Vanitas no Carte has been really engaging since the beginning. First chapter in and we get a glimpse of the main characters, and what little we get is already very interesting. Mochizuki-sensei is great at making things seem mysterious, and this begins from the very first chapter. There's the feeling hanging around that there's more to things than is revealed, which might either annoy or engage readers. The only way to know if you'd like it or not is to try it.
Characters:
Let's talk about the main characters, Noé and Vanitas.
Noé is easily likeable, and rather cute at times. He's the one whose story we are following, so it's a huge plus that he's easy to like. The gap between us readers and Noé doesn't seem that different, so it's not too difficult to follow his actions and thought processes. That's extremely relieving, because Vanitas, on the other hand, is an enigma.
We're introduced to Vanitas early on, but we know little to nothing about him. That makes for a very fascinating character, because his actions are unpredictable. Mochizuki-sensei does a great job in potraying his character in an unusual way, and he feels very unlike the usual protagonist. His motivations are unknown, and his actions crazy. Many main characters in stories have mysterious backgrounds, but we're usually able to get a sense of the character even before we find out what it is. With Vanitas though, it's difficult.
This causes two things:
1) Vanitas becomes a extremely fascinating character to watch.
2) We don't feel all that connected to Vanitas because we can't understand him.
Compared to the mangaka's other work, Pandora Hearts, I don't feel all that concerned for the wellbeing of Vanitas' main characters (of course, I'm only 13 chapters in, so I'll have to see). But at the same time the mysteriousness of the characters makes me more interested in the background/personality characters here than in Pandora Hearts. In short I just mean the characters here are more interesting but difficult to relate to and thus like on a personal level. It's both good and bad, so it's difficult to say what most people feel about it. Luckily, Noé exists as our main character, so readers can at least feel connected to him and view the story from his lens easily.
Art:
The art is amazing as expected. It really fits with the tone of the manga, and the character expressions are fabulous. The mangaka can convey things with not only words but expressions, which really makes for better storytelling. No complaints here.
Story:
This is pretty difficult to get a good grasp of right now (as of chapter 13). It does feel that the mangaka knows what she is doing and where the story is heading, but similar to early on in Pandora Hearts, the reader might feel a bit lost as to what the main story is right now.
But that doesn't mean it's an incoherent mess. It never feels like the story is just being made up as we go along. There's the feeling that everything happening has an importance to the story - except we don't know what it is yet. That might be frustrating to some. It certainly is frustrating to me. But I'm really looking forward to seeing how things play out, to have this story be revealed to me in bits and pieces. Considering the story setting, which feels more limited, I'm not sensing any upcoming crazy twists like in Pandora Hearts, but I'm sure whatever the author has in store will surely be interesting. For now, the frustration of not understand only makes me more curious rather than annoyed, so it's all good. It helps that the characters are interesting enough for me to keep on reading now.
Enjoyment:
This is difficult. I certainly do enjoy it, but not the mindless easy type of enjoyment. There aren't really slice-of-life moments for me to enjoy now, but so far the characters and their interactions with each other/how they react to situations is keeping me hooked. It's probably a manga not easy to enjoy if you read lightly and only look at the surface. But with all the interesting elements glaring at you in the face, I also think it's quite easy to be interested in this manga. It's too early for me to have an opinion on the overall plot, but there is potential for things to shape up well. Hopefully I have time to edit my review then.
(the review got too long, I'm sorry ;_;)
tldr;
Overall, an interesting manga, though too early now to see how it goes. Definitely should give it a try. The story moves fast, so it's pretty exciting, but there's also a lack of slice-of-life moments. Also be prepared to be lost and feel like you know nothing about the story/characters. Art is beautiful and story elements have the potential to lead to an interesting story. Characters are fascinating.
Pandora Heart fans should definitely check this out, but you might not feel too attached to the characters at first. But if you've enjoyed the characters in Pandora Hearts, I'm sure you'll find this interesting too. The setting doesn't give me that much hope for similar crazy plot twists, but the mysterious feeling is thick in the air and the characters are a joy to watch.
