What a lovely and heartfelt story!

"Perfect World" deals with some very difficult topics, like learning how to cope and live with a disability, and manages to narrate the story with a lot of dignity. I liked the pure emotion of the characters that just their facial expressions spoke more than the dialogue itself sometimes.

Kawana and Ayukawa are very genuine characters and I can't wait to see where their story goes!!

This is a romance manga, but if you paid close attention to the cover, the guy is on a wheelchair, so that is your first sign that this isn't your typical story. It's really nice to read a story not based on cliché plots with rich guys, damsels in distress and teenage love triangles. This manga offers more than just romantic enjoyment; the story lets you see the physical and emotional struggles of someone with spinal cord injury. From the girl's perspective, you can see her frustration for not knowing how to help the guy she loves and her reactions as she discovers more and more about his condition. From his perspective, you can see his frustrations and life expectations.

This type of story is better suited for those who like more serious dialogues and thought provoking situations. His condition is not sugar coated: bed sores, excretory disorder, phantom pain and UTI are mentioned in this volume as well as how society treats him. Having said that, it still has your typical romance tropes, light fluffy moments and emotional punches to your heart that will keep you hoping nothing bad happens to him in the next 100 years because they are both so sweet and deserve all the happiness in the world. Now I really need to know how this story will end.

I requested a review copy from Kodansha comics. Thank you!

I hope this title sells well, because I would love to purchase a print copy for both myself and my library's collection! While it's clearly romanticized (in multiple meanings of the word), I appreciate that Aruga makes no qualms about the fact that often able-bodied people aren't good at dealing with people who have disabilities. I think much of this comes from the fact that this is a josei title, but it truly is one of the more realistic romance manga titles I have read. I really just can't say enough good things about this title and am ecstatic to see that it is only the first in a series.

This romantic drama is amazing! It's so emotional and shows the real life struggles of being in a relationship with someone who is handicapped. I love the art style and feel like the writer really conveyed the emotions behind each character really well. I got so sucked into this manga and can't wait for volume 2!

Kawana is 26 years old and works for an interior design company called Cranberries. She shows up for a collaborative meeting with an architecture company called Sakuragaoka and unexpectedly sees her childhood friend and secret school crush Ayukawa. She fumbles awkwardly through the meeting, focusing more on how handsome her old crush is and doesn't realize until it's over that Ayukawa is in a wheelchair. She doesn't know what to think except that she doesn't understand disability and doesn't think she could ever date someone in that circumstance. They go out to eat to catch up and she has so much fun talking to him that their friendship renews. Now what will she do about these old feeling that have reignited?

I recieved this manga from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Perfect World is a gentle romantic manga story about a young woman who falls in love with a young man who attended the same high school as her when they were teenagers. Back then Tsugumi (the young woman) had a big crush on Itsuki, but nothing ever came of it because he had a girl friend and so that was that.

Now, many years later Tsugumi meets Itsuki at a work party. She is quite shocked to meet her unrequited love once more, but she is even more shocked when she realises that he is in a wheelchair.

Tsugumi realises her feelings for Itsuki haven't changed but this is a new Itsuki with a serious disability and she isn't sure she can love someone with such a serious condition. She has doubts but as they work together Tsugumi gets to learn what it is to love and slowly her feelings for Itsuki come to life.

Unfortunately for her Itsuki isn't looking for love. His one serious girlfriend left him after his accident and so he now puts all his energy into his job and that's it, but can Tsugumi overcome Itsuki's fears with her love? Is there a chance for their love despite the challenges he faces?

I thought this was a lovely manga story. Tsugumi has both doubts and disappointments about Itsuki. It hurts her to see her former high school crush in a wheelchair. She then starts to see life through his eyes and it isn't an easy experience but does she really want to give up her second opportunity to love someone she once felt so strongly about? As she considers these issues she grows closer to Itsuki but she doesn't know if her feelings for him are real, or if they are enough to sustain a relationship. Gradually she is able to answer some of her questions herself but Itsuki also has questions and she might not be the only one who is hesitant about getting involved.

I enjoyed this. The artwork is lovely and the story is gentle, but also emotional. The mangaka has done a brilliant job with the art and conveys the story through her drawing and prose. This is the first book in the series and if you like manga it will be well worth following this series.

