Yoru Hioka is a mysterious resident at Hatomura Boarding House. Younger resident Masaora and boarding house landlady Sonoe discuss how mysterious he is, including how rarely he eats with the other residents. Nonetheless, Sonoe seems to understand Yoru and make him dishes he loves from time to time.

The truth us Yoru is a vampire who truly loves human food, but cannot digest it unless he has sucked human blood. At night, he kills and drains the blood of criminals in the area for his corrupt police handler, Saneatsu. As he stalks the night as a vigilante, he dreams of a delicious dinner.

My Beloved Supper has story and art by Kaho Ozaki. English translation is done by Taylor Engel, with lettering by Aila Nagamine. Published by Yen Press (September 23, 2025). Rated 16+

Erica Friedman
Rating:

If you like the modern, post-Twilight iteration of vampires—immune to crosses, sunlight, and mirrors, emo with a side of Belle Arte pathos — and food, you'll enjoy My Beloved Supper, Volume 1.

Yoru's backstory is unnecessarily complicated, presumably to allow for future volumes, but Yoru himself is sincere and easy to sympathize with. After all, who among us wouldn't prefer to eat a good meal to do some dirty spot of murder, no matter how much it needed to get done?

Yoru is being used by Saneatsu and resents it deeply. Other members of the police force know something is going on, as well. The town is safe, Yoru gets to eat food, it's a win-win. Sort of. The story is a bit grim, in the offhanded way both cops and criminals play with other people's lives, while being utterly goofy at the same time. Pretty men, ugly men, hardly any memorable women, except for Sonoe, but tons of lovingly rendered food: beef stew, meat croquettes, miso soup, oyakodon, all steaming and gleaming on plate or in bowl.

I came into this volume assuming that this was or would become a BL at some point, probably because of the art. As I read, I actually found myself hoping that Masaora and Yoru manage to break past whatever boundaries they have between them. They'd make a good couple, if that ever happens.

But that would be an added emotional extra, because the point of this story is not romance. These pages are filled with the kind of revenge we as common citizens cannot get on the predators of the world, with a side of delicious homemade cooking. Yum.

Rebecca Silverman
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I think we're probably all familiar with the idea of the food you want to eat versus the food you have to eat. For most of us, it's cookies versus fruit or something similar, but when you're a vampire like Yoru, the distinction takes on a whole new meaning. That's because Yoru desperately wants to eat human food, but because of his vampiric state, he can only do so after he eats his vegetables – meaning, of course, human blood.

That's a piece of lore that I really like in this book. According to creator Kaho Ozaki, vampires' organs aren't functional if they haven't consumed blood; they're undead, and without outside blood, there's no way a stomach can function. That means that if Yoru wants to eat a bowl of miso soup, he needs to first partake of someone's blood to ensure that his digestive system works. He needs blood to eat what he actually wants, and he can only eat one food meal per human meal. Even without the additional information that he strictly eats criminals found for him by a police detective this is an interesting case of a conflicted vampire, one who's making the best of a bad situation. After all, broccoli doesn't require killing someone to get you to cake.

But even better than the vampire mythos Ozaki is working with (and possibly creating; I don't read tons of vampire stories, but I don't recall ever coming across this bit before) is the slow realization that Yoru is barely hidden in plain sight. The policeman knows what he is, of course, but he might not be the only one, and even in a metropolis as crowded as Tokyo, there are people who remember the faces of seventy years past. That adds a beautiful bittersweetness to the volume's finale, sweet because of the care humans have been showing Yoru since he arrived in Japan, but bitter because his life is so much longer than theirs, something that will eventually leave him all alone.

My chief complaint about this book is that it isn't longer. While the central conceit of Yoru killing villains so he can eat Sonoe's home cooking doesn't lend itself to a longer series, the rest of the plot elements do, and this could easily have been at least two volumes. I feel like it was just getting started when it concluded. But I'll take what I can get here – a surprisingly sweet story that reminds me of a vampire tale in Mitsukazu Mihara's Beautiful People that sets its own rules for vampire lore.

Jean-Karlo Lemus
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I'm on the Autistic spectrum, so food can be a bit weird for me; the texture of it all can make or break the entire meal, and temperature is of absolute importance (I cannot eat cold meat). I get by because there's joy in enjoying a meal: the preparation of it, the taste of it, or maybe even the knowledge that someone took the time to make it for you. There's a lot that goes into a meal. My Beloved Supper dares to ask a painful question: what if you couldn't eat?

Protagonist Hioka is a vampire. His circumstances as a vampire aren't touched upon much, but it's made clear that while he (like other modern vampires) has managed to overcome vampiric weakness to the Sun or crosses, he cannot process ordinary food. And so even though he can move and walk among people without much issue, he's still denied the intimacy and joy that eating a meal can impart—that is, for the most part. As it turns out, Hioka can still eat ordinary food, so long as he's had a proper meal of blood first.

Much is illustrated of Hioka's dual life, evading his neighbors at a boarding house while occasionally feeding on criminals, giving the local police station headaches. And while he can't often enjoy the food the boarding house's owner cooks, much is lavished on his love and appreciation for them. It speaks to a kind of yearning you only appreciate when there's a meal you've been hungering for, but can't enjoy. I find myself fixated upon this part of the story, and how much Hioka's attachment to Sonoe's food not only grounds him, but also illustrates the love he has for this kindly elderly woman in her twilight years. Indeed, even if you're immortal, the one thing you'll come to miss the most is a good meal... and good company.

My Beloved Supper is a one-and-done, and I feel like it's stronger for it. There's much we don't know about Hioka's attachment to Sonoe... but it's very easy to fill in the gaps. There's much we don't know about his past as a vampire or how he was turned... but the few memories he shares of it speak plenty. While My Beloved Supper is a bit short, it definitely stuck with me. Definitely a surprise this season. Strongly recommended.