The Dreaming Manga Volume 3, 3

So much has happened since Amber and Jeanie stepped into the foreboding Australian Greenwich private college. With Amber up from her illness and the strange happenings at the school, the girls to work together with a teacher who luckily was investigating the school. The three pooled their knowledge of written texts and the dream world to put together the missing pieces, but have they figured out the mystery in time to save not only themselves but the rest of the student body before they all become more innocent girls fed to the Bush that surround the school. Only 3 volumes long, this was a short read, but definitely worth it! The atmosphere was perfect for a horror story, the art brought out the feelings of the characters well and the school along with the elaborate Victorian dresses were beautiful touches to the background, and the story was chock-full of twist and turns, some that may be seem obvious, but others that will have you on the edge of your seat and gasping when you find out the truth. There were some minor nitpicks that I could say, but the series overall was so good I don't see a need to fault a great story by a (at the time I believe) relatively new artist for the sake of negativity. I still love the ending and feel like if that was the perfect way to end The Dreaming. If you like spooky stories, please please check out this series. I will forever recommend this; it is now one my top 5 favorite completed series.

Queenie Chan, The Dreaming, vol. 3 (Tokyopop, 2007) Chan brings The Dreaming to a close with, unsurprisingly, a large number of revelations. Because of this, the volume is, almost by definition, more satisfying than its predecessors; it's wonderful to actually see a satisfying ending to a manga series. I have to heartily agree with Chan's philosophy of "don't start something without intending to finish it", given the quality of the work she's produced here. If you've been wondering about this whole manga craze, but have been put off by most series having more volumes than you have shelf space in your house, The Dreaming is a great way to start out. ****

I've enjoyed this series, but I'll admit being a little dissapointed at the end. It is a good ending, and a creepy one, but not quite what I was expecting. Then again, my imagination was running in a million directions, so I don't know that it could ever have lived up to my expectations. Still, the volume does a nice job of tying up the storylines while it leaves us a few mysteries to chew over. All in all, a VERY good ending to a new author's big entry into the manga publishing world. If this is Queenie-Chan as a "new" author (she's published on the web for a while now), then I can only imagine how great she'll be once she's been around the block a few times & picked up some tricks.

I discovered The Dreaming volume one a little over a year ago. It captured my attention almost instantly. I bought the second book as soon as I had the chance and enjoyed it as much as the first volume. The third volume (this book) was a long time coming, but well worth the wait. I won't give any of the story away, since if you are a fan of The Dreaming you should already have a hunger to know how the story ends. Oh, and one last thing. At the end of the book, there is a secret. This is the reason that the release date (originally set for November) was delayed to December.