Horimiya

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Horimiya is a manga that I found occasionally, and seeing just the art, I found it very interesting and showy. Reading the synopsis already came to my mind "romance in sight", so I decided to deepen into the history of manga, and finally I ended up having good hours of entertainment by reading this great show. All content posted here is my opinion about the plot, I hope you enjoy reading.

Horimiya has a simple yet enjoyable story. I say simple in terms easy to be understood, and not be common. In fact, so far, I'm finding the development of history quite interesting, doesn't evolve very ... fast, but neither slows the story, she is followed in a very natural rhythm. The plot is the style that holds the attention of who's reading, and at the end of each chapter, causes the reader wishes for more of it, wish that the next chapters are longer, or even that the month pass quicker to then read a new chapter. This is a very captivating show.

The visual in general is fairly simple, with the traits of the characters being well-crafted, and the scenary being sufficiently filled, not having many details that could give the possibility to the reader losing the focus to what's going on the scene. The character designs are very good, and in general all are very beautiful, with each having a differential which calls attention, not being so called generics.

The development of each of the characters is quite interesting too, are quite charismatic. Many of them have very original personalities, but also having no absurd or unreal characteristic, each with its mysteries, which are being shown in the course of the plot. When reading the plot and the development of his characters, can even stay imagining if this is a true story or not. On Horimiya, it's very easy the reader create affection for a character, being or not the protagonists.

About the entertainment, Horimiya is practically perfect for anyone who enjoys Slice of Life and Romance, having their stories told well very natural way. For who likes of genres, is possible spend hours reading the plot of Horimiya without getting tired, because it is a captivating storyline, without many repetitions, or so called clichés. I'm not sure if is the story itself or the charisma of the characters that hold the reader's attention. But anyway, the entertainment here is guaranteed.

Concluding, Horimiya is a great manga, recommended reading for those who like calm stories and without much agitation. And who is not accustomed to read in that story of this style, reading Horimiya has a good chance of going to like. I can say that it was something like me, because I've always been more restless styles, such as action and adventure, but reading Horimiya, I started to give greater attention to romances. Horimiya is a manga that has everything to please all your readers, or at least most of them.

UPDATED REVIEW:
(In my original review I gave Horimiya a 10 but now that I thought about it I changed it into a 9, which I'll explain why in this new updated review)

This updated review is definitely better than ny original one. Yes, this review is 95% based on my enjoyment.

Horimiya is not for everyone so if you disagree with my review then you're obviously free to do so.

I absolutely love Horimiya, the characters, comedy, romance, YOU NAME IT! The casual and simplicity of Horimiya is what makes it special!

I see a lot of people saying that Horimiya is some kind of God of Rom-com ... and I can totally see why people are saying that but I personally do not agree. There are definitely other Rom-coms out there that are better. One of the usual things I see people say about Horimiya is "tHiS sErIes hAs tOo mAnY fIllErs" and YES, IT'S SUPPOSED TO HAVE FILLERS BECAUSE IT'S A FRICKING SLICE OF LIFE! People keep forgetting that Horimiya is a slice of life romance series and people see it as some kind of romance drama for some reason.

I want to talk about Horimiya's meaningful lesson. This series shows such a deep meaning in a not dramatic way and that's what I love about it. Horimiya shows the definition of anxiety and insecurity. Miyamura, the male MC, had anxiety and insecurities so in conclusion, he never showed anyone his true self because he was scared that people might judge him for his obsession with tattoos and piercings (which is very understandable). A lot of people suffer with anxiety and insecurity like Miyamura and I think what this show is trying telling us is that we should leave our fake masks and show our true selves because it might change our lives for the better even if it's a big risk to take.

The story is simple yet it's very fun to read, I absolutely enjoyed it top to bottom

The characters are so lovable but if I had to pick one character that I don't like then maybe it's Hori. It's not that she's bad but the thing with her with the "hiding the fact that I do chores in my house" is pretty stupid, I still like her though nonetheless.

My enjoyment of this series is S tier. The chapters were so wholesome and it just warms my heart. I'm a sucker for slice of life so Horimiya is the one for me. I always saw Horimiya as my "guilty pleasure" manga but sometimes I guess I can see it as a life learning manga as well.

Overall I give it a 9. Obviously it's not a masterpiece but the enjoyment and fun that I had while reading this series is unforgettable. Horimiya will always have a special place in my heart, forever

Horimiya is the shining light amongst the excessive flood of rehashed high school romances that Japan loves to print out. But what makes this manga so special? It has the same cliché scenario, after all: a popular female lead, a shut-in otaku male lead, high school setting; the list goes on and on. The premise may be unoriginal, but Horimiya excels greatly in the one aspect that most romances fail to deliver.

Intimacy.

The amount of intimacy that can be felt between our two lovers, Hori-san and Miyamura-kun, never ceases to amaze me. Unlike most romances, their love for each other never feels forced. HERO does a ... delicate job of developing the relationship between Hori and Miyamura so that their romance doesn't seem strained but rather genuinely real.

The honest love that can be felt between Hori and Miyamura stems from HERO's portrayal of them two as actual teenagers with doubts and insecurities. not as dimwits who can't spell out whether the other person likes him or her or not without it being blasted with big blockbuster letters. Hori and Miyamura are nothing like the slow, dense protagonists that we see so frequently. Their relationship doesn't progress with a simple 'yes' or 'no' to the question "Does the other person actually like me or is she acting flustered around me and devoting all of her time to me out of sheer friendship?" Instead, HERO progresses the story of Hori and Miyamura's relationship by showing them overcoming the insecurities each person has about their feelings for each other. Hori is a very popular girl at her school, so she has to face the doubtful and negative reactions from people discovering that she's dating a "closet otaku." Miyamura, who had been ostracized all of his life, struggles to gain the self-confidence to see himself as someone who can make a great girl such as Hori happy. HERO brings in a breath of fresh air by progressing the story through Hori and Miyamura overcoming their individual flaws and the problems that arise from an odd couple such as theirs.

Despite the uncertainty Hori and Miyamura have about their relationship, Horimiya is a very lighthearted and sweet read. The interactions between not only Hori and Miyamura, but also the rest of the cast feel very natural and often caused me to grin or chuckle. The frequent jabs at Miyamura's extreme aversion of thriller movies or Hori's aggressiveness never fail to bring out a laugh from me. HERO does a superb job of balancing a carefree atmosphere with moments that give me toothaches from how sweet they were.

