There's a lot more sadness and angst in this volume as Lise deals with the plot twist from the last volume. Some more characters are also added into Lise's "family", making for a rowdy household. We also learn a lot more about her feelings for Engetsu and she shows a wider range of emotions than previously seen, which is a lot more interesting than just her being cheery all the time. Still, I find Lise's character pretty boring. She is basically a generic "genki" shoujo protagonist, and her sad past seems almost tacked on as an afterthought. There is also the problem of much of the comedy relying on characters having ridiculous, over-the-top reactions to things.. which means most of the characters become more and more silly in personality, which takes away from some of the seriousness in the story (particularly the developments in the last volume). Overall, this is kind of entertaining still, and I'll read on because there's only 2 volumes left, but my initial enthusiasm about this series from the first volume has dampened considerably. ( )

Actually explaining what is going on helps the book a lot. The habitual use of word balloons and captions that contain only two words and an inordinate number of ellipses so a single sentence is strung across two or three pages continues to hinder. I guess this fantasy fluff needs to really stretch things out since it really doesn't have much substance to offer. ( )