this was one of very few manga i've ever read i just could not stop reading - it was like watching a traffic accident: you have to look - an amazing exposure of the cancer and pain that is the rotten center of modern celebrity culture - it is the saga of ririko, a rather plain girl who achieves super-model status through the complete subjection of her former self beneath layers of make-up, plastic surgery, pain, and drugs and her ever advancing dissolution from stone-cold beauty to stone-cold crazy and falling apart - the art is beautifully water-color sketchy and perfectly captures the mind state of our "heroine" - story is perfectly paced and draws you in like a runaway train - ririiko reminds me of similar sad stories of hollywood goddesses such as marilyn monroe, francis farmer, or veronica lake: beautiful doomed idols who will always capture the imagination of similarly lost people - a must read!!!!!!