Horimiya's story also has refreshingly fast pacing, unlike other romances where it seems to take forever for the main couple to realize their feelings for each other. The moment from when Hori and Miyamura meet to when they start dating moves along without any conflicts that feel stretched out into many chapters. The drama of the series is dealt with immediately and any misunderstandings aren't painfully drawn out (I'm looking at you, Kimi ni Todoke).

One notable fact about Horimiya that is often unheard of amongst high school romances is that HERO continues to develop Hori and Miyamura's relationship past the confession scene and shows the hurdles they must cross to maintain their romance. HERO even eventually goes on to develop the romances between the side characters while continuing to pump out the current stage of Hori and Miyamura's relationship. Horimiya is a fresh read among the many romances who call it quits after their main characters finally start dating.

Horimiya also excels in its above-average character design. Every character is distinguishable from the others and the designs are simply eye-candy. Yet, even though Horimiya's characters look great, its background detail isn't anything special. The school windows, desks, and so on are average in terms of how high school settings go. In many panels, it's even just the characters on a white and gray background. Despite this flaw, I find the characters' designs to make up for the lack of detail, especially Miyamura's transformation from his school image to his true image.

Horimiya is the manga that kicks clichés to the side and stands firmly atop the flood of high school romances that get published so often. It brings new hope for a genre I had thought to be decent at best; my only complaint is my growing struggle to wait an entire month between chapters.

Before you decide my review is already too biased what with the perfect marks. . Do read this review and try the manga out first.
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Story: 10/10. Classic romcom story with nice, subtle changes.
Horimiya is, undeniably, a high school romance comedy. It's not something that can be argued about. Thus, you can predict the general idea of how the story goes- girl meets guy, they fall in love, but there's another who was already in love with girl. However, what makes the story so amazing (that is, for a highschool romcom) is that it takes the classic story line and adds twists to it. Sadly, ... as I want this to be a spoiler free review so you can properly enjoy the manga, I won't be able to provide any examples. Trust me when I say they are there, though, and that you will probably adore them.

Art: 9/10. Beautiful, detailled, and gorgeous; practically flawless.
As far as I can tell, almost all romcoms have beautiful art. Horimiya is not an exception. There's not much more to say here. If there are flaws in the art, they are so minor that I haven't even noticed them . . after rereading all available chapters four times.
. . Plus, the boys are pure eye candy. Just FYI. Every night, I cry when I remember that they don't exist in real life.

Character: 9/10. Nothing amazingly unique, but still loveable.
The characters are your somewhat "classic romcom characters." You have the pretty, smart, and housewife-like main female character, the handsome but broody-looking main male character, the second main male character that also likes the main female character, and the airheaded, but loving, best friend of both main characters. You can usually predict what they will do and say, but it doesn't make them any less amazing. Plus, they /do/ things that you don't expect them to at times. Furthermore, they go through a surprising amount of development; even some of the minor characters.

Enjoyment: 10/10.
How could I not enjoy this? As a person who is tired of the usual animes and mangas found in the shoujo genre, Horimiya is not just a breath of fresh air- it is a whole, friggin' whirlwind. But a good whirlwind. As I've said, I've read it 4 times already; why would I do that if I didn't absolutely love and enjoy the manga?

Overall: 10/10.
The mangaka splendidly twists the usual highschool romcom story to make a very enjoyable manga; on top of that, he/she/it also twists the characters, which at first seem just like your usual, average set of characters. Moreover, the art is just a visual feast. I highly recommend this to anybody craving some romcoms but incapable of watching things like Amnesia with a straight face. Of course, if you like Amnesia, you will still like Horimiya.

Thank you for reading this review, and I hoped it helped you. Please provide some feedback if possible so I can better my writing. C8

Well, after more than a year of reading Horimiya every month I've decided to drop it. I'm writing this review because I am yet to see any negative review for this manga.

SHORT REVIEW - Overall (4/10): If you're looking for romance do NOT read Hormiya. If you want a sort of slice of life (with very little progression) comedy, then It may be the thing you want, although if you are like me you won't find it to be funny.

FULL REVIEW: CONTAINS VERY MINOR SPOILERS

Story (5/10): At the begging, the concept for the story appears to be somewhat ... original and refreshing, and the execution of said concept is rather good. We have a steady progression. Relationships developed naturally and every chapter functions as an extra step in the stairway that is the relationship of our two main characters (more on the characters soon). But then the stairway turns in to a hall. Since a little bit before chapter 40 things have been stagnant. The original plot has not moved at all. At this point (chapter 75) I've read more than 40 chapters of nothing going on, with the exception of more and more side characters. The quality of the comedy has also declined and the chapters seem to be getting shorter; and that is extremely annoying given that this is a monthly release. At this point, half of this manga is filler, and is all packed together after the first 40ish chapters. But maybe, the saddest of things is not how the main plot stagnates, but how it reverts. For the last 40+ chapters the main characters relationship is supposedly more serious than before, but you don't even see them holding hands.

Characters (3/10): Quirks and little oddities are a good portion of what makes a person, but it's no the only thing. Horimiya seems to forget that as the two main characters are more and more used as means to joke around with cowardice and sadism, and soon enough there is no mention of the things they had to do (cleaning the house, hide your own body) at the beginning, and those things were part of the characters. Without them they've lost richness. Our two main characters have transformed in to side characters as well. And let me tell you, there is an invasion of those. What we lack in progression we compensate (not) with side characters that look the same (the art style doesn't help) and have nothing to add. They are almost always the means to execute a joke. I've been reading this for some time now, and really, I don't know who most of these people are beside their name or position in the school. They're extremely shallow. From time to time a couple of interesting characters appear. The thing is ¿Are they relevant to the main plot? They're not. I belive the author needs to write something else where he could fit these character concepts that he has.

Art (6/10): Don't get me wrong, the art in Horimiya is very clean and neat. Initially I found it to be very pleasing, but with the added characters it's short comings became evident. Many of the characters look alike, to the point of being annoying. The male main character begins being distinctively different from the rest, but this changes rather soon. Sadly not only his looks become less unique, but also his standing in the manga. Characters aside, the art style is really clean, maybe too clean for my liking. It uses very few shadows and doesn't plays much with light. In consequence most of the drawings lack depth, everything is a little bit to much 2D.

Enjoyment (3/10): For a long time now I felt like this manga had become way to slow. Every moth I read a new chapter with the hope of it finally moving forward. But after 40+ chapters of very little happening I've gotten tired of it. I don't really care about the side characters, maybe if they were attractive to me I'd be content to keep on reading, but I wanted something more romance focused, or simply put, more focused.

