The summary describes the setting as "an alternate matriarchal 1900's Asia." Which... is better than any description I could come up with. Very little gets explained in this first volume. 
 Which is my main issue. While it could be argued that the storytelling dives right in without wasting a bunch of time on exposition, this left me with very little to latch on to. Things happened, characters acted, but I was just left feeling somewhat confused. I didn't quite know what to make of them or what I was supposed to be feeling. I don't need an infodump, but a little more context would have been nice. By the time I finally started feeling like I had a grasp on the world, the volume was over. 
 A lot of that is, I'm sure, in the nature of the serial storytelling common with comics. This is where I like graphic novels so much more - the story I pick up is complete, it has its arc, I don't have to keep going through issues on blind faith that I will, at some point, figure out what the heck is going on. 
 But this is genre convention, so I supposed it isn't really fair to judge Monstress for adhering to it. People who are more comfortable with serial comics will be fine, whereas people coming from a prose background, like myself, will likely struggle. Be warned. 
 The plot itself didn't have much room to develop in such a short volume. It's a fairly standard "ancient ones vs humans and oh yes the in between people", with the twist that people can absorb an element from the ancient ones (and their mixed offspring) to gain power. It's nothing I haven't seen before. 
 The matriarchy angle is interesting. There's a particular joy to reading a comic where nearly all the characters are female, except for a handful of background characters who have very little dialogue. After so much media being the opposite, it was refreshing. 
 But it felt like it just wasn't going quite far enough. It's a matriarchy, but soldiers wear armour that accentuates their sexy at the expense of protection (boob armour! boob armour everywhere!). And while there are a few larger bodies, they are in the background. All the central adult characters are super models. It would have been nice to have a little more variety. 
 That said, the main character is an amputee, and that is just wonderful to see. 
 Where the series really sells itself is in the artwork. It's sort of art nouveau inspired, and it is so gorgeous. Every single panel is rich with detail. From what I can judge of the first volume, it's the artwork where this series is distinguishing itself. It's the artwork that's going to make people giving volume 2 a chance.