A visitor arrives one day at Yaichi's doorstep. Mike and Yaichi's twin brother Ryoji, were married and lived in Canada, and while Ryoji and Mike had planned to someday travel together to Japan to introduce Mike to Ryoji's family, sadly that hope was never realized before Ryoji passed away. Arriving now alone, Mike has come to get to know Yaichi and his daughter Kana.

Wow, this book is beautiful and uplifting, and it will make you feel all of the emotions. Tagame is insanely talented at rendering human thought and emotion. The detailed scenes and conversations gives it a very autobiographical feel, though that may not necessarily be the case. Mike's eventual departure was heartbreaking — I ridiculously wanted Mike to move to Japan as Kana had bonded so strongly with him and clearly wanted her uncle in her life. ( )

Yaichi, an average Japanese man, lives with his young daughter Kana. His twin brother--who had lived overseas for many years--recently died. All of the sudden, his brother's burly Canadian husband Mike shows up on his doorstep, wanting to meet the family. Yaichi is forced to confront his own homophobia, as well as that of his neighbors, seeing a side of himself and his home he never realized was there. This leads him to deal with his previous interactions with his estranged brother, having to cope with not only the grief of losing him but realizing part of the estrangement may very well have been his own fault.

This is a touching picture of grief and complex emotions, as Yaichi views life through his own biases--one's he never realized were there in the first place--while also seeing his young daughter's innocent, carefree takes on life as she gleefully welcomes Mike into their family. Mike, meanwhile, is trying to understand a side of his husband he never really knew, and his affable nature brings joy to everyone around him.

I strongly recommend this one for anyone wanting to understand LGBTQ issues not only in Japan. The "polite" homophobia, the "cool, never talk about this again" coming out, the over-sexualization of gay men, ...this manga touches on all of them. ( )

My review of this book can be found on my YouTube Vlog at:

https://youtu.be/s7BV77eoPvA

Enjoy! ( )