(TLDR Review at the bottom, as always, thanks for reading)

I never understood the love for Horimiya.

I am not one to go trash on anything with popularity for the sake of "I'm not like the other girls", well, not now anyway, but Horimiya has genuinely confused me. It has this absurdly large amount of acclamation which has led me to believe that Horimiya is worth my while, or at least when I first came across it. After getting into manga like Horimiya and Horimiya itself, I have come to the conclusion that well, this is more or less, well, "like the other girls" in the medium.

I ... have to give props to Horimiya, in more ways than one though, it does a lot of things that not a lot of manga will attempt to do, and when those manga do attempt such techniques, it never usually works. I say this now because I am going to do quite a bit of pointing out flaws for this manga. I don't want anyone reading this to think that I hate Horimiya or something, I quite literally everything I have watched/read is good one way or another. Not even a joke. I can point out good things any day of the week. I do enjoy a lot of things. However, Horimiya just didn't fit the bill.

Narrative:
Horimiya first starts with quite an average start-up, we have two individuals who retain a hidden side to them from the rest of their classmates, only to be united by the power of plot no jutsu or something, I am not too sure. Also, side note, it suddenly occurred to me that how is Miyamura just allowed to hang out with Hori's brother like that at the start, and not get exiled from Japan or some divine punishment, the dude literally looks a shoujo protagonist came out of a yakuza makeover and no one is going to do anything about it. I thought Japan was very serious with people like him going as far as to not offer jobs and have parents that hate you for having such designs. But I mean, if that is going to be skipped over with no questions about it, so be it. In any case, with the union of Hori and Miyamura coming together, comes the strange part of the story, strange because it confuses me as to what Horimiya is trying to be.

Straight to the point, Horimiya's first problem is that it is pseudo-deep.

This far into the story and that statement doesn't mean much, only when you go further in is that you begin to understand that there wasn't much meaning to what went down in the beginning. Horimiya has quite a bit of drama prior to later changes with characters. People are arguing and at one point, things get a little physical. But after these events have elapsed, they don't mean much anymore, what I mean by that is we have all this setting of secrets being hidden, people having an unfortunate past, the crowds negative opinion. But they all go by like it means little. To be fair, Horimiya isn't a drama like a typical drama would be, one of the points in the story is to overlook superficial qualities, I think it does quite well in that category. But then, what was the point of the setup still? I will admit that it is smart to make the setup is some kind of personification of the people you don't need to think about in life, those who try to bring you down, but right after this everything changes for the sake of the new plot. Why wasn't it consistent? Or why hadn't it just gone another way around with telling such a tale? Was it because the characters were emotional hence needing the proportionally scaled responses from others in order to get somewhere convenient? Because if it did contain drama as such, why didn't it go the whole way, the later chapters of Horimiya do not check out with this category. The start is simply just there to drag you into a story where well over 50% of it isn't even remotely similar to the start. Everything that isn't the start is just high school students vibing, none of that of which was given before. Swift changes in the genre are hard to handle. Horimiya does this but it leaves you asking why. I am not one to say "oh because this was given, you have to stay like this" if the incredible change in the story is a good one, who am I to complain, I have seen this happen before with manga, an example is Watamote (I highly recommend it btw). But if Horimiya is going to forget its starting ground, then logically speaking, it had no value, to begin with.

Before I get onto the second problem I do have to talk about a good point of the manga. And that is progression. I won't lie, the character development and the progress of the story is loveable, it doesn't take a good while for Horimiya to develop, which does call for some pacing issues as well as characters speedrunning personality changes for the sake of "story go forward" but as the nice man I am, I actually looked over this, more truthfully, I didn't really care, maybe you won't too. But it is still a flaw regardless I would just point out for those who would like to know how the pacing runs. In any case, the progression of Horimiya is good for me. Not a lot of romance like to get to where the fans want it to be within a reasonable time frame, hell sometimes it does literally within the final few chapters. It is nice to know that Horimiya doesn't follow in this category, which gives it some of its own ground to stand on, thus making it more something people should take a look at.

Now the second problem with Horimiya. The "Between Story"

I call it "Between Story" because "After Story" doesn't make too much sense relative to these characters' lives and Clannad. The title I have given doesn't actually matter as long as you understand what I will give below. That was just a simplification.

As spoilerless and implicit as I can get, there are growing bonds between MCs. But what happens after is what makes the story worse. In romance stories, after the pinnacle of the story, or the climax if you like, nothing really happens from there on out, it is sad but real life isn't that exciting all the time, you can only shove so much until the plot gets ridiculous with trying to play with what is going to happen next. This isn't a bad thing to maintain realism, or for "nothing really happens" to happen, what is a bad thing is if that segment isn't of standard. That is where Horimiya falls. It doesn't have anything of high quality going for itself, maybe that is why most writers won't let characters get with each other until the very end. It makes sense because a drawn-out experience is better than one with the glory that dies out early. Horimiya is comparable to any, and I mean any, generic s.o.l out there. Two examples I will give, being the now completed "Pseudo Harem", and the second being the well-known "Komi-san can't Communicate" which is basically Horimiya but each important moment is split up very far apart. Stories like these get incredibly tedious because as said, real life isn't always outrageously exciting or intriguing, not that I hate realistic stories, but they tend to be generic. There is no real attempt to try something outside the box too if it could at all. Horimiya's later parts are just, that's it, no more goodness, just people doing stuff.

Now for the characters, I would say that they are, ironically in my taste, fine. They fit this type of story and I would argue that they are somewhat better than most characters in the manga I have mentioned above. Despite pacing being a little fast, character development is present. Is it good? Not the best. But it is liveable for sure, it gets slightly better on too. I feel like nothing is wrong with the characters, rather, they were handled poorly due to the story. If you really want arbitrary criticism, there is a tsundere and a gloomy dense dude but that blows away quickly, not the tsundere archetype, of course, there just had to be one. They both can't accept truths sometimes too, but that too disappears. Horimiya knows how to make a character, not a spectacular one, but decent nonetheless. They are basically what you would expect average high school students to be, growing with their friends as time goes by too. I won't look too deeply into characters for this review because there is nothing out of the ordinary that happens with these characters. The only one I can point out is Miyamura and how he changes for the "better" as a human. He grows out of his shell more and interacts with others like they were osananajimi from back in the PS2 days. Everyone else really doesn't have a selling point in all honesty. Quite forgettable in my eyes even though they are the top quality of their genre. I didn't have much interest in the characters, to begin with, so that might just be my bias you can consider if you want. There are also side characters coming and going because plot plot plot please let there be plot. Since side characters don't get the treatment of being remotely important, I won't even spend the time going on about them, you just need to know that you will only come out fully remembering 7 or 8 characters at most. The MCs do have development and a sense of humanity, but they are just the top players on a still very common field. You can reach the ceiling of floor 1, but that isn't the start of floor 2.


