This was my first manga ARC and I was pretty excited to receive it. That said, it turned out to be just okay to me. The art style was super cute and I really enjoyed the humor but some of the characters... not so much. It's a short standalone so that is probably why it felt rather rushed to me. All in all, it was just okay for me.

All the best yaoi tropes. Innocent little sunbeam Kouhei meets cynical play boy Takara.

They both attend the same university and Takara becomes protective of Kouhei when he sees others try to take advantage of him or when he naively stumbles into bad situations.

Of course this leads to out of the blue sexual situations, however Takara does try to move at a slow (slow for him anyway) pace just for Kouhei. And of course its luuuurve.

There's the usual wrench in the works with Kouhei's hometown friend Yuuta showing up and being a creeper and miscommunication.

I got a kick out of big bad Takara being so scared of bugs and Kouhei constantly saving him.

I'm looking for serious love by Shoko Rakuta is a quick and fun read. I felt like the love story was a little bit too rushed, but I guess it is understandable given it is a standalone and a short one nonetheless. Recommended if you'd like to spend an hour immersed in love and fun and the enemies to lover trope!

If you enjoy slice of life mangas then this is perfect for you! Fans of otome games will adore I’m Looking For Serious Love!

1.5 stars - I went into this pretty much not knowing what to expect, and at first I was pleasantly surprised. The humour was entertaining, the characters were beginning to take shape, and overall I was enjoying what I was reading. However, that slowly went away when our protagonist essentially got sexually assaulted not once, not twice, but three times. I'm not the biggest fan of dubious consent, but when a character is drunk or clearly uncomfortable during the act, then that's when I have to check out. I also feel like the title of this doesn't fit what the story is actually about, as this is not about anyone looking for love, serious or otherwise.

First of all, thank you so much for netgalley & Tokyo pop for giving me this e-ARC.....

Well, I think it's typical in BL manga where the main character getting jumped on by their soon to be lover, but isn't that rape (if we try to think about it logically)... 'I'm looking for serious love' also got the same trope. The main character, Kyouhei getting jumped on by his neighbour, Takara. Tbh, I dislike this Takara's character. He's the playboy typical type in manga, so cliche.... And then there is the thirdwheel, again so cliche...

Overall, this book is so BL typical, there is no something special about the plot and the characters. But, I enjoy it a lot !!! And the art.... Perfection 👌👌

Oh, and one point plus for the comedy 🤣🤣 the artist knew so well how to draw the expressions... I laugh so much when seeing Kyouhei's expression everytime he got news about his grandma

Granny, I love you... Just live your life being a Fangirl 💕🧑‍🦳

To start, I will say my ARC was a little difficult to read, for whatever reason my download was weird and split the pages and mixed them, nothing against the book, but I may have mixed some pages up which could influence my review.

That being said it’s a pretty standard BL manga. Originally published in Japan in 2018 it follows the stereotypical storyline for the end of the period, meaning blurred consent. I can usually look past blurred consent where there is a more developed love story that comes out of it, but with this being a one shot it just doesn’t hit the mark.

There was also some…oddities in the dialogue. Some thing’s were just worded strangely and I would have to compare to the original Japanese text to see if it’s just odd or they way it was translated. Hopefully just an odd translation that’s been adjusted for the final draft.

If you’re looking for something quick with a bit of smut, you might enjoy it, but personally I would recommend some of Tokyopop’s other yaoi titles such as Fangs or There are things I can’t tell you

This manga is not for everyone. There are many triggers within this volume: dubious consent, date drugging, sexual assault.
Kyouhei is from the countryside. He moves to Tokyo to attend university. Kyouhei is having a difficult time adjusting. His neighbor, and upperclassman, is not making it any easier.
Takara is Kyouhei’s neighbor. He is a blatant womanizer. Takara cannot help teasing his innocent, country-bumpkin neighbor. However, things take an unexpected turn when he rescues Kyouhei from a situation.
I absolutely adored this manga! It starts out on the cute side. However, further into the story, things start to mature. The ending gets raunchy and steamier.
There are some funny parts. Kyouhei and Takara compliments each othere. Takara’s experience balances Kyouhei’s inexperience. Kyouhei even balances out Takara’s insect phobia.
I cannot wait to add this title to my collection. I hope there is going to more to come.

