Seiji Utsumi is a second year high school student who has a secret crush on the captain of the schools tennis club, Shou Ikatani. He is discovered secretly watching practice one day by club member Yuki Kurokawa. Instead of exposing him, Yuki tells him shes going to make his dream of dating their senpai reality. Her first stop is by making him join the club. When Seiji seems to be more comfortable being in contact with his crush, Yuki forces him to take Shou on a date and then confess to her. When he is turned down Yuki helps nurse Seiji from the land of despair. With all the time spent together and the weakness in his heart, Seiji starts to fall for Yuki. After some reluctance she agrees to date him, but a secret from her past haunts their relationship. Seiji's previous feelings for Shou, who has also started to experience heartbreak, complicate the tenuous relationship even further. Can Seiji figure out what he has to do to prevent loosing the girl he keeps falling deeper in love with or will his awkwardness and confusion cause himself and those around him nothing but pain?
This is a pretty typical shounen high school romance. Seiji isn't much on anyone's radar and he whiles away his days with his small group of friends. Much of the plot devices used stem from inadequacy in teen romance, misunderstandings and the difficulties of being children while trying to become adults. It reminded me heavily of Suzuka, for more than just the sports sub-theme. While not a harem title there does develop a list of women who enter Seiji's life and tend to cause issues with him accomplishing his goals. Seiji though, does not fall much into the typical pervert character archetpye. There was a fair amount of fanservice, but unlike many similar titles not much of it seemed out of place. Some of it was there for comedic purposes instead of fap material. At times the road blocks thrown in front of Seiji were a bit frustrating and I am sure if I had read this series on a weekly basis some of the story arcs would have really pissed me off, unneeded story to stretch the title out longer than it needed to be. While the series wouldn't be hurt by trimming some of these small arcs out they didn't adversely affect the overall feel of the story. Honestly, this is the best shounen romance manga I have read and I really enjoyed most of it. My biggest complaint would be the arc before the climax of the story, it seemed a bit out of place and took the series in a direction that seemed wrong. However, the way it tied into the ending made it less out of place, so it worked out in the end. This series also seemed to be tied more to reality than many others, dealing with the way people really act and behave. Many times shounen romances take things a bit...dramatically and frequently use things that wouldn't normally happen. There are some unrealistic things in this story, like a pretty casual lack of parental concern across the board. The series does touch on some real and important items which I always like seeing in this large world of fantasy. Subjects as self image issues, depression, suicide and the always present molestation problem in Japan. I like seeing these dips into hard reality. Too much of manga and anime trying to gloss over the darker aspects of society in Japan and I always welcome their inclusion into a story. Too many people outside of Japan can get wrapped up in this false idolized land where the only problems people face are if the school sells out of melon bread or missing the last train home. Japan is the same as anywhere else and the people who life there are the same as anyone else. We all share similar experiences in life and can relate to them across the board, so its great to see that laid bare.
All in all I really did enjoy this series and would like to see it animated, if done properly. Given that it recently ended there is a glimmer of hope it could be animated...one can only hope. As of now though, it is not licensed in North America, but is being released in France.
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