Art:
The art is painfully simple, it is easy to compare this with other similar manga and see the similarity in plain art style. In saying this though Hagiwara has no doubt coined this style for their own, it looks a little manhwa webtoon-ish at times but even if Miyamura was rocking with Sung Jin-woo hair, you could still no doubt tell a difference between the two. Sometimes the scenes feel a bit magical like they were out of a bubbly version of Shaft, but I noticed this early on and it doesn't seem to hold true later on in the story. I suppose in the grand scheme of things, it is pleasant to look.

Also multi-coloured monochromatic hair lol.


Enjoyment:
I will say this again for those who read my reviews or are new to reading them. I enjoy everything (in some shape or form). Everything. Horimiya is no exception. Sometimes Horimiya makes me laugh. Sometimes Horimiya doesn't make me laugh. Sometimes Horimiya is yes. Sometimes Horimiya is no. In a more universal enjoyment approach, I would like to imagine that all fans, regardless of if you hate this or not, probably found something at the very minimum decent with this. Whether it be the fun cliche setups here or the humorous misunderstandings. Other aspects that would arise is just how plain simple this is, whilst Horimiya seemed very confused, at least it has simplicity somewhere. I didn't mind reading about high school students vibing even if it didn't work storywise. It just happens for so long that it does feel boring to read at times, but it was endurable for me. I just happen to have crazy endurance. It is also really sweet at times. That's a win.


Overall - 5.5 (6)
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TLDR Review:
Story - 4: Hey, it does a good thing with the pacing—though even that has its problems—in allowing itself to stand on its own, but really and truly Horimiya is rather low quality and baseline, with prior elements changing for the sake of whenever the plot needs to go somewhere. It tries to incite a real story but ends up being rather bland.
Characters - 6: Only Miyamura is good. Others are decent characters, top of their game in terms of the genre, but there is nothing to expand on that making them rather average. Side characters you won't remember too.
Art - 6: Simple art you will remember if shown again to you with its coined character design. Bubbly at times too.
Enjoyment - 6: This is fine, I liked it, but it should have got cut off ages ago or tried something out of the ordinary. It is very simple.

Overall - 5.5 (6)
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I remember coming across Horimiya a while ago on most popular or top-rated, I can't remember, and thinking to myself, "hey this looks decent" and decent it was, more like generic, but I am being nice here. Horimiya in the grand light of things is truly overhyped beyond belief. I have been told time and time again that simplicity is what gives it the credit it receives but it tried to incite a real story with its pseudo-deep writing and then proceed to say it never happened and then do the "nothing happens". Bruh. I mean, it is just an alright manga in my eyes. Nothing too deep or special. I would recommend this but it would be as if it were some other romance manga no one really talks about. It has its benefits and doesn't at the same time. There is better out there.

Yes, I will recommend Kimi ni Todoke. The pinnacle of wholesome vanilla ice cream on a good beach episode. Horimiya probably stole from it anyway. How shameless! :kuuderehmph:

After reading Hori-san Miyamura-kun or simply Horimiya, all i could think about is "This is not your average Romance Manga"



The story may not involve fantasy,fighting,heavy drama....a first impression of Horimiya would make you say that it has a simplistic story, but if you think about it The struggles of this characters, makes you connect to each one of them, they have those traits that make you want to sympathize with them, the struggles you face while growing up are clearly portrayed in the story, Horimiya is not your just romance or comedy...it has the power of making you feel nostalgia, it may be the ... romance part or simply their struggles as an adolescent. Horimiya is such a light, feel-good Manga.




The art is simply amazing, it's pleasant to the eyes, the mangaka has that unique touch in creating the manga, for a Shounen Manga.one can differentiate a shounen style manga to a shoujo style manga but the characters look really good it would pass as one of the best drawn Shounen out there, that kind off has a shoujo taste.

You can tell from the first chapter, the characters are well developed Horimiya is carefully planned out, I am in love with every single one of them, i can connect with all of them. Each and every one of those characters reminds me of my life in Highschool.

I enjoyed reading the manga to the point of getting hooked, i haven't even noticed that it was already 5AM in the morning, it has that kind of power..the comedy part kept me laughing, the romance made my heart beat faster..the friendship that Miyamura experienced through meeting Hori made me want to hang-out with each one of them.


Horimiya is simply precious and life-changing.

Overall: 7/10
Damn, a lot of big mangas are ending this year with Horimiya, the widely renown rom-com, being one of them. Surprisingly, I never really heard of Horimiya before the anime. After the first episode though, I was interested in seeing how things would play out and binged the manga in one night. And now here I am, watching something cherished by many going out with a bang.

However, I gotta say I don't think Horimiya is as amazing a masterpiece as people make it out to be. Trigger warning, but I actually think it's quite overrated: it's good, but at least in my books, it's ... not a 10. The story starts off pretty good, we have good character development at times, but the plot really fell off at a certain point, and it just felt like nothing was really happening in certain chapters. I get that it's supposed to be a slice of life and stuff, but I think we had more slices than we needed: more isn't always better.

That being said, Horimiya was still an enjoyable read. Is it something I'll reread in the future? Very unlikely, but as something I binged in a night, it was quite good.

Story: 6/10
Horimiya, a rom-com, is supposed to be a story primarily about how everyone has sides they don't want to show others, with some slight dashes of slice of life seasoning. While Horimiya does touch on the themes of feeling like a social outcast and social norms as a teenager, I can't help but feel like it wasn't as good as it could have been. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of touching chapters and moments where characters learn to grow and stuff, but I felt like there wasn't really a solid thematic throughout the entirety of the story. After a while, it was less about people overcoming their problems and just watching everyone get along with each other/their significant others. It was nice at first, but it did get quite boring after a while, especially for monthly releases, to just be tuning in to the same stuff reskinned over and over.

