Toradora!

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The story is about a boy and girl who both want to become closer to their respective crushes. The boy, Ryuuji, likes the girl’s best friend. The girl, Taiga, likes Ryuuji’s best friend. Under a certain circumstance Ryuuji and Taiga form an alliance and help each other to achieve their respective goals.

The main protagonist is Ryuuji Takasu. In school, he’s feared by his scary looking face. Despite having a scary face, he loves to clean and cook. His love for cleaning is so great that he even carries cleaning materials in his school locker. In the story, he has the conflict of not being ... able to control his life since his mother practically set up how she wants it to be. That’s supposed to be Ryuuji handling house chores and studying for school while the mom works. He wants to be more independent.

Taiga Aisaka is cute and small, but she’s actually a negative, bad-mouthed, violent girl. She’s actually a strong character who can go take on an opposing person head on; except for her crush…One of her features that aren’t well known is that she’s very clumsy. Her biggest conflict in the story is running away from problems she can’t handle. She acts on emotions and becomes a hard-to-fix mess.

Minori Kushieda is Taiga’s best friend and the girl whom Ryuuji likes. She’s like yang in the yin and yang relationship with Taiga as she’s a very positive person. She’s the type of person to go all out to make other people happy. She’s liked by Ryuuji because she appears to be bright like the sun and is constantly moving forward.

Yuusaku Kitamura is Ryuuji’s best friend and the boy whom Taiga likes. His character is that of a strong and charismatic leader. He’s somewhat similar to Minori to having such traits as having a positive attitude and making others happy.

Ami Kawashima really loves being in the spotlight and puts on a personality that will make those around her like her (with the exception of a few who can see right through her). She’s good at using people to her advantage, as well as figuring out what the other person’s intentions are.

The art is pretty good. The anime's art is better, but the art of the novel is cute, especially the designs for the girls. In each chapter, there's a picture that brings out the best out of a scene it's used for.

If you’re wondering about how close the adaptation of the novel and anime are, they’re close. But there are scenes that weren’t used in the anime as it was probably hard to include everything from the novel. That’s probably the reason why the endings of anime feel like they’re being rushed. Even some random comedy scenes weren’t used in the anime too. Reading the novel takes longer than just watching the anime since everything from describing expressions to the environments is told in detail. Some of the supporting characters of the novel have more depth in them, making them stick out more than the anime versions. Since Ryuuji is the main protagonist, the story is seen through his perspective and uses many inner thoughts that weren’t used in the anime. Ami seems to be a little more developed in her character in the novel than the anime. I found the ending of the novel a little more satisfying than the anime because the development towards the end didn’t feel rushed like the anime.

If you like romance, give Toradora a try. It’s really an amazing story. At four different parts I had watery eyes. But in the anime, I only had it one time. I watched the anime first and loved it, but later I read the novel and came to love it better than the anime.

Ayy lmao let's have another review here that's an opinion from someone else. That said, most of the things here are biased.....probably

I'll cut it straight to the point right now. Toradora's a nice read. And that's what I mean. Its nice. There isn't anything I'd change in this story. That said, its not amazing either. There weren't any heart wrenching or deeply moving parts (if that's your thing) It did have its share of serious moments, but to me it was awkward because it was like it was trying to tell me something about my life but it was vague and I couldn't properly understand, ... but that's just me.

Progression itself was nice, I didn't feel like there was any time when the story felt boring. The characters are all like-able too, and the whole story had a nice flow to it. The spin-off volumes are nice too, and there is one mini-arc that concentrates on Ryuuji's dumb best friend who's name I forgot.

I haven't watched the anime yet but based on the episode least, at least the last 2 episodes don't follow the plot in the novel.

Anyhow. Toradora: a nice, lighthearted read to fill in time when travelling or before going to bed.



Since this is a review, there are gonna be spoilers and here is where I'll say some of them because I have some things I have to say about it. For example the ship that sails in the end. If you have even half a brain you'll figure out which ship sails, but you can continue to hope that its not, though the writer doesn't mercilessly shatter your dreams the way she focuses on the interactions between the characters, so you won't be heartbroken if your favourite girl didn't win.

Also I said I wouldn't change anything above, but I lied. The ending could have been better. Felt like it ended abruptly, but somehow the ending was fine. Also this being a SoL it ends the way it should end, though there could have been better closure. (I know I keep saying I want better closure, but I can't exactly explain how better I want it)


That's the end of my review. Hope that I helped someone decide if they should/should not read Toradora. Thanks for reading this probably lengthy review.

