Review: HOUSE OF FLOWERS

Flowers can serve as metaphors for all sorts of things in manga: romance, joy, sadness, transformation, etc.  So why not review a manga that seems to contain all that and more?

HOUSE OF FLOWERS (Hana no Ie), by Mako Takami.  First published in 2003 and first published in North America in 2017.

PLOT:

Acclaimed kabuki actor Kaoru Fujita is finally taking a wife...but on the day of the wedding his bride runs away.  His little sister Hiyori convinces a friend from art school named Nakai to pose as her publicly, and the ruse succeeds beyond anyone's expectations.  Nakai agrees to stay on for half a year until they can fake a divorce, but in the process he discovers some family secrets, his love for Hiyori, and a desire to become a kabuki actor himself.

STORY:

House of Flowers is a manga that seems to be shifting its focus and tone every couple of chapters.  It's a wacky farce about a guy in drag!  It's one man's discovery of his life's purpose and his quest to achieve it!  It's a forbidden romance between a young man and his half-sister!  There are so many ideas going on in this series, but none of them are given enough time to settle in for maximum impact.

None of the ideas here are particularly bad in execution, but some of them are definitely stronger than others.  House of Flowers really doesn't find its footing until Nakai falls in love with kabuki, a subject which is clearly near and dear to Takumi's own heart.  It gives the otherwise free and easy Nakai a goal to work towards, and the field's inherent bias towards elite families who have been performing for generations gives him a hurdle to overcome.  It also helps to give Hiyori a purpose in the story beyond Nakai's love interest.  She is shown to be a talented performer in her own right that is held back only by kabuki's prohibition against women, and it's this frustration more than anything that fuels her desire to help him become a kabuki actor.

Sadly, the romance is where things start to fall flat.  I thought the series might stretch out the romantic tension between Hiyori and Nakai for a while, but the two fall into one another's arms within the second chapter.  I get she had to get them together to get the maximum impact from them being revealed to be half-siblings, but it's a twist that feels a little too melodramatic (and a little too icky) to fit with the rest of the manga.  Takami seems determined to keep these two together, so I'm sure she'll devise some way for them to not really be related in the next volume, but it still feels like a distraction from the heart of the story.

These are ideas that ideally would need volumes to full establish and explore, but Takumi flies through them in the space of a chapter or two.  This pace might keep things interesting, but it's also a disservice to the manga.  Instead of blowing through every idea she's got, she would do better to take her time, follow her passions, and give her work the space it needs to build both character and some proper pathos.

ART:

Takumi's writing surprised me in many ways, but her artwork is something of a let-down.  Her character designs are kind of old-fashioned for a josei mangaka, and for the most part her composition is perfectly pedestrian.  The only time she allows herself to elaborate is when she's showing off some component of kabuki.  She clearly loves drawing the fancy patterns and make-up, and it's only during the performances that her art shows any sort of life.  Much like with her writing, Takumi is not untalented but she's not quite refined or unique enough to truly shine.

PRESENTATION:

Media-Do is a newcomer to the world of digital manga, and with that comes with some of issues you might expect from a fledgling publisher.  The translation here is alright for the most part, but there is the occasional garbled phrase or outright typo.  It didn't ruin the book for me, but if Media-Do wants to compete with the more established manga publishers it either needs to hire more talented translators or give the work of those they do have a better polish before release.

RATING:

House of Flowers is at its best when it pursues its passion for kabuki instead of aiming for dramatic shock value.  It's not revolutionary, but it was better than expected and I'm glad Media-Do is giving it and many other works like it a chance to shine.

This series is published by Media-Do.  This series is complete in Japan with two volumes.  Both volumes have been published digitally and are currently in print.