And I think this fault goes back to Horimiya's lack of a concrete plot. It starts out great, we see actual development in our characters, and we get to see them navigate relationships. But there isn't really a plot to follow. It's truly just a slice of life. And after a while, that can get a bit boring/repetitive, especially when we don't see much development/change to the main cast or the side characters. While the story was fair, I still think there was a huge missed opportunity to explore the themes brought up in the beginning but kind of forgotten near the end, and the slice of life format for the latter half of the manga ended up hurting itself more than helping. That being said, I will applaud Horimiya for having a serviceable final chapter, something a lot of mangas can't even seem to pull off.

Art: 9/10
Very nicely drawn, great emotions and character designs: overall, the manga is very visually appealing.

Character: 7/10
I really like Horimiya's characters because I think they did a great job of being realistic teenagers dealing with life and love in high school. It's not as simple as some people would make it out to be, but it's not overly exaggerated for the sake of comedy or drama. It really does feel like you're watching real people grow and learn.

That being said, I think character development just kind of disappeared after a while. We start off with getting Miyamura and Hori's development, up until they're in a relationship. Once they tie the knot, we explore the side characters and their lives/relationships as they develop. But for the latter, it's just kind of brushed off around 50-70% through the series. I wouldn't mind if their development was shelved to further explore Hori and Miyamura's dynamic and develop them further, but it isn't. It just goes to regular slice of life stuff, which is kind of sad considering how much more development and depth we could've gotten out the characters, especially the side ones: their entire arcs/developments can pretty much be concluded in 3-4 chapters which is a bit underwhelming.

As for the comedy aspect, it was good to start, but just like the slice of life part, it got a bit predictable and repetitive halfway through the manga. However, I still found the occasional jokes or gags humourous, but not really enough to make me chuckle or crack a wide smile.

Enjoyment: 7/10
With all that said, I still think Horimiya is a great read. As someone who was fortunate enough to binge almost the entire manga (122 chapters actually) all at once, I can definitely say I suffered less than those forced to wait entire months for releases. But even then, I gotta say for the last 30 chapters or so, I was just mindlessly reading and hitting "next chapter", waiting for something big or interesting to happen. And as a result, I don't think I will ever reread Horimiya because I can't say it'd be worth the time: the latter parts of the manga are just too repetitive and boring to be worth a reread (although they could pass for a first-time read).

For me, Horimiya is one of those things you enjoy the first time around, but after you've caught up/finished, I ask you to sit on it and think: how many unique moments or chapters can you truly remember? For me, it's not that much. And that's a bit depressing for a manga that started off so well.

After seeing review after review of 10 and 9 ratings I thought it was about time to break up the reviews a little bit and give Horimiya a 6 out of 10.

Story
The sumary of this story is very cute. Hori and Miyamura act like a different person when at school, but when they get home they're true personality comes out. Hori is popular at school, but when at home she basically takes the role of mom. Miyamura is shy and withdrawn, but after school he shows off his piercings and tattoos. Then they find out about eachothers secret lives, and find comfort in the fact ... theres someone else out there that they can share their other half with.
Sounds adorable right? Well too bad this summary becomes totally irrelevant after about 26 chapters. Around the time Miyamura cuts his long hair is about the time that the plot loses all sense of direction.
I understand where the story is trying to go. Its trying to get to the point where Hori and miyamura accept and are open about the other half of their life. But the manga doesn't deliver on that. Instead, the manga focuses on unnecessary subplots and side characters, and Hori and Miya's involvement in those characters/sub plots. It gets to the point where the later chapters aren't even about Hori and Miya's relationship, and just about the other side characters drama.

Characters
The main characters are interesting. They have their quirks and are usually just a joy to read. Too bad the manga doesn't like to focus on the main characters, and instead focuses on the bland side characters.
Can you tell from my review yet that I don't like the side characters? becuase I dont. They're the root of this mangas problems.

Art
The art is very well done! Its actually one of the main reasons why I started reading this manga.

Overall this manga was 10 out of 10 for the first 25-30 chapters. Afterwards its become a jumble of short side plots lasting for a chapter each. And has gotten to the point where I dont care whats going on. Which is unfortnate, because I really liked this manga at first...

Wasn't a huge fan.

I liked the art a lot, but the story itself didn't seem like it was going anywhere?
I liked it up to the point where the MCs get together (after the rainy day), then after that there was no character or plot development between them. This manga also focused on the side characters more, which is always nice– I have nothing against it but there was no story!

I skipped a few chapters, maybe 4, and have caught up all the way to chapter 92 because I was hoping SOMETHING would happen, but nope. So I'm done with this manga, won't be picking it ... back up.

This is an adorable and funny manga that I just happened upon on a manga site one day and decided to start. Its nothing to rave about since its chapters are pretty short and the story is nothing too out of the ordinary, but somehow its still something special.

Story-9: I like the storyline and the plot, even though its been done before and its simple, it fits well with the style of the author, and it flows. Hori is pretty popular, and Miyamura, well, isn't. But they cross paths when both of their secrets are out in the open, and slowly their lives begin to ... change. There's romance, comedy, drama, and they all make for a great read.

Art-8: The manga is well drawn, there really isnt much to it to be honest, but for a simple manga, its just right. No complicated looking characters, no weird backgrounds, just simple.

Character-9: I actually really like the characters in Horimiya, I think they make the manga. Theyre a little quirky, a little awkward, and a little funny. They have different backgrounds but they are just normal school kids.

Enjoyment-9: I actually really enjoyed this manga. no matter how simple the story may be, I was still hoping to read more. It was very interesting, and im still currently waiting for updates!

Overall-8: I guess it seems like I didnt say much good about this manga, but im still telling you it was a good read :) if your bored pick it up! Its not so typical shoujo after all, I think its pretty great!

I'm a guy who enjoys to have a hot cup of joy, oh and this drink was very satisfactory.

Kyoko Hori is a popular high school girl, who excels in academics. Although she is a completely different person outside of school. She acts like a parent for her little brother, and does all the house chores including cooking, cleaning and grocery shopping. One day, Hori meets someone else who like her, does not present his true self at school. Her quiet, glasses-wearing classmate, Izumi Miyamura. his appearance at school is someone bookish and makes people assume that he an otaku. Hori realized she could ... not have been more wrong. Outside of school, Miyamura is a friendly guy with many piercings, and is actually not very good at academics. Miyamura’s encounter with Hori’s little brother and Hori’s discovery of Miyamura’s secret begins her new chapter in life.

