Tokyo Boys & Girls, Vol. 1

This is a really good series, who just keeps getting better and better, for each volume. In the first volume I had some trouble distinguishing between the characters.. as there were three people with almost the same hairstyle and face.. But once you get down that Haruta has dark roots (which means he's the only one with bleached hair.. the others are just drawn that way) then you're good.It's sweet, exciting, and fun.. a but angsty at times- as it should be ;) There is character development.. and they just get more and more loveable (or in the one case- annoying) for every page. It's from the mid- nineties. I mention this because the clothes are not as up to date as in many other mangas.. but it's loveley, and sometimes it's nice to read series who are only five volumes.. cuz who really have the patience to wait 3-4 years for that 27-volume series to come to an end?Do yourself a favor and buy it today ;)I also recommend Korean Manhwa "Goong", Miki Aiharas "Hot Gimmick", immensly cute and beautifully drawn "Merupuri", and for those with connections= anything by Korean manga artist Hwang Mi Ri, especcially "Hot blooded woman" about tough female gang leader Ha Ji,(Jijang of her highschool) is great.

This story is very similar to Hot Gimmick (by the same author): young girl, cute, sweet and nice-looking, becomes the target of several guys and one just happens to be a childhood friend she has totally forgotten about. Only one thing can come from that...It's a good volume, not much story, but you're introduced to all the characters and prepared for the rest of the story. The old early 90's manga art may be shocking to see especially since the style on the cover is simlar to the author's newer work but once you get past it, you have a fun cute story!

"Tokyo Boys and Girls", the newest effort by Manga artist Miki Aihara that is currently being released by Shojo beat, starts off with a basic premise. Mimori Kosaka is a new student at Meidai Attached High School. On the first day she befriends the beautiful Nana Taikaichi after managing to secure herself a window seat. Why is the placement so important? Well, in an all girls section of the high school with only a courtyard separating the girls from the boy's side of the school it becomes a strategic location to meet and be scoped out by all of the available young men... And Mimori has every hope of acquiring a handsome boyfriend this year. Her hopes are soon dashed when she is elected by her peers to become the class rep, which basically means she'll spend the better part of her time running errands for the teachers, but what she fails to realize is that many of the errands involve delivering things to the boy's side of the school... which naturally puts her in a good position to be in with the guys.On her first trip she encounters a young man with bleach blonde hair whom Nana informs her is a member of the West Tokyo Biker gang. The young man stays in her mind even when she chooses Nana to be her assistant rep and they make more trips over to the boy`s side. Eventually she reveals who she is, and to the young man's surprise she turns out to be a woman whom he's declared revenge upon. Apparently his name is Atsushi Haruta, and he and she were classmates in grade school, but the funny thing is that Mimori has no idea who he is. Things become even more complicated when an accident caused by Mimori erases a computer disc of a few classmates of Atsushi's. One of the classmates is a young man named Kazukita Kuniyasu, a young man whom Nana met in cram school and has developed quite a crush on. The other boy, Ran Shingyoji, is the one who is really distraught over the loss of the disc, as it was his and Kuniyasu's entry to a yearly video game contest. Suddenly everyone wants revenge against Mimori, and the three men band together to achieve this end.While this concept is not as attention getting as Aihara's "Hot Gimmick", it is definitely a worthwhile read. Because there is not the same amount of shock value we get to know the characters of a more natural momentum. Also, there is the fact that several of the people want to be in relationships with one another... Ran likes Nana, who likes Kuniyasu... who likes to remain unattached but for some reason is drawn to Mimori... and then there's Mimori who can't help but think about Haruta, even though he has sworn revenge on her... Who exactly was he from her past?The art from the manga is very well done, and the characters are wonderfully flawed and engaging. Overall, a wonderful read, something I intend on keeping up with in the future.

Mimori Kosaka has a few simple requests of God. She wants to get accepted into Medai Attached High School. She wants to wear the uniform and be cute. Lastly, she wants to spend her high school years with a handsome boyfriend. Two of these wishes come true. She gets accepted into Medai, one of the best schools in the city, and of course, she gets to wear the uniform, but the third one is running into a bit of difficulty. It's kinda hard to meet the guys because the school is split into two halves, male and female. The boys and girls can still SEE each other through the windows across from each other so it's not very hard to scope each other out from a distance. Mimori makes a new friend quickly in Nana Takaichi, who is as beautiful as she is naive. Mimori is a bit tougher and more of a tomboy. Mimori's personality also lands her the job of being class representative. On the boyfriend front, things are looking pretty ugly. Atsushi Haruta holds a grudge against Mimori for something Mimori did to him back in elementary school and swears revenge against her. Mimori doesn't even remember him! Ran is another guy that dislikes Mimori, but at least she knows the reason. She ruined a computer game he was developing for a contest. And then there's Kuniyasu, the resident stud, who goes along with the other two guys because he's a jerk, or maybe he's just bored.I liked Tokyo Boys & Girls because I know how awkward going to a new school can be and also because we've all had days when everything went completely wrong. Or you unintentionally upset people and made them dislike you. These are all just human things that happen to all of us. So in this respect, Mimori is a sympathetic character. Watching her interact with the guys is pretty funny at times. One problem I had with this book was in the sometimes cliched storytelling. The biggest example of this is the conflict between Mimori and Haruta. Everytime he's on the verge of telling her what she did to him, another character shows up to interrupt the story, and so the author pulls the carrot back and hits us with the stick. This happens again and again, and it gets annoying. I'm sure the secret, once revealed, will not warrant all this bait and switching. The art at least never fell into bad shojo shortcuts and retained normal looking designs instead of rail-thin bishonen Clamp ostriches. Volume 1 was interesting enough to make me read Volume 2, where I HOPE Haruta will reveal his grudge so we can move on with the story.