This was funny and cute and a little bit sexy at times, but the consent bit fell into the grey area of dubious behaviour a little too often for me to recommend this 100% to everyone.

Despite the very cute concept for this manga I couldn't bring myself to like this at all.

I thought that this would be a pretty solid read but I just couldn't get past the non consensual scenes and just the general sexual assault. One of the characters ends up with a dude that literally SA''d and I hated it so much.

I went into this with only the context of the cover and the NetGalley description, and did not read any other reviews or looked up any content warnings. I was thinking this was going to be typical spicy opposites attract adult romance, but what threw me off was the lack of consent before particular activities. It made me incredibly uncomfortable to read this. At the end, you are able to see the back cover and the content warning, one of which is ‘dubious consent’. This is something I had to look up as I did not know what that meant.

After doing some research, it is not something I agree with and support. Therefore I personally would not recommend this.

The only thing I liked was the character Kyouhei, who I thought was witty and sweet.

Thank you TOKYOPOP and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

↠ 𝑩𝑳. 𝑬𝒏𝒆𝒎𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒔. 𝑶𝒑𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒊𝒕𝒆 𝒂𝒕𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕.

"I'm Looking for Serious Love" is a light and very entertaining manga to read. I found it incredulously funny and humorous. Both of the main characters are extremely cute and lovable. They are completely polar opposites which made their interactions and banter even more amusing. Kyouhei is hesitant and socially awkward where Takara is full of confidence. They balance each other well.

The romance is very adorable. The starting of it, is a bit messy. But later on, I loved the romance very very much. It was cute, hot and swoony. There are some explicit scenes. That may bother some poeple. So, I am giving you a heads up.

The art style is just gorgeous. I loved how simple yet detailed it is.

I am not sure if this manga will get a sequel or not. But I really do want more of it. There are some contents and dialogues which could have been better. Still, overall I really liked it. Highly recommended if you love Yaoi.

Thanks to netgalley for providing me an arc of this manga.

I did not like this at all sadly enough.

I did not like that all the horrible things that the main character went through in this manga where just kind of brushed over. They did not address how the main character felt experiencing all this traumatic stuff. I mean the dude got sexually assaulted multiple times and they barely acknowledge it?? The people who sexually assaulted him get away with it?? One of them even ends up as his boyfriend?? Why??

I think partially the reason why he ended up forgiving those guys who hurt him because he thinks it wasn't actually assault. The main character seems to think that just because there was no penetration, that there was no assault, which just isn't true. I hate how both their actions get brushed off. I really hate it.

"There's nothing worse than a guy who takes advantage of others." is literally the line that the "love interest" says as he takes advantage of the main character... Like dude.

Anyway to conclude my review. I sincerely hope the main character is okay after all of that and gets the therapy he probably desperately needs. I feel so bad for him. Let's hope that if there is gonna be a second volume of this, the love interest is nice and sweet to him and spoils him to death. That's the least that kid deserves.

This manga is HOT. *fans self* Like, if you're buying it in a physical bookstore it's going to come wrapped in plastic hot, haha. I also really liked the storyline. Kyouhei moves to the big city from the country, and he's got a bit of a chip on his shoulder about it. When he meets his playboy next door neighbor, it's enemies at first sight. But wait! There's more to his senpai Takara than it first appears...

The chemistry between Kyouhei and Takara is so great. VERY steamy but also sweet and sort of innocent at the same time. I love Kyouhei's reluctant change to the big city, and the friendship he builds with fellow country-boy (sorry, I don't remember your name, friendly side character!) Kyouhei's buddy and his granny are a total hoot! I would read a manga about them going to concerts - if that's all the manga was I'd be happy, haha!

Fun story. Pretty basic and simple, but good MCs and funny moments. Would read more from this author, even about these MCs.

