Posted by b00kworm, October 21, 2010:
The series "God Child" by Kaori Yuki (one of my favourite mangaka [manga
artists]) originally was named "Count Cain", as the main character's
name is Cain Hargreaves and he's a nobleman (although an earl and not a
count). After the strories published in the first few volumes (before
the main story about the secret organisation "Delilah" really starts
up), Kaori Yuki abandoned it and started drawing her biggest manga so
far, "Angel Sanctuary". Once the 20 volumes were done, she returned to
Cain, however, and the main story started up. The name of the series was
changed to "God Child" and the battle between Cain and his supposedly
dead father started for real. The first few volumes, up to the story
'Kafka', contain short stories that sometimes take a look in Cain's
past, sometimes tell of cases he's been involved in.
The series is set in a slightly altered Victorian era where Cain
Hargreaves has succeeded his supposedly dead father as head of the
family at a young age. But his father isn't dead and things rarely are
the way they seem.
As always with Kaori Yuki's stories, certain topics are just around the
corner. Murder, blood and the occult are among them (and so is incest, I
didn't find one manga she wrote and drew that does not at least
insinuate a close relation between blood relatives - except, perhaps,
"Blood Hound"). Cain is not the child of his father and his father's
wife - he's the child of his father and his father's sister. Alexis
(Cain's father) also has a host of children born outside of wedlock. One
of them is Dr. Jezebel Disraeli, the guy (despite the name and the long
hair) in the picture above (if not drawn as a super-deformed cutie,
Jezebel is over six foot tall and rarely taken for a woman, despite name
and hairstyle). Jezebel works for "Delilah" as a scientist and killer
and is seriously disturbed (as most characters, including Cain and his
butler Riff). He has nothing at all against killing humans or using them
for his experiments - but on the other side he's kind to animals. And
he's after Cain's golden-green eyes he wants to put into formalin for
keeps...
Most stories told within the series have to do with murder and
supernatural themes at the same time. Cain has a passion for poisons and
a big collection (that he inherited - the Hargreaves have always been a
strange family), but he's also interested in strange things that
happen. As a member of nobility he moves in circles in which, during
that era, séances and other occult practices were not unusual. Most of
the time, though, the ones behind gruesome supernatural murders are
disturbed people (and quite a lot of them are deranged due to the
workings of "Delilah", his father's secret society). Dr. Disraeli, for
example, first turns up in the story 'Kafka', in which supposedly a
female vampire hunts people in a little village somewhere in England.
Dr. Disraeli, called Dr. Allan (whom he has killed to take his place),
has been hypnotizing a young girl with a disfigured face who does the
killing. She really believes she is a vampire, because he has used
(without her knowing it) skin from the people she has killed to rebuild
her face (that has been partly burned). In the end, though, she and her
brother (who suspected, but didn't know for most of the story) both
perish - the stories seldom end happily.
Kaori Yuki's drawing style is one of the main reasons why I have read
all her manga - as long as they were published in Germany. She has a
rather complicated style, a lot of lines, a lot of grey and raster foil.
She also takes the times she sets her stories in very seriously, so
clothes and hairstyles are pretty much historically correct. The main
characters usually are very distinct, as well - and thus easy to
recognize.
Most of her longer stories tend to gather a lot of important characters
after a while ("God Child" with 13 volumes and "Angel Sanctuary" with 20
are by far the longest, most others have two, three or four volumes)
and she's not afraid of killing them off, so you never know whether the
main character does survive.
I'm not sure if you can find the manga in the US (there seem to be
scanlations around, but they are not really legal), but if you can and
have nothing against the topics or the missing happy ends, you should at
least risk a closer look.
The series "God Child" by Kaori Yuki (one of my favourite mangaka [manga
artists]) originally was named "Count Cain", as the main character's
name is Cain Hargreaves and he's a nobleman (although an earl and not a
count). After the strories published in the first few volumes (before
the main story about the secret organisation "Delilah" really starts
up), Kaori Yuki abandoned it and started drawing her biggest manga so
far, "Angel Sanctuary". Once the 20 volumes were done, she returned to
Cain, however, and the main story started up. The name of the series was
changed to "God Child" and the battle between Cain and his supposedly
dead father started for real. The first few volumes, up to the story
'Kafka', contain short stories that sometimes take a look in Cain's
past, sometimes tell of cases he's been involved in.
The series is set in a slightly altered Victorian era where Cain
Hargreaves has succeeded his supposedly dead father as head of the
family at a young age. But his father isn't dead and things rarely are
the way they seem.
As always with Kaori Yuki's stories, certain topics are just around the
corner. Murder, blood and the occult are among them (and so is incest, I
didn't find one manga she wrote and drew that does not at least
insinuate a close relation between blood relatives - except, perhaps,
"Blood Hound"). Cain is not the child of his father and his father's
wife - he's the child of his father and his father's sister. Alexis
(Cain's father) also has a host of children born outside of wedlock. One
of them is Dr. Jezebel Disraeli, the guy (despite the name and the long
hair) in the picture above (if not drawn as a super-deformed cutie,
Jezebel is over six foot tall and rarely taken for a woman, despite name
and hairstyle). Jezebel works for "Delilah" as a scientist and killer
and is seriously disturbed (as most characters, including Cain and his
butler Riff). He has nothing at all against killing humans or using them
for his experiments - but on the other side he's kind to animals. And
he's after Cain's golden-green eyes he wants to put into formalin for
keeps...
Most stories told within the series have to do with murder and
supernatural themes at the same time. Cain has a passion for poisons and
a big collection (that he inherited - the Hargreaves have always been a
strange family), but he's also interested in strange things that
happen. As a member of nobility he moves in circles in which, during
that era, séances and other occult practices were not unusual. Most of
the time, though, the ones behind gruesome supernatural murders are
disturbed people (and quite a lot of them are deranged due to the
workings of "Delilah", his father's secret society). Dr. Disraeli, for
example, first turns up in the story 'Kafka', in which supposedly a
female vampire hunts people in a little village somewhere in England.
Dr. Disraeli, called Dr. Allan (whom he has killed to take his place),
has been hypnotizing a young girl with a disfigured face who does the
killing. She really believes she is a vampire, because he has used
(without her knowing it) skin from the people she has killed to rebuild
her face (that has been partly burned). In the end, though, she and her
brother (who suspected, but didn't know for most of the story) both
perish - the stories seldom end happily.
Kaori Yuki's drawing style is one of the main reasons why I have read
all her manga - as long as they were published in Germany. She has a
rather complicated style, a lot of lines, a lot of grey and raster foil.
She also takes the times she sets her stories in very seriously, so
clothes and hairstyles are pretty much historically correct. The main
characters usually are very distinct, as well - and thus easy to
recognize.
Most of her longer stories tend to gather a lot of important characters
after a while ("God Child" with 13 volumes and "Angel Sanctuary" with 20
are by far the longest, most others have two, three or four volumes)
and she's not afraid of killing them off, so you never know whether the
main character does survive.
I'm not sure if you can find the manga in the US (there seem to be
scanlations around, but they are not really legal), but if you can and
have nothing against the topics or the missing happy ends, you should at
least risk a closer look.
