Doubt Vol. 1 TP (Manga)
Publisher: Yen Press
Release Date: 4/23/2013
Price: $18.99
Creator: Story & Art by Yoshiki Tonogai
Format: 400 pgs., B&W, Trade Paperback
ISBN: 9-780-3162-4530-2
Age Rating: Older Teen
ICv2 Rating: 4 stars out of 5
 
A new mobile phone game is sweeping Japan called Rabbit Doubt in which players take on the roles of rabbits and must sniff out the wolf hidden amongst them before they are killed.  When a group of players get together for a social gathering, everything seems just fine until they find themselves knocked out and taken to a remote facility.  After they wake up they find that one of their members has been killed with a stake to the heart and strung up for all to see.  Now they are playing the game for real and must figure out who amongst them is the killer.
 
I LOVE a good anime or manga horror story. Just love them to pieces and so Doubt Volume 1 caught my eye pretty quickly.  A very graphic, grisly whodunnit; this is a story that is meant to capture the attention of the reader and pull them into that dark, secluded warehouse with these teenagers and make them feel the terror that they feel as they try to figure out who is the killer among them and it does a great job of that.
 
From the writing to the art, this manga is a fantastic work of bloody mayhem that refuses to let the reader put the book down until they get to the very end.  Don't let the basic idea behind this one fool you though, this isn't a body count type of book where murders lurk behind every corner.  This is all about the suspense and chase as the teens work out the clues left for them and attempt to figure out who it is that could have brought them to this place.  Is it the rough Eiji?  The quiet Yuu?  The jilted Haruka?  The outsider Hajime?  The possibilities will pile up and leave the reader guessing just as much as the characters.
 
The one and only real fault of this book is in the very basic style of artwork.  When the murders do happen, which they infrequently do, you kind of wish the artist had taken more time to create an even bloodier and more visceral death each time just to heighten the horror factor of the book but this is a small complaint as most of the time you, as the reader, will too busy going from page to page waiting for them to figure out who is the "wolf."
 
The chapters in this book go by very quickly making this a quick read despite how thick it is.  After a 70 page first chapter, the book quickens the pace by quite a large margin by shortening its chapters to a faster paced 50 or so pages per chapter which makes this an easy book to get through within a day or weekend.
 
If you want a solid horror/suspense, this is a great place to look.  Yen Press picked up a solid tale for their catalog and I can't wait to read on to find out who the killer is and how these kids plan on dealing with them once they find out who it is for sure.
 
This is very recommended!
 
-- L.B. Bryant