Please note

This review is all subjective and my own personal opinion. You do not have to agree with it, nor am I asking you to. I hope that this just helps you get an idea of what the manga I am talking about is like and form a basic and general consensus on it. The ratings I give anime and manga are mostly my personal overall enjoyment. I have not read the novel, nor have I seen the animated adaptation. This review will be spoiler free, but for the plot there will be a spoiler filled section that will be marked as such. A big thank you to Nikz for proofreading my reviews and giving me feedback. TL;DR will be at the bottom.

Introduction

Tsuki no Sango (Coral of the Moon) is a short story written by Kinoko Nasu taking place in the year 3000, where humankind has reached their peak, but is losing its will to keep living. Note that Tsuki no Sango takes place in a world where Tsukihime did not occur. Tsuki no Sango follows the story of a girl, called "princess" living on a small island. She is a descendant of the Moon people, and the plot uncovers how her ancestor came to earth.

Plot

This manga only holds 14 chapters, but despite that, it feels as though a lot happens throughout the small amount of chapters. The plot mainly revolves around the main character discovering how her ancestor came to earth. The story begins with the girl turning away yet another suitor with an impossible request, with the most recent one asking to retrieve a fish from the moon. This is not an important part of the story, things only truly begin with the arrival of Kobito (literally small person). He has come from the moon, and asks the girl to write a story for him and in return, he will give her something. Kobito offers to teach the girl how to write so that she can present a story for him. I cannot go into too much detail without spoiling the plot, but this is where the plot becomes the most interesting. The manga begins to delve into the girl's ancestor's past, and ultimately how she came to the earth.

Spoiler, click to view

The ancestor's past is first told through a old tale that was brought down from the girl's grandmother. It details how the girl's ancestor met a man who came to the moon. The tale details how the man talked to the ancestor, and the effect he had on her. Eventually, the ancestor becomes more and more human, finally being able to walk around. In the end of the tale, the man places her on his ship and sends her to earth. Satisfied with her story, Kobito gives the girl a shell, which holds a recording What we find out though, however, that this is no mere tale, it is actually what happened to the girl's ancestor. The person who made the recording is actually the man that is present in the tale. His recording details a bit of his backstory, his journey to the moon, how he met the ancestor, their relationship development and him ultimately sending her back to the earth. This is the most captivating part of the story, I was drawn in seeing how the two interacted and grew.

It presents itself as a mystery, and it slowly unfolds as the events of the manga play out. I kept reading on as I wanted to find out the real meaning as to what happened, and I was pleased to see how the plot unfolded. At the beginning, we are thrown into a world we know very little about. We find ourselves asking ourselves "what is this world?", "who is this girl?" and so on. Only as we read on, we start to obtain some understanding, even only a little.

Characters

Tsuki no Sango does not have a large cast, with only four characters of interest. There are more characters than that, but they are not focused on in the story and do not warrant an analysis into them. The first character of interest is the storyteller girl. She is the princess of the island she resides on. She cannot understand the notion of love and cannot comprehend the idea. Not that interesting of an character by her own, but I enjoyed her development throughout the story. The next character to talk about is Kobito. He mostly serves as the guide for the storyteller girl, teaching her how to write. He is not exactly a special character, but he held his own in the story, despite not being the main character of focus. Next up is the Girl of the Moon. Her development is probably the best part of her character, seeing how she changed so greatly from the beginning. Her personality is not much, it is not expanded on that much. Finally there is the Man of the Earth. He presents himself as someone quite apathetic, not caring about much other than his own issues. And yet, this quality made his development even more satisfying, even if it only happened in the end. The relationship between him and the Girl on the Moon is quite fascinating to read about, and posed to be one of the most engaging parts of the entire story. Given the manga's length, there is not too much that can be done in terms of development, but I believe that it did well to work with what it was given, providing good enough character development that was interesting enough to read. Some might say these characters are a bit shallow, but that may be a factor of the story length.

Art

The art style in Tsuki no Sango resembles Takashi Takeuchi's art style, which I have a particular fondness of. And so of course, I quite liked the art style, liking how the characters and the world was drawn. Shounen Sasaki did well to craft a world that not only looked appealing, but also conveyed the sense of loneliness and hopelessness the entire world in Tsuki no Sango was going through.

Conclusion and TL;DR

All in all, this was a nice short story written, bringing upon a world with seemingly no hope left, but then it lights up once again. I would recommend this to those who are fans of Kinoko Nasu and his works. It is a short read, I got it done in about an hour or so. To summarise this review:

• A plot that leaves the reader to ask themselves as to many questions, and whilst not all of them may be answered, the plot does unfold in a satisfying manner.
• A small cast of characters that may not be the most interesting (some might say shallow) compared to other works, but still hold their own. The development some characters go through are engaging.
• Art that does well to convey a world that is lost and devoid of hope, as well as depicting nice looking characters.

Thank you to those who took the time to read this review. Hopefully you were able to get something out of it. If you did not like this review, then I apologise for wasting your time.