Author: Arina Toshimi
Imprint: Chara Comics
Publisher: Tokuma Shoten
ISBN: vol 1 4-19-960075-2
vol 2 4-19-960115-5
Summarized by Jeanne
Kimi no Mukougawa (On Your Other Side) is Arina Toshimi's first professional manga, begun in the early 90's and not complete until six years later, a period which coincides with her peak production as a YYH doujinshika. The artstyle is classic Arina, and so are some of the characters, especially Kanako, the female in the threesome of Shou, the conflicted 'anti-hero' and Takashi, his honest and straightforward best friend from middle school.
Years ago Shou went away to Kyuushuu and never answered his best friend Takashi's letters. Suddenly he's back at Takashi's high school, rude and unfriendly, along with a beautiful girl, Kanako, who says she's his 'roommate.' What's going on? Takashi isn't the only one confused by the layers of pretence and deception that Shou and Kanako weave between them.
The plotting and revelations are classic Arina as well, much more complex than a bare bones outline can do justice to. Kanako is a fascinating oddity for a BL tale, a complex female character. An attractive girl who knows it, manipulative but also full of her own ambivalent feelings, she's very much Arina's seductive teasing make-Hiei's-head-spin Kurama, without the psychosis and in a female body. It's rare to see a girl given this much depth in any genre of manga. Takashi brings a certain interest to the usually thankless role of the 'sunao' (straightforward, uncomplex) hero, and Shou functions very well as the drop dead beautiful ice prince with the core of molten lava. Kanako's right, fundamentally she and Shou are a lot alike. The interest is in seeing how these two negotiate over Takashi. The complication of Kanako aside, the yaoi plot may not break any new ground, but it's fun going over the old terrain in Arina's company. Weeping all the way, of course.
Warning: the following are summaries, not reviews. Spoilers abounding.