Kobato, by CLAMP

Kobato is something between a slice-of-life and a mystery series, with a touch of fantasy (more along the lines of xxxHolic, where the story is set in current Japan with supernatural events occurring, rather than Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, where supernatural events occur in strange worlds). On the surface it's the story of a girl named Kobato Hanato who gets a job working at a kindergarten plagued by money troubles; but below that is the mystery of why the yakuza threatening to close the kindergarten is married to the woman running it, and who Kobato really is.

Because Kobato has a wish: she wants to go somewhere. And in order to do so, she has to fill a magic bottle with the fragments of injured hearts that she has healed. I'd almost say this series has a magical girl angle, except Kobato (so far) doesn't transform and hasn't fought anyone. But the reason she asked for her job at the kindergarten was to try and help the owner of it with her problems, thereby healing her heart and making Kobato one step closer to her wish.

In addition, there's another story going on: Kobato has some kind of spirit guide (this is the best term I can think of to explain the abusive, animate stuffed animal who is helping her on her quest--think Cerberus with a lot of rage), Ioryogi, who has his own motives for wanting to see her wish come true. He has no chance of being freed from the form he's currently in unless Kobato succeeds. And Ioryogi isn't the only supernatural creature stuck in a body that isn't his own; there are other creatures, too, and it's been implied that Kobato herself isn't human (or at least, sure isn't a normal one). There's clearly something going on in the spiritual world, and Kobato is involved, regardless of whether she knows it or not.

Kobato seems like a sweet, fun read; but if you're like me and you've read a lot of CLAMP's works, a warning light probably went off as soon as I mentioned that she had a wish. The series is cute and sweet; but there's a darker undercurrent to it that has me counting pages until we learn that one character is blind in their right eye. After all, it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye: then it's CLAMP.

Kobato is translated by Yen Press, which is something of a newcomer in the field of manga, but which is a company I've always admired for both their diverse titles and their translations. The series was put on hiatus by CLAMP in 2005, and then was not so much resumed as restarted (opening at an earlier point in the timeline) in 2007. There are 5 volumes so far; 3 have been translated into English, with volume 4 coming out in May. There is also an anime of the series that ran for 24 episodes from 2009-2010, but so far it has not been brought over in subtitled or dubbed form.