A quick note about this ARC. The digital copy presented by Abrams is thoroughly degraded as a measure of copy protection. I don't want to rate the art based on the ARC copy alone, since the Abrams copy of this title is so thoroughly filtered that it's really hard to see the quality of the art, so I did a google image search for preview pages, and got a good sense of what it looks like. Creator Brandon Arias has developed a style that fells pretty reverential to 70's and 80'smanga, with some pretty broad cartooning for the facial expressions, and fairly realistic background elements. It looks a little Lleiji Matsumoto, a little late-career Osamu Tezuka, with some 80's/early 90's shonen sensibilities thrown in. All in all, it's pretty work and the framing has a lot of negative space to create room for emotional resonance.

However, that said, the story is particularly broad and feels a bit shallow for an anti-bullying story focussing on diverse character representation. It's not bad, but it does lack nuance. The bullies (minus lead bully Kenta, who gets his own abuse arc) are very black-and-white just plain bad, and much of the story follows Kyonosuke and Akira being threatened and beat up, over and over again. It makes for a harrowing read, with little time given over to the small triumphs of the leads. The heart is very much in the right place here, and the preview pages from other sources are gorgeous, but the narrative execution feels somewhat ham-fisted.

Thank you so much for letting me read this manga. I enjoyed reading this story. I will think about these characters for a long time.

Brandon Arias is a skateboarder, animal lover, and artist who has created a heartfelt slice of life manga.

This beautiful manga follows a disfigured boy as he moves to a new school. It is a roller-coaster of emotions as he confronts the cruel realities of the world, while also finding genuine kindness, and falling in love.

You can’t help but fall in love with the two main characters, especially Kyonoto, who displays empathy and compassion despite what he is forced to endure. The result is a book that manages to be a beacon of hope, despite not shying away from the darkness out there in the world.

I’m fascinated by this series and feel this was a really strong first volume. I’m really interested in learning more about Kyonosuke’s backstory and in seeing how Kenta fits into the story again in the future. I’m most interested though in seeing how Akira’s character is developed. There’s a lot of painful moments, but I think it’s a very realistic look at the harsher realities kids face in dealing with bullying, abuse, and queerphobic parents and peers. I will say I’m not a big fan of the art style, but it is an ARC so perhaps it’s unfinished. I got used to it after a couple chapters but it definitely makes it a bit more difficult to follow the scenes as the art is just so fuzzy. Perhaps that’s a style choice though too, it does seem to fit the mood of the story even if I’m not a personal fan of it. Either way, I definitely want to read the next volume.

The quality of the art is way too low as I really recognize most things and the story is a bit cliché though it may attract people concerned with the topic of bullying

While I applaud the effort that went into creating this story, the stage it’s in now very much felt like a first draft. The art was highly stylized, but unfortunately it was in a way that made it incredibly hard to see and comprehend what was happening. Also, even though I recognize that this is a piece of fiction, it still just felt too unrealistic for what I think the author was trying to accomplish. There needed to be a lot more foundation and development behind each character and their relationships with each other. That choppiness - and then almost every single character being abusive for some reason - was just too jarring to create the real, emotional impact that I think was intended.

I'm not entirely sure what happened, but this was so poorly drawn and rendered that it was incredibly difficult to read. What I did read was weird and did not flow well. I hope that the final copy has better artwork and lots of editing to make this readable.