Copy provided via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

The artwork in this manga was beautiful. It really popped with lots of detail to keep you interested
but not enough to take away from the story. The thing that I did like the most about this book was
even though it was about a young man who gets hurt and has to live in a wheelchair for the rest
of his life. It shows the struggles and how he was still having a hard time with it even
though people were trying their best to help him. Quick read that had you really rooting
for the couple all the way through. If you like mangas then this is one that you need
to read.

A twenty-something interior designer meets her high school crush when they work on the same architecture project together. He was in an accident in college and uses a wheelchair to get around. This is a touching drama with plenty of emotion. Recommended for fans of romance manga.

* ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

I love manga and when I read the premise of this I knew I had to try it. I haven’t read many manga stories that include disability, so I was interested to see how this potential love story would unfold. I enjoyed this one a lot. I liked seeing how realistically the characters were portrayed. Having a disability isn’t easy and often times not so pretty emotions and thoughts pop up and I was glad the mangaka didn’t sugar coat any of it. While serious and sometimes frustrating, there were some really cute moments too. I also liked learning a little bit about SCI and all the complications it can have relating to it. Will be picking up vol 2 when it’s releases

Bonus is the art is pretty too 💕

I loved this manga and can't wait to read the rest of the series! The art style is wonderful and I really liked both Kawana and Ayukawa. The story gives a realistic view of what life is like for someone living in a wheel chair due to a spinal injury and the complications that come with it.

Kawana is initially put off by Ayukawa's disability but steadily sees past his wheelchair and sees him for the determined young man that she's always known. I appreciated the way that things are handled between the main two characters; Kawana cares for Ayukawa and feels sympathy and compassion for him, but she also acknowledges that she doesn't know a thing about his world and can barely even begin to understand what he goes through.

I think that this manga can be really great and tells an important story. There are not enough disabled main characters in literature and so it's refreshing to see it discussed with honesty.

This is a touching story about a girl who reconnects as an adult with the boy she had a crush on in high school, and finds he’s suffered an accident that’s left him wheelchair bound. Her eyes are opened to privileges she enjoys as an abled person, and the struggles he (and by extension his loved ones) face. It’s sweet and the illustrations are beautiful, and both characters have some soul searching and personal growth.

First of all I should tell you that I requested this first volume of Perfect World for its cover and its synopsis. I intend to read diverse books and it’s not often that I come across books with a disabled person as one of the main characters. I picked it up for this, and for personal reasons.

Kawana starts working with her high school crush, they had been friends back then until he started dating another girl and that tore them apart. He was so smart, so lively and so determined to see his dream of being an architect come true. And that hasn’t changed. Ayukawa is the same optimistic man he used to be as a boy, his enthusiasm for his work is so encouraging that Kawana feels inspired by him. She, on her part, had given up her dream of being an illustrator but her job as an interior designer is what brought them together again and she’s thankful for it. But…

Ayukawa had an accident that left him with a spinal cord injury. He was on his third year of college. He was riding his bike when a car run over him making a mess of his body and since then he’s in a wheelchair. Kawana is shocked, so shocked that, at first, she reacts like everyone else does. Doubting herself, feeling outraged because she liked him but now… she can’t even think of being friends with him.

Ayukawa is so strong, so positive that little by little he gives her little lessons about what it is like to live in a wheelchair. What it feels like to live in a society where being disabled is unthinkable… or so it seems, because of the many hardships he encounters in his everyday life. And yet Ayukawa never loses his smile, he’s always encouraging and hardworking, trying alternatives when he reaches a dead end, both in his job and in his life.

Soon Kawana, as she gets closer and closer to him, learns that most of the smiles are just for show. Ayukawa’s experiences inspire Kawana, she starts learning, she changes and she falls in love with Ayukawa again, only this time she falls deeper than ever. But, as he did with his former girlfriend, Ayukawa pushes her away, he doesn’t want to be a burden, he doesn’t want anyone to feel responsible for him or look after him everytime he gets a fever or ghost pain (a pain you feel when one of your limbs isn’t there anymore or it doesn’t have sensitivity). It’ll be the time for Kawana to teach him the most important lesson of them all… love gives us strength to do anything, to bear anything.

I really loved this manga, and I wish everyone read it. It’s so important. Not only because representation matters but also because mangas, books, movies, etc, that show what it feels to live as a person with disabilities. I loved that everyday barriers are shown in the manga; both physical (stairs, for example) and personal (speaking behind their back, fear of certain topics).

