In high school, a friend of mine insisted I read these books. She described her own reaction as, "Why have I waited so long?" and how much she had liked them. I finally said okay, borrowed the first three? books from her...and read through them all in one night. I couldn't put them down. I stopped at the fourth book, though. I didn't have the attention span to continue the series. That's common with me as an adult; I rarely read series past the first book. So, back then, I read those first three manga and my reaction, too, was, "Why have I waited so long?" I freakin' -adored- the series, and identified so much with Yuki. I was trying to become a professional novelist. Eighteen years later, I became an amateur playwright and I'm so pleased. But back as a teen, I was arrogant as shit. I saw myself in Yuki a lot. As an adult...I am realizing over and over how much I have changed as a person now that I have more life experience and am a more critical reader. This is the definition of melodrama, and it's fucking stupid. This is Enemies to Lovers on complete fast-forward. Shuichi is eighteen and in high school, but he acts like he's twelve or even younger. Yuki is twenty-two, and high schoolers dating people older than them squicks me out. Nineteen dating eighteen or something, fine. Other than that--you're dating someone who still has homework and is still surrounded by children. Teenagers are slightly older children. Yuki is engaging sexually with someone who is mentally, and maybe even physically, still a child. I know people who didn't finish puberty until they were nearly nineteen. Squick squick squick.

So nothing happens in this first volume, to the extent that...I wonder if I somehow read the scans wrong, or they were cut off at an odd point. Yes, the wind blows his lyrics out of his hands, and yes, he jumps in front of Yuki's car FUCKING MORON YOU COULD HAVE BEEN KILLED. It's a desperate, desperate bid for his attention and UGH. I totally bought it as a teenager, too, given that the melodrama was so high! I questioned NOTHING. Not Shuichi's stalking of Yuki, not his harrassment of Yuki, not Hiro's arguable sexualization of Shuichi. Shuichi seemed not to notice this, though. He's willfully ignorant of a bunch of stuff and comes across as stupid plus naive. Yuki and Shuichi met ONCE for less than five minutes when the lyrics blew away, and Shuichi unleashed his considerable stalker powers and unhinged emotions. This is marketed as EROTICA. Nothing happens sexually in the first volume I read, and I remember even sixteen years ago, consent was blurred when it DID happen.

I had no idea I would wind up hating the first volume so much. Friendships are not shown. We, the audience, are just supposed to accept it. Yuki's a bestselling romance author at twenty-two? Sounds like plagiarism to me. I've--it--it's just so unlikely. There's no romance or chemistry between Shuichi or Yuki. Yuki hates him and Shuichi won't leave him alone. Tohma is just tossed in there for no reason. Yuki's sister is there to--what? Shuichi jumps to conclusions so much that I'm wondering if he doesn't have back injuries yet. Shut up and slow down, little boy. To the adults in this: stop laughing at him, sit him down, and explain his behavior is wrong. You irresponsible jerks are just encouraging him.

This is a terrible introduction to yaoi manga, dated and melodramatic even for its time, and I wouldn't recommend it for anyone. It's boring, repetitive, and stupid. I'd say go read "Kizuna" or "Loveless," but those books can be acquired tastes. I remember being shocked by how blunt ""Kizuna" was compared to "Gravitation," which is shonen-ai in comparison. "Loveless" had an actual plot, which I couldn't get into at the time so I put it down. Shrug. ( )

I saw the anime before attempting to read the manga. Just to let you know, they're very different.

The manga has some definite non-con that the anime glosses over. Shuichi and Eiri meet at a different point in their life--Shuichi is still in high school for one thing and is living at home with his mother and sister.

Basically, I went into this manga with some preconceived notions of what was going to happen that I immediately had shattered. Your first sign that the manga and anime have diverged? The drawing style is very different--where did my pink haired cutie go???

This was a very average shounen-ai manga that has sentimental value at least as one of the very first of the genre to cross the Japanese-English language barrier. ( )