"Madcap adventures, slightly crude humour and a cast of colourful characters make this a cheerful read."

The continuing adventures of Son Goku and Bulma. And Yamcha the bandit. The man who wanted to to steal the Dragon Balls and ends up being Bulma's boyfriend instead. Well who wouldn't? Volume 2 see's the quest go very well, then disasterously wrong. How wrong? Well volume 3 see's the intrepid band left with exactly no dragon balls to their name.

Akira Toriyama is one of Japans most sucessful and popular manga artists, and the creator of the Dragon Ball series.

2006-03-21 And so it begins...

With this, the first Dragon Ball book of forty two, begins an epic manga serial that will have you utterly and completely engrossed, and if you're like me, and this is the first manga serialisastion you've bought, will be the start of a manga addiction that will fill you with great satisfaction while at the same time depleting your bank account of funds!

To give an extremely concise summary of the plot of this volume; it centres around a monkey-tailed youth named Son Goku, and how he tumbles into a quest to find the seven mystical Dragon Balls, which when collected will make a dragon appear who will grant a single wish to the person who has the Dragon Balls in their posession. However, this paragraph does in no way convey the complex and constant evolution of the story or how a reader can come to feel personally involved in the actions of the main characters.

These volumes prove that no television programme can ever truly do justice to the tome from which it is adapted, and the rich illustrations, even if in black and white, provide the reader with much more visual satisfaction than a few minutes of flickering colour animation ever could.

Although these volumes overflow with adventure, danger and martial arts, they do not take themselves too seriously and also provide the reader with some wonderful typical Japanese humour, which although at times can seem a little purile, has had me crying my eyes out laughing on a number of occasions. Also be aware that there are some depictions of nudity, although these are always stricly in context to the story and therefore extremely necessary!

Toriyama Akira, to write his name in the correct Japanese format, has been the author of several other manga series such as Dr. Slump, a tale of a crazy inventor and his android daughter. If you do enjoy the Dragon Ball series then it is definetly worthwhile to look at his other works as these will provide you with the same wonderful entertainment and escapism that Dragon Ball will.