Ryu’s Musings: A Husband to Belong to

ahtbt ISBN-13: 9784596951335
Language: English
Direction: Right to Left
Pages: 12
by: Marito Ai (Art), Susan Fox (Original Story)
Publisher: Harlequin K.K
Type: One-Shot
Genre: Josei, Drama, Romance

Synopsis:

Marla and Jaicey are twin sisters. They were separated at birth and reunited 24 years later, but Jaicey asks Marla to keep it a secret. She doesn’t want her loving adopted family to know about Marla yet. Jaicey’s brother, Jake, regards his sister’s new "friend" with suspicion and is mean to Marla, but she is just happy to have a family of her own, after years of loneliness. How could she have known that more suffering awaits her…?

A husband to belong to:

This is by far my favourite Harlequin release so far. Unlike the others there’s no romance as such, though we do get a wedding. However unlike other harlequin titles this one has holes the size a truck could drive through, yet i still love it.

Lets get the holes out the way, the synopsis alone is full of errors. Firstly, in the synopsis her name is spelt as Jaicey, but in the manga it’s Jaycee, minor difference true, but it’s there. Next we have them stated as twins separated at birth. Yet this is shown as untrue during the story, also doubt is cast on them actually being twins.

These are some rather large glaring holes in the story, however they aren’t killers. If you can ignore these flaws you get a really good and touching story of loss, reunion and loss again.

Marito does an excellent job of creating the characters, and i found i was really attached to them. The bond between the two girls is clearly visible, and also very touching. As we start to learn more about them, and the different lives they had lead, it’s hard not to feel something for them.

Marla especially was an excellently portrayed character. The way her life had effected her, both in the subtle ways, and the overt ways. Jaycee was also well done, with her softer upbringing coming to the fore in subtle ways, the way they come into conflict, but also together was done perfectly.

After Jaycee’s accident, the changes are perfectly done. However as you would expect with a limited page count, her recovery is rather fast. There’s very little time for the angst and emotions to build up, which is a shame.

I would have liked to see a counter to the girls earlier attachment, as well as how Marla handles the separation and rejection. However given the low page count the way it was done was for the best.

The art of the volumes is pretty decent, i liked the way the characters were designed, and the settings were developed and varied. Marito does a good job with drawing the expressions of the characters.

I would love to say Harlequin did a great job, and don’t get me wrong, on the editing side of things I’ve got no complaints. Yet i do wonder how much of the issues i mentioned were down to bad translations.

Still, i love this story and highly recommend it.

Jake took a little longer for me to grow to like, and it wasn’t until half way through the story that he grew on me. While he does end up marrying  Jake, the focus of the story is on

Author: Ryu Sheng