There is a moment in which Kawana stops thinking about how Ayukawa’s situation affects her, up to that moment she thinks about herself. And eventually she starts thinking about him, his life and what it must feel like for him. I started to really like her then. I saw that she was just scared and that’s understandable, even Ayukawa tells her so. That’s the kind of change I would like to see in today’s society. We need to be more human.

It’s really eyeopening the fact that Kawana (at the beginning) says things like: “Ayukawa is strong, determined, intelligent, talented, hardworking, encouraging, and a really good friend… despite being in a wheelchair” please don’t hate her for saying it. This is exactly how people in general react towards disabilities. But thankfully in the manga there are people who tell her “That’s who he is, everything you said, that’s his personality… what does all that have to do with the wheelchair?”. This kind of people also exists in our society, and I’m grateful for that, because they bring hope for the future.

This little book was meant as a standalone but it was so important and it’s so incredibly beautiful and moving that people wanted more of Ayukawa’s and Kawana’s story, therefore Rie Aruga created a series around them. I hope and wish that one day it is published in my country so I can recommend it to everyone, and buy it for all of my friends’ birthdays and Christmases.

This was both a different kind of romance based manga for me and eerily similar.

Firstly - I'm not disabled and I have not done any sort of in depth research into it. Nor do I know anyone who is on level with Ayukawa (Itsuki)'s disability. So my views are from my own POV, which much like Kawana's are well intentioned but uninformed.

The art of this book is pretty - rough at times, but as I understand this is a debut manga so the polish isn't there yet. Its not anything above average, but its easy on the eyes. The pacing is somewhat rough as well though - the book is mainly from Kawana's POV, but it jumps to Ayukawa for a chapter or so before going back, so that took a minute for me to catch on to.

As to the story - I appreciate that this wasn't an instant "MY LOVE WILL OVERCOME THIS" scenario. Kawana, moreso than Ayukawa gives her credit for, tries to be honest with herself about how the idea of a relationship with Ayukawa would be. She doesn't shy away from the fact that she doesn't feel confident in her ability to help him in all the ways he needs, but she remains consistent that she wants to learn more. She wants to understand what Ayukawa is going through - good and bad, past and present - so they can build something true together.

By contrast Ayukawa is very defeatist. He's determined in his professional life, but his personal life? He's given up because he doesn't want to lean on someone or be a burden. His feelings came across quite well sometimes (when he's talking with Haruto about how hard it can be or when he's discussing what happened with his ex), but it felt at first he used the blunt reality of his disability as a shield as well. This didn't always come across as cleanly as it could have however.

We go through a few awfully coincidental occurrences to test their burgeoning relationship, but really none of that is any different than your typical romance where suddenly his ex, their friends and sudden family appearance test a couple.

I'm looking forward to seeing where this series goes once Ayukawa and Kawana have begun to be more honest with each other about expectations.

I received this manga from Netgalley in exchange of an honest review.

Ahhhhhhhhh, this was just fabulous, sweet, heartbreaking, beautiful. Really, I would warn everyone to bring tissues when you are reading this one. You will need those. Tears were just streaming down my cheeks while reading. I am still all teary from this beautiful volume.

Tsugumi reunites with her crush from high school, Itsuki, during a get-together from her firm (interior design) and his firm (architecture). She is happy to see him and her love is immediately rekindled, but then finds out that her crush isn't having such a good life as she thought he was having. He is in a wheel chair.

And from that moment the manga truly begins as Tsugumi wonders about if a relationship with a wheelchair-bound guy would work. Can you be with someone who can't do everything you can? Can you handle the care, the worries, the fact he can get sick at any moment, even die in a few years? It is a very loaded subject, and we see how Tsugumi tries to find an answer while falling deeper and deeper in love with Itsuki. She tries to help him out whenever she can, she is there for him when he is in the hospital a few times, she tries to show him that she really cares, that she really wants him as he is. That she knows that it may not last long, that it won't be easy, but that she just loves him.

Of course it isn't an easy road. Itsuki is not doing well, despite just continuing with everything. While I was impressed that he never gave up and I could also understand that he wanted to continue as he is getting great chances at the firm... at times I wanted to shake him a bit to tell him that it is OK to take a break at times, you don't need to go until your body collapses, until everything shuts down.

Haruto's story was heartbreaking. The poor guy, I hope that with what Itsuki has done for him, showed him, that he can pave a new road to something awesome. Plus I hope he can accept his girlfriend again, she has waited for him. She has been visiting for a year now, waiting, waiting. I think you don't need to be worried she may run away from you (like Itsuki's girlfriend in college did after the accident).