Well, Horimiya is our usual comedy-romance-school life types of genre. It takes place in school and it’s about youth romance between our protagonist. Speaking of protagonist, the girl’s name is Kyouko Hori and the guy’s name is Izumi Miyamura.

What makes Horimiya different is that it's charms do not lie on the secret being exposed but on the calm and subtlety- which also reflects in the illustrator's art syle- it is dealt with and the relationship that blossoms from it. Far from cartoonish, it reflects what would happen if it was set in real life perfectly.

Hori is a popular girl in school. Beauty and smart, she has everything that every guys in school ever wanted. She might be a perfect dream girl in the school but she is low profile. Hori has a secret, she always appears like a plain housewife in her home. That’s because her parents are too busy at work so they’re rarely at home so Hori has to take care of her little brother, Sota and also taking care of cooking and also cleaning at home. That’s why she always rejecting her friend’s invitation to go out and have fun.While Miyamura is a plain looking guy with glasses who appearance is very much like an otaku.

Miyamura on the other hand is the perfect portrait of adorable-I-want-you. Some may fondly dub him as "loser" because of his docile personality. It is apparent how deeply he admires Hori with how reliable and noble she is. Perhaps this is a factor to why he goes out of his way to protect her and make her happy. A perfect gentleman. With an offhand way of making every reader into a gooey mess.Other characters like Toru, Yuki and the members of the student council keep the story dynamic and fresh. All of them spicing up the everyday life of Hori and Miyamura.

Truly, this manga is a character-driven story. The pacing is slow and sweet, guaranteeing a thorough look at the characters and building up the relationships of the cast, especially that of the two leads. Just when you think your heart can take on whatever happens next, the new chapter will taunt you, tease you and ultimately make your heart swell with the joy of budding love.

Out of all the romantic type of mangas that I’ve already read, I could say that Horimiya is one of the best. I highly recommend this manga especially to those who are just want some tingly feelings in themselves.

For some reason, this manga just happened to catch my attention when I was scanning through Mangafox for latest updates. It was a new manga and I was curious about what it was like. Taking up this manga was one of the best decisions I've ever made, manga-wise.

Story 10/10
The story is quite fresh and original and pleasant to read. Hori is one of the most popular girls in her school, but she's completely different at home. She has to act as a parent to her little brother and take over all the housework, due to her parents who are away at work. Because of this, ... her social life is limited. However one day she meets a silent boy with glasses, Miyamura, whom everyone assumes is an otaku and a bit nerdy, but he himself is hiding a few secrets. Outside he is a friendly guy with lots of piercings and with pretty much average grades. Due to a sudden accident, they both stumble upon each others' secrets and decide to share this half of their lives with each other and develops a friendship. It is an interesting plot, and will hook you in for sure.

Art 9/10
Personal opinion here, but I think the art is amazing. Its simple, effective, clean and humorous at times. You can identify the characters easily, even though some look quite similar, and the mangaka can display facial expressions well, and not blank like some other mangas I've come across. I'd give it a 9/10.

Characters 9/10
You have to love all the characters. Hori isn't a typical airhead, she's smart, hard-working and strong-willed. Miyamura is friendly, out-going with a slight punk-ish side but he is funny and nice. Hori's little brother is amusing and irritating like brothers should be. There are still more characters to be introduced I'm sure, since there's only 4 chapters.

Enjoyment 10/10
I enjoyed it completely. Even if there are only 4 chapters.

Overall 9/10
Too soon to give it a 10, but I'd love to. So far, it has been interesting and not at all cliche. highly recommended!

The first chapters were amazing and all. I'd recommend it.

I dropped it because the whole thing was drifting away from having an overall plot and going more towards the slice of life, which I do not enjoy as it just got... boring, for me. (especially as the story drags on and is still being updated to this day)
However, the plot in itself is very good, the romance is cute, and if you like slice of life and you won't get bored reading it, then go ahead and finish the manga, but it has about 100+ chapters or so just about their daily lives.

Words aren't enough to express the disappointment I felt while reading this.

This story had been recommended to me by a few people I hold very dear to my heart. Considering that the anime is only 12 episodes and the manga is 122 chapters, my stupid brain said "well, since the anime cuts that much, I'll go to the manga to read the full story".

My god what a stupid mistake I made. Not only this was a pain to sit through, it was probably one of the least enjoyable manga reading experiences I faced in all my weeb life.
However, I will say that it's not all ... crap and the story has a few redeeming qualities. I'll start with what most people agree on: The first 40 or so chapters are good and the foundations of Hori and Miyamura's relationship in that part are pretty nice to read. Not the most amazing romance I've found in fiction, but fairly interesting and good nonetheless. Even after the unnecesary stretch of the story, they still manage to have nice interactions from time to time. The side characters at this moment were also (for the most part) well handled. I liked the Sengoku and Remi chapters specially.
Also Miyamura himself is a pretty good character and I like the dilemmas he faces and the growth he achieves, I'll say the story of the shy and closed-off character getting friends has been done to death but also it's just a trope that works for me, so most of the time I'll take it. And I'll say his interactions with most male characters (Tooru, Sengoku and Shindou) are, most of the time, nice to read.
However, I guess this is were all my praise for this manga ends.

So well, I'll go to my three points here.

Plot/Narrative:
There isn't much and to be honest I wasn't expecting there to be much of it, but an endless cycle of characters bantering and saying dumb stuff didn't do it for me. Don't get me wrong, I knew I was sitting towards a slice of life with mindless comedy, but this was easily one of the most uninteresting reads I had reading something like that. Why? Because of a few things. Firstly, the humor. When it hits, its great, and when it doesn't hit, its painful and cringy. Unfortunately, the second situation happens more frequently. And I get that teenagers are cringy, I don't tend to mind that in fiction, but here some interactions feel so unrealistic and out of hand that were just downright idiotic.
Lots of things that happen here are absurd and, most of the time, meaningless to the story. Chapters such as the one that Miyamura and Sengoku clean the pool, or Hori suddenly not eating (and then not developing into that issue again aside to make jokes about girls not eating, pls tell japanese men to stop writing about that), or that pointless chapter in which this ex-classmate of Miyamura goes closer to the cake shop of Mura's family and then has the most devoid conversation I've ever read in a manga (to then never appear again). And those are the ones I remember because I'm pretty sure I already forgot half of this manga. These scenes don't do it for me, not only because some of them imply a character banter that isn't funny (eg: the chapter in which Miyamura can't say "atatakai"), they never really dive deep into something interesting for the characters or the story. And I like dumb, simple fun with no plot progression, it really does it for me in stories like Wotakoi or Gintama, but here not only there is too much of it that the story doesn't progress, it's just not fun to read.
Though as I said, I enjoyed Hori and Mura's plot in the beginning and some interactions the characters have are still nice at times so I'll give this manga that.
(5/10)

But I guess my biggest flaw here lies with the characters so here is where my rant will get more intense.
Oh my god, have I ever found a manga in which I thought that most of its characters were complete idiots? (maybe Komi-San, but that's not the topic here) Because this was the sensation that Horimiya left in me. And as I said above, this wouldn't have bothered me if they were funny or the story did something to hold them accountable on their faults. Because that's exactly what I would have liked to see with characters like Hori.

