This series is beginning to amaze me with its ability to not do anything wrongly. Sometimes, when I read something, I'll come across something that's so utterly stupid I can't even get past it, and that thing, whatever it was, will stick like a thorn in my side until I finish the book. (Frequently they pile up until I feel like a pincushion.)But this series? No. Every panel just makes me adore it more. It's always introducing new amazing characters, or the characters I already love are making me want to laugh or cry. The plot gets broader and twistier and, yes, more confusing, with every volume.
I think - aside from Raven and Break - it's the sheer depth of the thing that has me most entranced. I can't stop wondering what's going to happen next, and I can't stop thinking about all those little clues . . . it's like reading the best kind of mystery, but without the series stepping out and blatantly saying, "I'm a mystery". Pandora Hearts (so far) is very artful that way.
A couple of things about this installment actually made me laugh. The scene where they find the candy on the stairs and instantly know Break was there . . . that's adorable, and it so makes sense. And the scene where Cheshire shows up, and immediately Raven demands to know why nobody told him there would be a cat.
Raven, dear, they did say the word Cheshire about three hundred times before they went to his dimension. (Normally I'd be condescending when I say that, but in the book it wasn't presented as the kind of scene I can condescend to, it was just amusing. And I love Raven too much to ever condescend to him. Also, Oz says to Raven basically what I just said. That right there makes the series a hop, skip, and a bounding Superman leap more intelligent than so many I've read recently.)
I'm loving Alice more and more, too. She's such a good character. I can't help but love the way she's always so fierce and driven . . . but then you never get the feeling that there's nothing underneath. She's afraid a lot of the time, and she obviously tells herself she's never going to lose, but I think she always knows it's avery real possibility.
I wish the others would stop leaving her all by herself, since she obviously hates to be alone. . . .
Ah, okay, rant over. I'm going to go read the next one.
