Kaze Hikaru, Volume 1 Book

This is an odd blend as a story, but it mostly works. As historical fiction, I feel like I'm almost understanding what is going on at this pivotal point in Japanese history, but I think that reading more about the period and the advent of the shinsengumi would help. It is a point in favor of this series that it makes me want to read more, but it is a point against it that I feel a NEED to read more, in order to follow the context of the story. In this initial volume, anyway, the context just isn't fleshed out quite enough.
The story is a familiar one...a young woman disguises herself as a young man in order to achieve her goals. In this case her goal is to avenge the death of her father and elder brother, but her path is a complicated one. Having learned the way of the sword from her family, she joins a semi-official police force which is in support of the shogun's faction in the political struggles of the mid-19th century. She believes that the other faction was responsible for the deaths of her father and brother.
Her disguise and the reality of her situation gradually complicate things, and the story becomes very interesting. One of the side plots may offend some, in that there is a gay man who is out to seduce the supposedly pretty boy, and his form of seduction is far from subtle, or even ethical by our standards.
In any case, I plan to read more, but not until I can read up on the history side of the story.