I don't downright hate Hori, but I think she is one of the worst romance female protagonists I've ever read. She is fine at the beginning of the story but she ends up being pretty intense (specially with how she treats Mura) and despite the story and the other characters acknowledging that she has some pretty bad personality traits, Hori never does enough introspection herself to question that. I get that the story tries to be simple, but if Miyamura did question himself, why didn't Hori ever did so? That would have been great to explore and would have left to better development for the two of them!! I also get that Miyamura likes her as she is, but realisticly speaking, your romantic partner can take so much of your shit until it blows up on them, and if you don't make the effort to change your bad relationship habits, most probably you'll end hurting that person very badly. And believe me, reading Hori behaving like this made me realize about my own bad relationship habits and how I had to acknowledge and question them in the past so my partner and I can be healthy towards one another when conflict arises. So really, considering this is a shonen, it would be a nice lesson to teach to pubert kids, but I guess it wasn't in the author to do so.
My point with Hori is: she does shitty stuff to the people around her and despite the characters by her side knowing she doesn't treat people right, she still gets a pass and it's super popular. And really, if you wanted her to be like that and to work as a character, a little bit of questioning and her being hold accountable would have been great. She is just too much and at times had me saying "this girl is an idiot", which I don't really tend to do with protagonists when reading fiction, even less with female characters.
Then there is the rest of the characters. I like some of them (Sengoku, Tooru, Remi, Sakura and Shindou) but the cast ends up being so fucking big that the story sidelines into the most unteresting plots or (almost non existant) character development.
If it's not this, its just a gimmicky character that's here to add mindless drama (the blonde boy with glasses and that girl who has a crush on hori, or the few teachers). To add up to the fact, the reactions some characters have to some situations (eg: this green haired guy who has some chapters dedicated to him cockblocking his sister's crush) are too intense and don't help me care for them or like them at all! Chill please!
But to sum up, I guess the amount of characters did end up stretching this story into meaningless arcs thar really don't add anything up or end up just feeling flat.
At least Hori's father has a nice relationship with Miyamura, though his dynamic with Hori ends up being a little bit too repetitive (and even problematic if you ask me). Mura's dynamic with the Hori family its quite nice too.
(3/10)

Art:
It's fine, it does what it has to do. The only issue I have is some male designs, when you have Sengoku, Yanagi and the green haired guy together, they have the same hairstyle so you can't really tell them apart. The monochrome could be better used also, it doesn't really help to recognize the huge amount of characters this has. (6/10)

Some other stuff:
-Who thought that Hori saying that she feels worse about Mura cheating on her with guys than with girls was a good idea? (or even thought it was funny?). Maybe this is my western brain speaking but that statement can be really easily interepreted as homophobic, and the manga should at least try to stop Hori on thinking like that, because it's also a toxic behaviour on her part.
-Yes Hero and Haigawara, we girls tall about our tits, it's just natural to talk about your body with your friends. BUT WE DON'T GO THERE TAKING OUR FRIENDS CLOTHES IN PUBLIC TO PROVE HOW BIG SOME OF OUR FRIEND'S BREASTS ARE. AND ALSO YOU DON'T GROPE YOUR FRIEND'S TITS OUT OF NOWHERE NOT EVEN IF IT IS YOUR BEST FRIEND IN THE WHOLE WORLD. This is not the only anime/manga in which this happens and I'm so tired of this scene happening because it's the most unrealistic shit I've ever read in my life. Specially considering the characters are Japanese, which tend to be very prudish people so this makes even less sense by their own standards!! (lots of scenes in this manga don't make sense at all considering their standards, to be honest, eg: miyamura being tatted af being 16 y/o). But well, guess it's just an excuse for underaged girls to undress? It's not like shonen editors ever see a problem in that, but still, this was completely unnecesary. And it isn't even funny for fuck's sake.
-On the same note, perverted teachers aren't funny, they're creepy af!! If you're going to have a character like that please make it be held accountable for their actions.
-Why did the story set us up with the fact that Hori's parents are never home to then have the father constantly acting like a parasite in the house? What a fast way to contradict your own statements.
-Yeah maybe this is just me but honestly If I'm going to read a slice-of-life set in a school I'm going to excpet realistic interactions and midly realistic people. This manga didn't give me this at all so I guess that's were most of my problems lie in here. No fucking brother cockblocks his younger sister like that, almost no father acts like Hori's father, no married couple with self-respect towards each other keeps sustaining a marriage in which they barely see each other. Editors, please, stop giving Shonen such passes, I'm begging you.
-Why didn't this close up the love triangle between Sakura Tooru and Yuki?? Why didn't Yuki and Tooru ever dated? I didn't really liked them together but the fact that this relationship has no closure is also pretty nonsensical.

Well, I guess this wasn't for me or I'm just getting old for this stuff. Don't waste your time reading this if you're looking for an interesting realistic story with nice progresion and good character development, there is almost none of it here. Some scenes may warm up your heart but at the end, you'll find out they're scarce and won't really fullfill what you're looking for.

The dream sequences with the cats were cute though.

Alright so I have only written a few reviews but I decided I will write one for Horimiya. I feel the best way to explain Horimiya is to write the same thing I have said to my friend:

I really enjoyed Horimiya when it first came out. I had it rated at 10 out of 10 for a long time, but I realized that nowadays I am no longer excited to see a new chapter being released. Now, I kind of feel like I've been forcing myself to read this manga. I've read 92 chapters of the story so I have been keeping up for a ... while, but I think its finally time for me to drop it.

The reason I feel this way is because the story feels like it no longer has any substance. It feels like the characters aren't developing anymore because there don't seem to be anymore story arcs. Every chapter feels like it's a one-off chapter that won't impact the plot or characters in the future.

