Comics / Manga

Vampire Knight Official Fanbooks

By Leroy Douresseaux
October 17, 2010 - 20:28

Vampire Knight Official Fanbook cover image is courtesy of barnesandnoble.com.

Rated “T+” for “Older Teen”

Vampire Knight is a popular shojo manga from creator Matsuri Hino.  Its Japanese home is LaLa magazine, but in the United States, VIZ Media publishes the series in book form.  Now, VIZ Media is also publishing an English-language edition of Vampire Knight Official Fanbook, a guide to the manga filled with illustrations, trivia, and information.

Vampire Knight takes place at Cross Academy, a private boarding school.  Cross Academy has two classes – the Day Class and the Night Class.  The Day Class students are humans.  When they return to their dorms at twilight, they don’t know that the Night Class students that are on their way to school are actually vampires.  Vampire Knight’s main character is Yuki Cross, the adopted daughter of Headmaster Kainen Cross.  Yuki’s earliest memory is of being attacked by a vampire.

There are two co-leads.  One is Zero Kiryu, a human suffering the curse of the vampire.  Yuki and Zero are Guardians at Cross Academy; they patrol the hallways and school grounds to protect the students of the Day Class from the vampires.  The other co-lead is Kaname Kuran, a pureblood vampire who is the leader of the Night Class.  Yuki is attracted to Kaname, and the two actually have a connection revealed later in the story.

For the devoted fan or nerd, Vampire Knight Official Fanbook opens with a facsimile, Cross Academy student ID card between the inside front cover and the first page.  Then, it’s the first of two, full color galleries of character portraits and group shots.  Most of the first 130 pages of this book is essentially a Cross Academy yearbook, filled with the fictional equivalent of stuff found in real high school yearbooks:  bios, tidbits, photos, Q&As, recollections of activities and events (like the formal ball), etc.

The second half of this book is about the actual manga and narrative.  This includes profiles of characters and also alliances and organizations that exist within the story.  Some of this section also goes into Vampire Knight’s internal mythology with pieces about the history, politics, science, biology, and social organizing of vampires.

For nosy nerds like me, there are samples of actual Matsuri Hino storyboards for scenes in the manga and also sketches of things vampires wear, from clothes and shoes to buttons and cufflinks.  There is also an interview of Hino.  Vampire Knight Official Fanbook is a gift to Vampire Knight fans.  I’d like more storyboard and sketchbook material, but this is packed with cool stuff.

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Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12