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Love Me, Love Me Not, vol. 1–3 by Io Sakisaka
VIZ Media
Publication Date: March 3, May 5, and July 7, 2020
ISBN: 9781974713097, 9781974713103, 9781974713110
When Akari moves into Yuna’s apartment building just as they begin high school, they become fast friends, but their friendship is tested when they learn they navigate crushes and relationships differently. Yuna is a cautious romantic who loves shojo manga and believes in predestined love. Akari is more practical and prefers to date before falling in love. Akari thinks Yuna might do well to date her longtime friend Kazuomi, but Yuna falls hard and fast for Akari’s stepbrother Rio. The plot thickens when Yuna learns that Rio is secretly in love with Akari—their parents are only recently married—and Akari starts to develop feelings for Kazuomi. Is everyone going to end up with a broken heart?
This fun, high drama shōjo manga is a little more quickly paced than Sakisaka’s previous series and explores the concepts of friendship and honesty in addition to all the will-they-won’t-they plotting. Recommended for fans of romance comics like Ao Haru Ride (also by Sakisaka), Love in Focus by Yoko Nogiri, or Daytime Shooting Star by Mika Yamamori, as well as romances like To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (the book by Jenny Han or the movie!) and the movie Clueless.
—Becky Standal
