50 Rules for Teenagers Volume 1

The desire for a normal teenage life haunts Mi-Roo. While most people her age are having fun, with little or no worries, Mi-Roo is stuck playing the role of student, homemaker, and full-time babysitter to her siblings. With a mother who is gone more than half of the time and a twin brother who serves only as a hindrance, Mi-Roo is trapped in a constant balancing act of housework and schoolwork. She's no super-hero, though, and it will take more than her undaunted determination to stay afloat! Mi-Roo doesn't mind all this responsibility, but when she meets Ma-Roo's handsome buddy Chang-Soo, she finally realizes that she wants something more from life. But in a world of worry and responsibility, can teenage Mi-Roo find time for love?

Adult/High School–Mi-Roo is about to start high school. Her mother is overseas, her father is a hardworking businessman, and her older sister is a manhwa artist chronically behind on her deadlines. So it's up to Mi-Roo to do the chores and the shopping, and take care of her younger brother, Da-Ro. She's confident and energetic and cares a lot about her family, so this would be easy–if it weren't for her twin brother, Ma-Roo, with whom she constantly clashes. Mi-Roo is a charming heroine and her brother makes a great foil, selfish where she's generous, lazy where she's industrious, and utterly incapable of getting the best of her when they fight. The characters switch between model-like beauty in static poses and more dynamic cartoon forms, which are generally used for comic effect. The change in style is initially jarring, but eventually just becomes part of the reading experience.–Susan Salpini, TASIS–The American School in England
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The first volume of this Korean manhwa series is, well, very Korean—even readers accustomed to the look of Japanese comics may be confused, not just by its cultural references, but by its storytelling techniques. In Ye-Ri's hands, very different drawing styles butt up against each other. Any given character may be drawn as a realistic, glamorous-looking teenager in one panel and as an impish, cartoony kid in the next, to underscore his or her psychological state. And there's plenty of psychological flux going on. Protagonist Mi-Roo Yoo has a heavy burden to bear for a 15-year-old entering high school: her father's a salaryman facing layoffs at his company; her twin brother, Ma-Roo, is a lucky but lazy slacker (and Mi-Roo might have a little crush on Ma-Roo's best friend); her sister, Na-Roo, is an overworked, stress-crazed manhwa artist; and Mi-Roo's pretty much the only one keeping her household going. There's not much more to the plot than mild domestic friction and social jockeying in school, and the story's wild fluctuations in tone are jarring. Also, for a major character, Mi-Roo is strangely blank; though big-hearted and resilient, she doesn't have a very distinct personality. Still, there's some entertaining material, particularly a goofy scene with Na-Roo and her fellow cartoonists frantically trying to meet a deadline.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.