I picked up switch at my small town bookstore since I was going away from home for a few weeks on my own and I though it would a good idea to stock up on new books. I picked switch as my reading material because it had no mention of female characters on it and I have learned to hate series that center around female characters. The art looked pretty interesting but the story had me meh. But wait.
After reading about 4 volumes or so I was (excuse the bad pun) addicted to this series. Switch is stunning. The background art, the character's personalities, the original storyline... all just magnificent.
I'll have to say, from the start switch wasn't looking so good. Naked ape's art wasn't the best and switch is a manga more on the realistic side so none of the characters had wacky multicolored sticky-up-against-gravity hair that you can identify them by. This, as well as sloppy panel planning makes it very hard to interpret for some people. I say some, since my friend had no trouble following it. But the art improves more then you'd believe as the story progresses so at about the 3rd volume point, you should have no problem identifying who's who.
As far as the storyline goes, it's a lot deeper then the back of the book gives it credit for. Our two protagonists, Kai and Hal are rookie investigators at the NCD. They're drug cops; narcs. Though what at first seems like they're just busting small fries, there's really more to it all then it seems. A powerful drug-smuggling fictional Chinese mafia known as the the Ryugen want Kai and Hal for something huge... Something to do with their pasts.
The main character Kai is also very different. He has a "switch"-like personality that turns him into a killing machine whenever he, or is friends are in danger. This also folds out to be a bigger problem then it seems.
I'm 11 volumes in and I'm enjoying this series a ton. Sometimes it has you begging for more, screaming at the book itself over a character, or even moved to tears. All of the characters are memorable and the two female characters are highly tolerable, and even funny. Though totally serious at times switch can make wonderful comedy parts. Also, it does have some Boy's Love elements at times so anyone into such will probably enjoy it very much.
I'd recommend this series to anyone. :)
