Ouran High School Host Club

Title: Ouran High School Host Club
Author: Bisco Hatori
Review: A very popular comical manga series set in an ultra-exclusive Ouran Academy. Admitance is only possible for the children of the untra-rich or for a very few "commoners" with the academic achievement to win a scholarship. Haruhi is one such student. Living with her well meaning but scatty father (a facinating character in his own right!) she has to borrow his clothes to wear on her first day as he cannot even afford the schools exclusively tailored uniform. The eternally practical Haruhi thinks nothing of it until she gets lost looking for her class and stumbles across a spare music room, now home to the charming, rose bud showered, School Host Club.

This student club exists to delight and distract the bored daughters of the super rich. The handsome Host Boy Clubs serve tea and cake with a smile and delight the girls with stories, play acting and sumptuous costumes. It is into this rarefied atmosphere Haruhi enters, and is immediately mistaken for a boy. Dismissed by the club (who are only concerned with the schools female population) Haruhi almost gets out scott-free until, as she attempts to exit the room, she smashes an $80 000 vase the club was about to auction. Having no money she is forced to pay the club back by working it off, as a host. Provided with a uniform, at first, Haruhi's sense of honour keeps her turning up at a club she sees as vapid and pointless as the clubs' idealistic and thoroughly impractical leader, Tamaki. But the over-the-top characters that inhabit the club slowly peak a genuine interest, even as they constantly remind her of the huge gap between them and her as she is presented as almost a sideshow attraction (a real life commoner!). It becomes clear just how little these people know about the world around them and the results are hilarious.

This is a beautifully drawn, clever and funny manga series. Hatori masterfully keeps her larger than life characters barely in check as they work their clumsy charms on the reader. Not for the easily shocked but if you approach it with a sense of fun you may well be glad you did.

Staff Reviewer: Alex Salter, State Library of Tasmania- Resources and Access

You can find the first Ouran High School Host Club graphic novel on the State Library of Tasmania catalogue here.