Review Toradora! in 2022 in fact, it seems useless, since we already have two other very old ones that have already gained their relevance, but as I did in the novel of Death, as someone native of Brazil, I feel obliged to come here to represent better in relation to the opinion of the people. Brazilians, who I'm sure also really like the work. My intention here is to make more people interested in the work, so everything here will be without spoilers, and I ask you to be patient, after all, it is very difficult not to do a big review since there are ... 10 volumes of 350 pages. I know very few people will read this in its entirety, but I still do it, because if I can get at least one person to read the work and enjoy it, that's enough. Oh, and I'm not going to make any comparisons to the anime, as I've never seen it.

Generally speaking, Toradora! It's...very interesting, and I actually think it's worth your time as well as your money. Of course, from the beginning understand, the work is not amazing or the most interesting I've read so far. Since the work began its publication in 2006, it is in itself full of numerous boring clichés that we see so often repeated in current novels, such that, also, the work is gigantic, precisely because it is very convoluted and having entire volumes, let's say. ... do not serve in any way for the development of the novel, but that I will give more details later. Also, we see a clear “inspiration” here, perhaps too strong, in Lovely Complex, a very old manga that is considered one of the first of the shoujo romance, which this same genre also impacts a lot here. Being negative points in my opinion, while many scenes are built on a shonen pattern, with a whole question of ecchi scenes and female characters being sexualized, scenes that tend towards drama are always extremely melodic, where there is always a certain weight, and a wealth of unnecessary details on the part of the narrator.

To better explain the point said earlier, Toradora! is rolled up, perhaps even unnecessarily. I don't think this is exactly a negative point, but I think it's important to explain it anyway. The speed with which things develop is always slow, but it is not necessarily monotonous, of course. There are entire volumes here that don't delve into the characters' development at all, and that maybe, if they were skipped, it wouldn't be so impactful. In the entire work, everything develops through “events”, so to speak, where this, this and that generate coincidences and more coincidences that deepen the characters as much as the novel and their relationship. Volume 5 is entirely an example of what I'm saying. In it, none of these “important events” take place, giving space to an entire volume focused entirely on humor, to entertain the reader with jokes.

BUT, as already said, Toradora! It is indeed very good, so this work is formed not only from negative points.

To start with the praise, I would say that the main point here would be the number of characters so captivating. As much as, by the impression, it is easy to hate them for the fact that many of them present stereotypes of common characters, they are much more interesting and well developed than it seems. It's actually easy to like them, since many of them have a huge charisma, which also comes from the humor of the work, and it's even easier to empathize with them as they are developed, especially by Taiga, for example, which starts as a very annoying stereotype of a tsundere, and ends up making you inevitably like her throughout the development of the novel. The protagonist's sad situations, for example, always make you like him. After all, he has a difficult life for being poor, and all the time he is surrounded by difficult decisions, where he always makes mistakes, but he learns from it. And of course, no one doesn't like Ami Kawashima.

Another thing worth mentioning here is the narration. I mentioned it as a negative point up there, but it's not just about bad things that it's made up of here. In fact, I like the way things are narrated precisely because they are different. Here, it is not one of the characters who narrates, but rather a narrator with an external point of view, which attracts me. Even so, things end up being narrated more from the protagonist's point of view, since his thoughts are always the ones exposed here, but this narration is precisely interesting because of how much it adds to the humorous scenes, and about how interesting it is to see the characters. facts that actually occurred as a reader, as an outsider who observes how things happen from above, not as the character himself.

One more positive point is about the humour. Honestly, I'm pretty boring when it comes to comedy when it comes to manga, novels, and anime, where I hardly see the fun in Toradora! it was indeed different. Quoting from here, it seems strange to say that a lot of text can have some kind of fun, but yes, it does. The way things are said and the narrator's comments really win over, and even when the scenes fail to be funny, the relaxed atmosphere always attracts, and generates curiosity to see what's next. Which also opens up another point here.

Also part of the narration, Toradora! at no time was it monotonous for me, coming from dramatic scenes or those with relaxed parts, inevitably they always brought me a good mood, or curiosity for what's to come next, inevitably entertaining me regardless of when.

Art also needs no introduction. Not that I think Yasu is the illustration master, or anything like that. He is a good illustrator, as are others, but what I mean is how his art, with very characteristic traits for being... cute, is like the window of Toradora!. Watching the anime, reading the novel, watching Joshiraku, inevitably makes you remember him, for having such a unique and characteristic trait, I end up seeing his art as the main representation of the work, the first thing that comes to my mind when I think of Toradora!.

I think that's it. In the end, yes, I highly recommend this novel. It has a lot of its negative points, and it's not necessarily the best thing I've ever read in my life, but I really like the work and I think it's worth the long time of those who were interested in the facts said in the review.

Thanks for reading to the end!