The ending was just perfection, I am so happy for both of them, and I hope that their romance will continue for a long time to come. Though... given several things, and I have read enough other manga, I fear that we may be going for a bad ending. I already cried tons while reading, I am not sure if I can handle a bad ending should one appear in the next volumes.

We also see how people react to a guy in a wheelchair and I frankly wanted to shake up some people. :|

The art is pretty decent, at times I felt the style didn't exactly fit with the story and the heaviness of it all.

All in all, I want to read more of series. Though again, I do hope for a good ending for Itsuki and Tsugumi.

This is an excellent piece of art dealing with a very courageous and unusual topic: how to engagé in a relationship with a disabled person. A young woman meets her high school crush after graduating only to find out that he is now wheelchair bound after a car accident caused a severe spinal cord injury that made him paralyzed from waist down as well as causing several other collateral health problems. However, his tenacity in pursuing his old dream to become a successful architect reignites her old feelings, but she has to struggle against his rejection of any ties to abled people to avoid confrontation with his. problems and the repercussions that his problems can have on other people's lives.

I plaude to how brave the author was in addressing such an unusual topic and how delicately and plausibly he developed the story. The art is also very enjoyable and I wholeheartedly recommend this comic novel.

I'm unsure how to review this manga. On one hand I really liked it. I enjoy slow-building romances and have been interested in starting a manga series, Perfect World fits the bill for both. My main problem was the treatment of our male lead in the wheelchair. Living in Canada (where most places are wheelchair accessible and if not the store will make accommodations), reading the treatment of Ayukawa was just horrible, nevermind the close-minded characters throughout the novel. I believe as a society we have moved past that. But I am not well-versed enough in Japanese culture to say if this is the case there. It may be the author's take or the culture across seas, so I'm not comfortable hating the book solely based on Ayukawa's treatment. Reading the manga through you realize that the goal is eventually to be open-minded so I'll leave a positive review. I enjoyed parts of the novel, hope the culture isn't like this overseas, and will probably read the next in the series to see what happens.

I would like to say that I enjoyed reading this. The story focuses around two friends as they reunite later in life. Life for both of them has went through many changes but for one it has been a very drastic change. This story lets you see them struggle through isolation and feelings till they seem to fk d each other at the end.

I liked that it wasn't just a superficial take on the subject--it went into unexpected detail, talking about aspects of SCI that most people wouldn't know about. The subject was handled delicately and accurately, imo. I enjoyed it.

I received an advanced copy of Perfect World from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

Tsugumi Kawana and her high school crush, Itsuki Ayukawa, reunite after many years during two companies' meeting. She soon realizes that Ayukawa is now bound to a wheelchair due to a car accident. As time goes by, she realizes she has strong feelings for him, but he keeps pushing her away, considering himself a liability.

This is a very good story. Far from light-hearted, it depicts some real problems people with spinal injuries face, as well as prejudice, and other people's perception of disabilities . It is realistic, witty, and can at times become quite sad. However, it is also a very good love story, with smart and cute dialogue at times. Its sketching is also very good and easy on the eye.

I would definitely recommend it for fans of mangas.

I received a free advanced e-copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is Volume 1 in this manga series.

I really enjoyed reading this manga, especially as I read a manga after such a long time. The story was quite sweet and emotional at the same time. However, there were times when I thought Kawana and Ayukawa seemed like teenagers, when they are supposed to be around 26 years-old.

Overall, a good read and definitely want to continue reading the series.

I got this manga as an e-arc from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Therefore, I would like to thank the publishers and Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read this manga in advance.

I'm not a huge manga reader, I've only read 5 others so far (Death Note and Horimiya). I want to read more manga and when I saw this title on Netgalley, I didn't hesitate.

Perfect World is a cute romance story about a girl falling in love with her former high school crush, only now he's in a wheelchair. He has issues accepting that he'll never walk again and how that affects his life.

I really enjoyed this manga, it was a fast and entertaining read and if I could I would immediately continue to read the sequel. My only problem with Perfect World is a problem I have with manga in general, sometimes I find it confusing to determine who is talking or what exactly is happening and I would love it if the story had more depth, but then I would be comparing the genre to actual novels, which I shouldn't do.

If you like manga or if you want to try it out for the first time, this is a nice choice that will leave you wanting for more! I gave this manga 4 stars and I hope to read more in the future! Very cute and at times a thought-provoking read. Highly recommend it!