枯れ気に恋を咲かせます [Kareki ni Koi o Sakasemasu]

by Yōko Maki, 槙ようこ

6歳の栗澤亜純は退屈な高校生活を送っていた。ある日、亜純の前に現れたヤンキー少年！　彼の名は平松明石。亜純の友達の香名を追って転校してきたのだけど…！？

Genres: Manga

178 pages, Paperback

First published August 7, 2000

About the author

槙ようこ, Maki-sensei speaks of herself in the third person. Has a mangaka sister, Aki Mochida.

Pet: Leo, dog
Height: 164.5 cmv

Reviews

[Ya Boi Be Reading · Rating 2 out of 5]

This oneshot collection as a whole was a neat insight to Yoko Maki (the creator of Aishiteruze Baby) and some of her strengths. I do think this is a lot of her early work however before she's worked out some of the kinks in her storytelling as these all fell flat in some manner.
Don't get me wrong I did enjoy seeing her as a mangaka in these oneshots. You can tell she excels in having neat memorable set-ups, setpieces, and character dynamics. However she seems to struggle with the execution which assuming how far Aishiteruze Baby went I'm assuming she later worked out.
You also get a sorta handle on her artstyle as well. It seems she either has a squatty and stubby look or a "airpod" look like in Tokyo Revengers with long and skinny necks. SHe also seems to love shaggy hair. I enjoyed her large and wide eyes (even for shojosei) though they can get a bit fish-like because of how they're spaced.
Reviews for each below. Overall average is 2.1/5. Best was undoubtedly Heavy Crash.
Kareki ni Koi wo Sakasemasu - A manic pixie dream boy that's written way too hard to be charmingly quirky, but failing to do so making it even worse, transfers to our female leads’ school. He transfers to get closer to a friend of the female lead who he loves but is rejected. All the while the female lead finds him endearing and has her first realization of what love feels like. The concept is alright enough and neat with its focus on the sorta/sorta not love square but it's execution is very weak. It's done full-on as a romance but I didn't really connect with it. Theres not any real introspection about her blossoming feelings other than “owo i cant describe this feeling” and I feel like some stronger introspection would really drive up the romance. It just ended up a bit of a slog albeit with some neat dynamics because Maki Yoko can write up a neat setpiece or scene idea. The ending did have a cute moment with the girl using the guy's jacket for confidence before declaring her love. She draws people really squatty and stubby. I notice her nice use of screentones which is continuously well-done throughout this collection. As an aside I am shocked by how shaggy the female lead's hair is. Combine it with the block legs Yoko can draw her with she oddly looks like a Chewbacca Disneybounder. 1.75/5
Heavy Crash - Another neat idea and character dynamic set-up that the execution doesn’t live up to though it does much more than Kareki ni Koi and with like a third of the pages. It is exploring female friendships and what one who is part of a duo is without their other half. I enjoyed it's from the perspective of the one who is less successful and easier to be found as the “mooch” of the duo. I didnt vibe with this at the beginning but it grew on me. Though its odd how hard it was tell the two girls apart considering they have different hair colors but I eventually got it down pat. 2.5/5
Juicy Game - This where the long airpod necks a la Tokyo Revengers at its worst is seen. This is a middling romance whose more impressive (but still flat) angle is the message about changing yourself to fit in with your lover's family but Yoko teeters into brocon territory too awkwardly and much for my liking. 2/5
Love Service - The art here is a mix of her squatty and her airpod-y style. There is also less shaggy hair but it's still a bit there. A bad inner city girl ends up meeting and butting heads with her innocent labrador retriever country friend (maybe cousin but I dont think so but if it is ew). She's a bad girl but ends up falling for him and there's a “I don't want you” turned “I want you.” The personality mismatch was neat and falls in-line with Yoko's nice use of neat concepts and character dynamics. Sadly execution doesn't sell it again though to be fair the scanlation quality here might be hurting it a lot as I'm sure with a higher quality scanlation the dialogue would hit a lot harder and shine Yoko's strength in character dynamics. 2/5