Wow, WOW. this is the slowest of slow burns and yes, keep me in those pits!! This was honestly such a beautiful read full of high school love, boyhood, longing, and friendship. I'm just, in tears, no words. I'm really curious about the cliffhanger and where that will lead

Koimonogatari is a collection of short stories on BL. The art is goodso are the stories. The first one was my fav. There is something about love in high school that is so endearing to me, maybe nostalgia but I like these feelings. Also, it's so good to read wholesome BLs.

Bland, boring characters. People getting over homophobia is an important topic, but it's not handled well here, with the gay character treated like an object instead of a character in his own right.

Koimonogatari: Love Story by Tohru Tagura

I did have some difficulty reading the manga because the quality was low. It would be the only thing that I would complain about but I managed. The artwork was lovely and enjoyable throughout the story. I liked the slow build-up and knowing what was going to happen. It still had a lovely charm to the characters. Enjoyed the story overall.

I received this arc from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!

I really wanted to be able to read this ARC that was so graciously extended to me but was unable to. The version that was offered for me to read was difficult to parse the words due to the low quality nature of the images that the PDF were created from. I hope I'm able to pick this and enjoy it in the future

I just want to say that the cover is pretty and the art style was the main reason I got interested in this BL manga.

HOWEVER. This might be the most disappointing BL manga I've ever read.

I don't mind a slow burn romance but this one isn't just it. It was just way TOO SLOW. The characters were bland. I just couldn't connect to them most of the times and it's just sad as I think it's kind of an entertaining read but the pacing and characters just put it off and made the story draggy.

I really liked the cute scenes but that just it. I think I'll be picking up the 2nd volume but not too soon.

Digital file was really difficult to read, but from what I could make out, this was a sweet story about being comfortable with yourself. It was a really slow story, so definitely something readers would have to commit to.

I received an early copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

There were some issues with this book. I tried to open it but the pages were so blurry that I couldn't understand anything. The images were not clear, so I don't have any views regarding the plot or characters.

The main character pissed me off with his thoughts on the boy. I didn't care much for this at all. The plot was just annoying as well.

It doesnt support or open after I download the pdf version of it. It's also not showing in my shelf in netgalley and I cant open it to read Please look into the issue and if you can send me the pdf in my mail ID- taniagungunsarkar@gmail.com I cant read the book from here. Please look into the issue

When I first saw this manga on Netgalley I was instantly drawn to it. I’ve been trying to get more into manga and after reading the description I knew I wanted to read it.

In this manga we follow Yuji, who, after accidentally overhearing his classmate Yamato confessing to another friend that he's gay, his perspective shifts. Yuji only wants Yamato to be happy, and to be able to express his true self.

First I have to make a comment about the format of the manga provided, it definitely was not the best, you could hardly read the text boxes because of how blurry it was, some pages overlapped with each other and you couldn’t zoom in. So it definitely was a struggle to get into.

I am really sad to say that I didn’t quite enjoy this manga as much as I wanted to. It was so slow, it took forever for anything interesting the happen and taking into consideration the format I just wanted it to end.

Another problem I had was the fact that all the characters looked the same to me, they all had similar expressions, dressed similarly and overall I couldn’t distinguish between them. Because of this I couldn’t connect to the story because by the time I was able to tell them apart I no longer cared.

Although I had trouble with the manga I immensely appreciate the message the author is trying to portray. I loved how Yuji was always supportive of Yamato and I really enjoyed the friendship aspect (because even though this is marketed as a romance it was much more of a friendship).

If I find a physical copy of the manga I will definitely pick it up and give it another chance and maybe even consider continuing on with the series. Like I said most of my problems were due to the poor formatting of the copy I received but I was really disappointed with this one.

Thank you so much to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

So I had to DNF this book after 50% I read a good amount of the chapters and to be blunt this manga is homophobic or has a lot of harmful stereotypes in it. Obviously they could be addressed later in the manga but it was too much for me AND the characters/story was not engaging.

