Note: reviews and tags are for whole series, not just this volume 
 One thing: suspense It's a roller coaster ride, and much better than the anime, go read it. 
 If you havent read this, DO NOT click the spoiler unless you want the story ruined for you. This is one of those stories that are better not known than being spoiled. It really does ruin the suspense, and the story really falls flat. 
 (view spoiler)[Really liked the characters, especially Light, L and Matsuda. Light is a character that I like and don't like, I admire how smart he is, but it's really sad that he never felt anything for the people he manipulated. With justice as his goal, I was rooting for him to not get caught since the beginning. Near the end, he was more about making his perfect world, emphasis on 'his'. He still did get rid of criminals, but he focused less on that and more on those that were against him. It felt kind of dystopian-ish, so while I was interested in watching Light outsmart those that were after him, I was also hoping that he'd get caught. 
 I never really cared about L until the part where Light, L and Misa worked together. Between Light and L, I'd relate to L more. I really liked his unique traits. 
 And finally Matsuda the idiot lol. He really surprised me at the ending, and I liked how he still cared about Light even after he found out who he was. 
 I didn't hate L and Near, but sometimes it seemed that they were jumping to conclusions without having solid proof behind them? Idk how, but I did get that vibe. 
 The beginning was the best part. The second part is also really good, but Light stops caring about hiding who he is, and everyone just turns a blind eye to it, which was disappointingly frustrating. Please, I know you have more common sense than that... They could've cut out that part. Maybe they had their reasons, but it just made the characters look like idiots. 
 Even then, the ending had so much hype. I kind of liked how they showed how the ending happened based on both Near and Mello's efforts, but I wish they actually worked together, although it wouldn't have happened without Mello swallowing his pride. The ending was also sad. 
 (hide spoiler)] 
 Despite its shortcoming, this is one of my favorites, and I'm looking forward to rereading it.