Blood+ is an animated series that ran from year 2005 to 2006 in Japan, having established itself as one of the top anime of the genre. It's no coincidence that some readers may find it familiar that the protagonist is a girl named Saya who hunts beings that are “vampires” (though it's rather loosely related to the more modern usage of the term) known in the series as “Chiropterans.” Blood+ has roots in the OVA Blood The Last Vampire, by the same creator. Blood+ is a rather old series, and perhaps some leniency should be given as it as one of the earlier light novel series to be published in English. This will be addressed later, but for now, onto the review.
Before taking on the task of even opening the pages the sheer volume was, at the very least, impressive. I'm simply not used to light novels of this length and it was an alien feeling, though not a negative one in the least. Having missed out on the animated series I was a bit hesitant that the novels would not do the animated series justice, and while it may not be the most stellar adaptation, it lends its own voice as an entertaining piece of work.
First, I should note: while it is very common for light novels to be adapted into an animated series it's not often that you find yourself faced with the situation in reverse. However, here is such an exception. While I can't exactly judge the novel based on how faithful it is to the original, I can say it was quite a read. For any readers like myself that haven't watched the series before, the “introduction” page of the cast alone may be a bit overwhelming. A grand total of twenty-two portraits with a tiny biography to get the reader familiar before the story? While it's not the kind of convention I enjoy writers employing, the story does end up easing the reader into the story and its cast like it should have in the first place.
The story itself is, for the lack of a better grading system, satisfactory. The diction is limited to familiar terms, and seems to be aimed at the middle school crowd, which isn't exactly a bad thing. It simply wasn't what I expected, having heard about some of the twists that occur later in the series. I wish I could speak all positively for the novel, but it does suffer from what seems to be either weak writing or lesser-experienced translation that didn't exactly captivate me fully through the experience.
Also, though this one gripe may be unfair due to differences in the usage of written language between English and Japanese; I have to stress how anemic some of the paragraphs were. It's a critique readers in high school or older may understand better, but it stood out to me as something I've noticed present more often in the earlier translated light novel works. It is at least present much less often in more recent works in which the editors may have tinkered with the written structures a little in an effort to provide a more familiar form of reading for English speakers.
All in all, it's a book that opens up the road to a very well-established series. I hesitate to recommend this novel seriously for one who is looking to only delve into the written series, but definitely give it a thumb-up for the curious that simply need a fix of some supernatural action novel with plenty of blood-suckers. While it is a dated work, it's still exciting for those that don't mind the small quirks that may deter the critics from enjoying it.
© 2011 Linda Thai
Thank you Jeremy S. Atkins, Director of Public Relations at Dark Horse Comics, for letting us use the cover art!
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