Manga Reviews vs. Manga Recommendations

I own and read a lot of manga, and I've been wanting to start reviewing them here, but I've been struggling with how I can review the newest volumes of long series, because if you aren't already reading the series, the review would be rather useless as you can't just start at that volume. It would also be rather hard for me to go back and review volume one as a stand alone, because so much of my love or hate for that volume would be based on what I know of the plot in the remaining volumes.  So how do I review them? 

That's when I came up with the idea of doing manga reviews and manga recommendations.  So, here is the break down of the difference:

Manga Reviews:
    Will be review of only the first volume of a series.  I will do this when I'm starting a new series, or when I don't feel I've read enough of the series to do a manga recommendation. I'll rate the artwork of the volume, the characters, and the plot.  I will also give a brief synopsis of the plot. 

Manga Recommendation:
   This will be my opinion on whether you should read or pass on a full series.  I will only do this if I have read more than half of a series (or more than 10 volumes for really long series) or all of a series (if a series is under 5 volumes I must read all of them before I'll put them in this category).   I'll rate the artwork and let you know if it improves, stays the same or gets worse as the series continues.  I'll talk about whether characters grow, grow on you, or just grow annoying.  When it comes to plot, many manga can tie up one plot line and move on to a next and then a next, but I'll let you know if its episodic or if they head towards a certain goal, and more importantly, if it is an enjoyable story.  Unlike a manga review or a book review I may not give much of a plot synopsis since , for the reasons mentioned in the last sentence, but I'll make sure you know the general idea of what the series is about.

I'm going to try to post more reviews of both books and manga, but I'm not sure how many I'll be able to do in the next couple of weeks since I must focus on getting all of my Christmas presents bought, made (hoping to make Teddy bear ornaments this year), and wrapped, but after the new year you can expect a book review and a manga review or recommendation every week. 

This week I shall be posting a review of "We Were There" since I'm giving away a copy in my current giveaway.  Before the end of the month I will also be doing recommendations on both Fruits Basket and Time Stranger Kyoko, since I'm also giving them away.