Other people could totally like this manga but at the same time this thought process can be very harmful, so want you to be informed.

The main character talked about how he didn't want to associate with a possible gay person just for POSSIBLY being gay. He mentions wanting to beat up the boy if he ever touches his friend.

Then the main character befriends him and realizes he was wrong BUT it's such a slow process and in my opinion his thoughts are harmful stereotypes of people who are gay but instead of accepting themselves they decide to degrade gays.

This could all change towards the end of the manga but the beginning was so blunt with homophobia with very little plot I couldn't continue. I have read plenty of books addressing self-deprecation and homophobia that dress the issues without it being problematic and very engaging.
After reading more than half I'm surprised how none of the problematic comments have been addressed.
I really didn't care for the main character, do to his previous comments, and that's why I decided to put this arc down.

And besides all the internal monologues their was really no plot. They're just kids studying so, it was a grueling read.

This are just my opinions but I wouldn't recommend this book.

i would’ve read this and most likely enjoyed it but the e-arc copy of the book cuts off each page so it’s not possible for me to read the book which is super upsetting because i was so excited for this! will get to it if i can find a better copy!

The digital file for this manga was not good. I could barely read parts and some didn’t even load. That being said, what I could read wasn’t really engaging enough to keep my attention. I wanted more from the story. I might try to pick this up in physical format to see if I change my mind.

Book provided by the publisher on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I requested this book on NetGalley mainly because I was intrigued by the cover of the manga. However, I did have problems reading the manga which impacted my enjoyment of it overall, as well as how quickly it took me to read the manga.

The plot of the manga was incredibly slow which made me not enjoy it as much, and hard to connect with the story. I did like seeing the friendship between Yuji and Yamato develop but I didn't connect with the characters beyond that. The story focuses on Yamoto's struggles being a closeted gay man, and his fears of being discovered. I like that it was the main storyline but I also felt like it lacked good execution of the story, and there was one character who was also gay that did something to Yamato that made me not like the manga as much, and question that subplot. I'm being purposefully vague but I didn't like it. Overall, when I was reading it, I was reading it more to finish it as quickly as possible as opposed to me enjoying the story. I don't think I will be picking up the next volume in the series.

In addition, the artwork made the characters look really similar. I had a hard time figuring out who was who when a character that looks like Yuji was introduced. It made it harder for me to enjoy the story because I spent a lot of time questioning who was talking.

I wouldn't recommend this manga.

This is the definition of a slow-burn - there's not really any romance yet to speak of, but we can see that Tagura is planting the seeds that will eventually grow into one. Right now it's actually a lovely story of friendship - Yuiji is just <i>there</i> for Yamato, who is struggling with being in the closet, and listening to his problems is helping Yuiji to realize what's lacking in his own life, to say nothing of the all-important realization that being gay doesn't make you less human. I'm not always a fan of slow-moving stories, but this one has me hooked, because I genuinely want the two protagonists to be happy, whatever that means.


...even if I can't always tell the characters apart from the art.

3.5

There were no contents in this ARC except for the cover.


Will look forward to read and review it when the contents are available.

Kindly fix this issue.

Hope I get to read it soon.

Thanks.

NetGalley.

This is hard to rate because the copy I received was blurry and difficult to read. Additionally, I had to skip whole panels for this reason. That said - I appreciate the thematic elements of this story and love the burgeoning friendship between the two boys as they work towards understanding each other.

I have mixed feelings about this one. On the one hand, the cover caught my attention and the artwork was lovely throughout, and I liked the premise and want to see where it will go. However, it was very slow-paced with very little happening, and while this is the first in the series it would have been nice to see a little more of the plot. I also found it difficult connecting to the characters, until towards the end of the book. That said I think this manga has potential, and I am very interested to see where it goes in future volumes.

This is a really cute manga! I loved the story line and the characters. This is a slow burn so just keep that in mind if it's not really your thing. Overall a cute start to the series.