Mia Paluzzi

Claude likes Ben and Claude thinks Ben likes Claude and Ben does like Claude and Ben thought Claude likes Ben only Ben's friends think Claude likes Beatrice so now Ben thinks Claude likes Beatrice and that Beatrice likes Claude so who better than Beatrice's best friend Ben to help them get together...right?

Yeah, it's one of those stories. And the author isn't here to redefine or deconstruct this little genre convention either. What they have done, however, is used it to write a story so charming, romantic, and utterly endearing (without going too sickly sweet) that you simply don't care.

For one thing, it feels quite clear reading it that the author had WAY too much fun writing all that double-meaning dialog that allowed the characters to continue their misunderstanding. At times I simply sat and laughed, not because a situation was funny (though they were sometimes), but because I couldn't not laugh whenever I started wondering what on earth must have been going through the writer's head to come up with it all. The basic romantic plot may not be original, but you've GOT to be creative to pull of some of the conversations in this manga.

But as often is the case when a story manages to be good despite being mired in cliche, what really pulls this one is the characters. Romantic misunderstandings aside, the story is about Claude, who's art is technically brilliant but lacks emotion. Claude transferrers to a new art school with the hopes of escaping the fame he does not believe himself worthy of, where he not only fails to do so, but where he also runs into Ben, a photographer who calls Claude on the dissatisfaction he feels with his work. Ben, however, hopes to help Claude overcome his inability to put feelings into his art. And much as we know they whole thing comes straight from a formula, the romance actually feels decidedly more character driven than formula driven. The scenes between Claude and Ben are not just there for misunderstanding hijinks and to play with sexual tension. Through them, we see their insecurities, along with how good the two really are for each other, not just in a romantic pair sense, but in how much they can help one another grow. And yeah, when an author makes a relationship in a BL story about more than just sexual and romantic longing, actually about character growth and reasons they have to stay together besides those things... I'm pretty much sold. ^^

The art slinks a little more toward American comic style than some yaoi fans might like, with things not really on the realistic side, but still with sometimes angular body parts and faces. Though it's not my favorite kind of art style, I still find it very refreshing compared to all the identical yaoi art out there. I like the men who don't look like girls, and I love the expressiveness of it. In the end, I enjoyed it very much. (In my copy there seem to be some pages early in the volume where the blacks aren't as black as they should be, and it was always a little jolting, but the latter 3/4 seemed fine).

My biggest complaint with it would have to be the side characters. I'm not a fan of the kooky flamboinatly gay characters or couples you see in stories sometimes. One note wonders, and it's not my type of humor to begin with. (Beatrice, Ben's friend, is alright actually, but she doesn't have much screen time). However, it's hard to call them a 'weakness' in the story, as they don't really affect the 'real' story, the one between Claude and Ben, in a negative manner. They don't really 'bring the whole thing down.' They're just annoying. And a little boring.

Oftentimes I'm annoyed at how so many yaoi 'series' we see are only one volume. I find them unsatisfying. But reading this one volume, it becomes even more clear to me that it is not the length that makes these series unsatisfying, but that the writers simply aren't doing with their limited pages what they could do. Because it's what this manga does do. Annoying side characters are enough to make me not give it a full score. I feel a little weird giving it four and a half stars, though. It seems the realm of 'deeper' things. But I really enjoyed this volume so much. I think I'm going to have to give in to my simpler side here. Poor Ben and Claude just grab my heart. ^_^… (mehr)