Fullmetal Alchemist Vol. I by Hiromu Arakawa

Bibliographic information: 

Arakawa, Hiromu.  Fullmetal Alchemist Vol. I.  San Francisco: VIZ Media, LLC, 2005 this printing 2009. ISBN-13:  978-1-59116-920-8

Plot Summary:

            Edward Elric is a young man that is part human and part machine due to an accident doing alchemy.  During the accident, Edward’s brother Alphonse loses his body altogether and becomes a soul encased in a suit of armor.  Edward is an Alchemist in the service of his government and is dedicated to fighting evil by using alchemy.  The two brothers meet Rose, a young girl, who is part of a religious group led by Father Cornello.  The Elrics discover that Cornello is misleading people using simple alchemy in order to get an army of fanatics to take over the country.  The brothers expose him and then defeat him in a battle of alchemy. 

            The story then jumps to the two brothers traveling on a train to a coal mining region.  They find that the local military officer owns the coal mines and everything else and is taxing the miners unfairly.  Edward tricks the military officer by changing stones into gold and buying the entire area, he then turns the gold back into stones.  Edward turns control of the mines over to a local miner/innkeeper.

            On the train journey in the same region, a General and his family are taken hostage by a group of extremists.  Edward and Alphonse happen to be traveling on the same train and come to the rescue.  The book ends by the brothers saving the day and meeting up with another government alchemist who will take over as protagonist in Volume II.

Critical Evaluation:

            The story is certainly action-packed and full of violence.  The violence is fairly graphic, but should be suitable for most teens.  It is a quick read and one can get through it fairly easily.  There are a number of gaps in the story which could have been easily solved with a bit more of a background being given.  Perhaps the background was left ambiguous so it could be developed in more detail in later volumes.  The book also reads from the right to the left, not the words just the individual action blocks and the pages also progress from right to left.  This is the format of most manga and takes some getting used to.  One not used to reading in this fashion, as most readers of Western languages, may find that somewhat difficult to deal with.  The art is rather good and displays a great amount of emotion and action.

 Reader’s Annotation:

The Elric brothers travel around a fantasy land fighting evil with advanced alchemy.  Cult leaders, corrupt officials, and terrorists are all defeated by the half machine government alchemist Eric, and his suit of armor brother Alphonse.

Information about the author:

            Although currently living in Tokyo, Hiromu Arakawa is from rural Hokkaido, Japan and grew up on a dairy farm.  She is the winner of many manga awards including the Shogakukan Manga Award and the Shonen Gangan Award.  
            She not only writes the stories for her manga novels, she is also the primary artist. Arakawa’s works are generally published in Japan first and then re-worked and translated for release in the United States.

Genre:

Manga/Adventure

Curriculum Ties:

N/A

Booktalking Ideas:

1.  Talk about how the character Rose is tricked into believing the promises of Father Cornello and how similar things happen outside of fiction.

2.  Discuss how the Brothers Elric give to the poor by tricking the rich.

3.  Focus on why the most powerful character, Edward Elric, is physically the smallest of the combative characters.

Reading Level/Interest Age:

14+

Challenge Issues:

Violence

Challenge Defense Ideas:

1.  Read the book.

2.  Be Familiar with the policy of the ALA and your institution.

3. Make a note of the contents of the work and how they fall in with the collection development policy of your institution and the standpoint of the ALA. 

4. Gain an awareness of the awards, reviews, and criticisms of the work, as well as other works by the same writer.

5. Know the process for materials challenges at your library.

Why did you include this book? :

It promised to be a rather good manga work as many other volumes were produced in this series and was highly rated by many manga websites.
Author Info Website:
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/people.php?id=17621