3.5 stars. This was a fun manga and not much else. I thought the drawing style was well done and it definitely captured the spark of the moments. There was virtually no character depth or change. Just pure lust and rivalry. This part was well done and you could feel the chemistry between the characters but besides that, there was not much there. I did like the cute side story of the grandmother and the friend but the main characters had no story. If you want a sexy BL manga that is well-drawn, you might enjoy this. if you want character development and a good story, this may not be for you.

I'm Looking for Serious Love! is a pretty standard bl about two next-door neighbors, Miyazawa Kyouhei and Takara Tomohiro. At first, Kyouhei is wary of Tomohiro's big city ways, but when Tomohiro reveals his fear of bugs, Kyouhei realizes that his neighbor might be different after all.

Because I read a digital ARC, and I didn't see the back cover until I finished the book, I didn't realize it came with specific content warnings. Had I seen the content warnings, I would not have read this book. The art and story flow well, but I'm not a fan of some of the tropes employed in this book.

Content Warnings from the back of the book: Nudity, Explicit Sexual Content, Drugs/Aphrodisiac, Dubious Consent, Stalking, Voyurism


Writing and Art: Shoko Takuta

Editor: Lena Atanassova
Translator: Christine Dashiell
Copy Editor: Tina Tseng
Graphic Designer: Sol DeLeo
Editorial Associate: Janae Young
Retouching and Lettering :Vibraant Publishing Studio
Licensing Specialist: Arika Yanaka
Editor-in-Chief and Publisher: Stu Levy

While I thank Netgalley for the ARC, I was completely blindsided by how gross this book was going to be.
I had an expectation that anything that came from Tokyopop would be friendly, nice and a really cute read. The cover sure reflects that with the nice art and fun design. But after reading not only had I changed my mind, I would warn people off even thinking about reading this book.
One of my biggest issues was the amount of sexual assault they managed to cram into one small manga book that took me about half an hour to read. I'm not going to act like it added to the plot - it was simply disgusting. First, his neighbour sexually assaults him, then someone at a party is slipping drugs into everyone's drinks which once again leads to his neighbour sexually assaulting him, and then his friend from the country visits him who... also sexually assaults him.
It was like a Series of Unfortunate Events but with sexual assault and we were somehow meant to find a romance story mixed in here somewhere??
Now, I'm not someone who disagrees with the topic being brought up, but what I disagreed with was how it was used to further a 'romance' plot and how creeps are treated after.
For example, the guy at the party spiking the drink was used to create a sexual scene between the two protagonists (which was just super uncomfortable because one of them was DRUGGED). Then the country friend comes and attempts to rape the protagonist and they find out he's set up cameras in the protagonists house because... content? After this, for some reason the rapist gets to go to a fun concert with the victim's grandma because he 'looks sad and this will cheer him up' and the neighbour is like 'let's be boyfriends' because... creeps get rewarded and normalised in this book?
Not only was it a super gross read, but it normalises the idea that gay characters are predatory. That the 'nice guy' he chooses had put him in awful situations where he has to accept whatever this man is going to do with him because his other option is an even worse predatory man. Congratulations on the homophobic trope.
I expected much more from Tokyopop which has created some of my favourite mangas, but I'm honestly shocked at what I read and rethinking whether or not I'll trust this company for my reading from now on.

Yeah it's basically just hentai, definitely not for YA if you're looking to add it to your manga collection. It doesn't even have plot and the one character just touches people without their consent.

I'm Looking for Serious Love! is one of the better boys' love series actually as it portrays the guys in a more realistic manner. Kyouhei is from the country side now living in Tokyo. He meets his new neighbor, who's a womanizer called Takara. The two study at the same university and bump into each other all the time. These encounters with bickering and humor soon grow out to be something more. In a sense the plot isn't all that wondrous, but the heart of the manga is surely the relationship and how these two interact with each other. I love it how the guys are so normal and even when they eventually date, they don't act like lovestruck teenagers. This is hard to find in BL, really and thus made the manga refreshing.

The art is OK and the facial expressions are very lively, which great. The title isn't the best though, since it makes this sound your average boys' love, when this is not. If you want your guys to be actual guys, then this is for you. Perhaps I'm Looking for Serious Love! isn't amazing, but very nice still indeed.