Tohru Honda was living in a tent in the woods when she accidentally stumbled upon the Sohma household - and got caught up in the antics within! Whenever a cursed family member is hugged by the opposite sex, they turn into their zodiac animal. 
 I read this manga because a lot of my friends loved it. They breathed, slept, and ate Fruits Basket. Tohru's difficult past was interesting; I hope they explore it more in later volumes. Her sadness of being an outsider - of being the onigiri in the fruits basket - was touching and the most powerful scene in this volume. The rest of this installment relies on well-timed house-breaking; humor can only bring a series so far and the feeling of being an outsider was a great addition that, unfortunately, a lot of readers can relate to. 
 The issue for me in this manga was its distorted sense of time. Tohru tells the Sohmas that she lived in the tent for about a week (though during the storm, she tells Yuki she faced worse weather in the tent. Really? During that single week?). She then moves in with the Sohmas. How long does she live there? No one says, but suddenly Grandpa calls and says the renovations are done. Already? Renovations usually take months. When she goes home to Grandpa, she cries and says she wants to go back to Yuki and Kyo - but how quickly did she get attached to them? She couldn't have been there more than a week or two. Everything seemed to happen too quickly and rushed in this volume; for that reason, I couldn't get into it. 
 Right now, the characters are all caricatures; their actions are very formulaic and based heavily on their zodiac animal. This could be a byproduct of setting the story up, but I hope to see some depth and development for everyone in the next volume.