Claudine, by Riyoko Ikeda

クローディーヌ・・・! by Riyoko Ikeda
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

For how wonderful the drawings are, I think the main story of this volume, Claudine, is a bit too quickly defined. Too many events happened in a too short time and the role of some characters is unclear.
Unfortunately, I think that the story lacks originality and the right story telling for being interesting, but one surely get caught and remained fascinated by how beautiful the drawings are.
In the same style are the two other short stories that follow Claudine. They are connected to one of Ikeda's main manga, Orpheus. The story development is as always full quite tragic events, though differently from Claudine, I did enjoy them more.
I was also very surprised by the final touch given to the story, which with a little bit of humour makes up for all the gloomy and serious tone. I thought at first that was a bit ouf of place, considering the general mood in which the stories were set, but then I realized that it was an excellent way to break the desolation and lead the plot development to a lighter path.
For all the Ikeda's fans I think this is a nice way to admire her beautiful drawings and read, once again, about such desperate lovestories. However, I can easily understand that they would be considered average by an "average" reader and that he could be put off track by the main themes of such stories. In Claudine, as in Versailles no Bara, we have a girl who is struggling with her sexuality, but here it is obvious that she has no intention to be like a girl and on the other hand wants to be like her father.
In the short stories connected to Orpheus, we have the unhappy relationships where two brothers end up falling in love, without being aware of their kinship.
Though, this is nothing so out of line to read in Ikeda's stories (or in many shojo manga).

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