anime was worth sticking around for. When I found out these books were coming out, I signed up immediately, knowing the old Tokyopop editions were kind of terrible and also missing one volume I could never end up tracking down.
In short, Fruits Basket is absolutely worth buying.
In long, Fruits Basket touches hearts. It changes hearts, and shows them there’s right in this world. There’s good in this world in every person. It’s the people that surround them that influence who they are and who they become. Tohru’s mom was a delinquent yanki in junior high, but became a blue collar worker and raised an upstanding daughter. Kyo and Yuki’s hearts also temper as Tohru gets further and further into their lives.
She gets Yuki to open up not just what he displays to everyone else, but what he shelters behind layers and layers of metaphorical protections after all his friends’ memories were erased in elementary school. He’s never wanted to connect with anyone else for fear he would feel that same disconnect as he did back then…until Tohru showed up in his life.
The story is the same with Kyo. He’s the cat of the Chinese zodiac, rejected for just being who he is based on acenturies-oldd myth. He’s got an inferiority complex because of it and doesn’t want anyone judging him on surface value. So he rejects them completely. He lashes out and physically and emotionally pushes them away. But Tohru gets in. She sees the pickled plum on Kyo’s back.
Tohru herself has been through enough herself. Her father passed when she was 3 years old from an illness, her mother passed away four months ago in an accident, and she’s been living with her grandpa until he needed to do some renovations on his house so his daughter and her husband could move in with him…She ended up in a tent on Sohma property, wanting to prove to herself that she can live on her own. Tohru is the type to not ask for the moon, as the manga says. She appreciates every moment she has and everyone she can share those moments with. She warms the heart just to see her existing.
As someone who had and flipped casually through the Tokyopop books, these are much better. The covers aren’t nearly as stiff, so you don’t feel like you’re breaking the book when you’re trying to read it. There are four gorgeous color pages at the beginning of the book, and the paper’s thick enough that you don’t feel like you’re ripping it by turning the page. The only thing more I could have asked for is a hardcover in terms of quality of book, but keeping the price reasonable is a much better option for Yen. At 12 volumes and $20 each, this isn’t out of many people’s price range, if they keep expectations to buy one or two at a time rather than all at once.
In Summary:
Fruits Basket has always been one of my favorite manga (and anime) of all time, and I’m glad to be able to revisit it. I’ve revisited the anime many, many times, but I’ve only read the manga once. I remember these anime moments very well, but I’ll be interested to see how the rest of it plays out compared to my memory.
For now, I’m just as impressed as I was upon first watching / reading of Fruits Basket. It’s an absolute joy to read through again. The stories have touched my heart yet again, and I found tears welling up as I was getting to some of the more emotional parts.
Content Grade: A
Art Grade: A-
Packaging Grade: A
Text/Translation Grade: A
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: June 21, 2016
MSRP: $19.99
