Ever since Tohru Honda discovered the Zodiac secret of the Sohma clan, her eyes have been opened to the world of magic and wonder. But with such a great secret comes great responsibility. When her best friends Hana and Uo come to the Sohma house for a sleepover, Tohru has her work cut out for her keeping the cat in the bag and the dog on a leash. Tohru's friends are naturally a little suspicious about her living with three men, and so they decide to check the place out and stay the night. Naturally this leads to many silly hi-jinks involving the Sohma's being accidentally transformed into their Zodiac animal forms. But more importantly it gives a chance for character development to Uo and Hana, as well as giving insight into the relationship between the three girls. Tohru was both girls' first friend, so they're very protective of her, especially now since her mother died. So when they heard that she had previously been living in a tent alone in the woods, and now living with Yuki and Kyo, they were of course deeply concerned since she had neglected to tell them. It's obvious that her friends care about Tohru more than she realizes. Tohru has a chance to meet two more members of the Sohma family during the school culture festival. Momiji, a young half-German half-Japanese boy, and Hatori an older man and the family doctor of the Sohmas. Hatori takes a special interest in Tohru and her involvement with the family, and warns her that it would be best if she stopped being involved with them. His reason for this is because in the past, he was forced to erase his fiance's memories when the head of the family, Akito, didn't want them to get married. He knows that Akito is using Tohru for something and doesn't want to see her get hurt. Hatori's story is the first glimpse we get into what it's like to carry the Sohma curse and how it can hurt the people around them. The second volume of Fruits Basket carries on much like the first. There's an overwhelming amount of humour found it in with Yuki being forced to crossdress during the culture festival, and Tohru accidentally finding out Hatori's strange animal form. The introduction of Hatori and his warning to Tohru give the first impression that there might be some underlying plot to the events going on, though what that is isn't entirely clear at this point. There's also a fairly touching moment when Yuki and Kyo decide to defy family orders and spend New Years with Tohru instead of leaving her alone to go to the Sohma family celebration. Just like in the first volume, the word onigiri remains untranslated whenever it's used. I still don't see how this serves any purpose or why they can't just put rice-ball. Another problem is that sound effects are not translated on the actual pages. Normally sound effects will have a translation written under them, or in the margin if need be. But for Fruits Basket TOKYOPOP instead chose to just have translations for every sound effect compiled on a couple pages in the back of the book. These pages don't really help though, because you would need to constantly flip back and forth to get any use out of them. I've also never really liked the use of honorifics in a translation, but that's become so common that I barely care at this point. Fruits Basket continues to be a fun series with plenty of humour and interesting characters. Hatori's backstory alone makes this volume a good read, and his warning to Tohru leaves one wondering how the plot is going to develop. I definitely recommend reading it. <iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=anthsrevi-20&amp;o=1&amp;p=8&amp;l=bpl&amp;asins=B001O9CE1E&amp;fc1=D5D3D3&amp;IS2=1&amp;lt1=_blank&amp;m=amazon&amp;lc1=0000FF&amp;bc1=000000&amp;bg1=121212&amp;f=ifr" style="height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>
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