Satsuki is rescued from a train groper by the rough looking Yamaguchi, who everybody thinks is a gangster. Turns out he’s actually a perfect student, but nobody can get past his rough exterior. Satsuki sees him for what he is though, and they might see one another in a whole other light soon…
Phew, well, this book happened. And now it is done. And I, too, am done with it. This book has enough charm to make me not dislike it, but it’s also got a banality to it that comes from Xeroxing every single story beat you expect from these ‘oh he seems shady but he’s really nice’ stories.
Seriously, if you plan to step into the ring with shojo stalwarts like Those Not-So-Sweet Boys or When We’re In Love, or any other book that has a character who isn’t what they appear, you best bring your A-game and this book might be doing its best, but for me it’s really not doing enough.
Yamaguchi is scary, everybody thinks the wrong thing, Satsuki sees him for who he really is, they grow closer, repeat. It’s not all bad - there’s a great moment at the PE storage that ends up being very polite in reality but gets twisted around completely by the students involved. Our pair’s burgeoning relationship is a lot more equal than we typically get, which isn’t terrible either.
It’s just that there is absolutely nothing here you probably haven’t seen before, from the pointless jealousy caused by assumptions to the other jerk who turns out to not be as jerk as originally suspected (this guy ends up being the most unique character I’ve seen just because of how nonsensical his actions are).
It is perfectly fine and totally nice in every way and if you needed something new in terms of a series, if not content, then this will do you just fine. There’s just… only so much you can do with this to make it novel and it isn’t really doing any of it. Honestly there’s not much more I can say about it.
3 stars, largely for being decent and inoffensive. For my money, this type of story has never been done better when it wasn’t even a shojo and it was called Toradora!. And Yamaguchi is no Ryuji any more than Satsuki is Taiga.