I understand some people may still enjoy Horimiya and I'm not hating on them, but I personally feel that the manga should have ended a while ago and I no longer have fun reading it so i'm finally gonna drop it.

If someone were to strictly define Horimiya by the conventions it follows, there's very little to mention that hasn't been tackled in other romance series; the series is a romantic comedy with increasing emphasis on comedy over the romance as the series goes on. There are various typical themes revolving around the characters and their ability (or lack thereof) to connect, resulting in miscommunications as they struggle to empathize with one another, usually resulting in various shades of drama that take up portions of the manga. What sets Horimiya apart from its competition - and is the main reason for its massive success and ... popularity - is the casualness through which the series manages to tackle these themes, consistently develop a gigantic cast of characters - including a noteworthy and memorable side cast - and somehow consistently improve from start to finish, without ever missing a beat or sliding into stagnation.

Horimiya's story beats generally follow Hori, an upbeat, somewhat crude jerk with a heart of gold whose core character flaws revolve around her possessiveness and desire to mean something substantial in someone's life beyond being materially beneficial to her family and selflessly being the caretaker of their house. This changes when Miyamura - someone she assumed to be nothing other than a generic geek - drops by her door, laden in piercings and tattoos, starting a pattern of both characters meeting at Hori's house, where their acquaintanceship turns to friendship before blossoming into a romance. The series follows this general structure for much of its first half, with the focus being largely focused on Hori and Miyamura, loosely but not entirely following its webcomic equivalent before deviating from it entirely in the second half.

The heart of Horimiya as a story is showing the uniformity of everyone having some level of distance between one another, and that much of what people ascribe involving friendships and romance as destiny are often just, well, coincidences and nothing more than that. This helps emphasize the humanity of these characters instead of portraying their meetings in a rose colored manner, with love at first sight being something that's interestingly not ever the subject of essentially any of the various romantic pairings.

There is one noteworthy exception to this rule in Miyamura, a former social outcast who has gone out of his way to change his image to break away from his former self as hard as possible - Hori's unconditional acceptance of his character flaws, ranging from everything from his lack of understanding of social norms, awkwardness and often misreading people's intentions as overly negative. The narrative's main focus on Hori is to emphasize that as possessive she is, she is a person who does all she could to bring the best out of people, her missteps and failings aside, and that despite it all there is an earnest, well-meaning and kindhearted person who goes out of her way to help others. There are countless times when Hori does things that are questionable, ranging from her questioning if Miyamura's male friends are a danger to her relationship with him to often letting her pride get in the way when fighting with others - Miyamura and Yuki being standout examples - yet there's no possible way to misinterpret her intent as either malicious or harmful due to her behavior being incredibly convincing in swaying the audience to liking her even when she's being comically stupid.

Back to Miyamura, his role as a former social outcast has deeply scarred him, yet his character arc is about overcoming said scars, inch by inch, while accepting that the person he once was still had positive traits worth loving, as Hori emphasizes to him numerous times over the course of the story. Much of the narrative involving various characters is introspective, and this is especially true with Miyamura, who spends the entire story wondering if he even deserves such happiness at all. The answer to this is obvious; people should be loved for who they are, and past scars may or may not fade, but that is irrelevant to how much a given person even deserves happiness, as if something like that is even in the hands of the person in question. Miyamura's character arc is beyond a shadow of doubt the most important one in the series, and the emphasis placed on how much Hori broke him out of his shell is beyond heartwarming.

Horimiya's standout accomplishment is that much of its side characters are every bit as well-developed as the two central leads; Yuki and Ishikawa are noteworthy examples of this, being my favorite pair in the whole series. Yuki's apathy to the world around her coincides with her being similar to Hori insofar as she sacrifices her day to day life to please others and allow them to take anything she wants; where she differs is that in her case, this leads to a cycle of inward hatred both towards herself and others. Her character arc is about becoming a more cheerful person and letting herself become more selfish about what she wants while turning her otherwise well-intentioned feelings towards others into empathy as opposed to an excuse for self-hatred. Ishikawa is key to this character arc himself, being someone who gets rejected by Hori early into the story before moving on and becoming the heart of his social group; his empathy acts as a positive influence on various characters, Yuki and Miyamura included, and despite the immaturity and straightforwardness of his feelings towards others - a character flaw he slowly grows out of as the series progresses - his acceptance of Yuki's flaws help morph her increasingly into a better person. And while their relationship is intentionally left inconclusive, it is not a question of if but when, due to Ishikawa's own understanding of Yuki's hesitation in how to approach him. Yuki's closeness to Ishikawa as opposed to Hori is emphasized in two scenes - one early into the manga, and one during the Christmas date later on in the series - when she asks who Hori was, with the second time coming off as less ignorance and more an intentional self-reflection on how far she has come in understanding her friends compared to the beginning of the series.

There's other noteworthy character arcs and dynamics at play, and what I've said about Hori and Miyamura as well as Yuki and Ishikawa can be said for every pairing and character in the series. Remi and Sengoku are both tryhards who desperately struggle in fitting into a given social role - Remi's over her supposed flirtatiousness and Sengoku as being the rigid student council president. Yet both are masks betraying something more substantial to one another - Remi legitimately is unfairly labeled due to her often speaking casually to men in a society where conservative values reign dominant, and Sengoku has a fear of insects and based on his interactions with Hori and other characters is a legitimate goofball who struggles with his own self-confidence. Yet both characters play these personae up, while at the same time their attractions to one another are initially based on the weaknesses within those personae. This increasingly materializes into a genuinely sweet relationship between the two, where both relax considerably around both their classmates and each other.

Sakura and Yanagi have characters arcs about both of them getting rejected, yet their arcs are a positive look into how such a negative matter can be seen as a tool for self-betterment and empathy. Sawada's arc is about her breaking out of her loneliness while ironically benefiting from her unrequited love's boyfriend Miyamura, whose kindness and compassion towards her as two people who struggle greatly in interacting with the world around them due to a history of isolation that has brought both of them trauma. Shuu, Shindou and Motoko all have well-developed arcs involving their connections to people who are dear to them, with Shuu and Shindou being clowns who otherwise take their interpersonal relationships seriously, and Motoko's arc being more about her being defined by her scores instead of her effort in an overly grade obsessed society.

All of these characters are worthy of - and can be - analyzed for hours and hours on end, and it's a testament to how amazing Horimiya is as a story that this is done seamlessly and with no real pacing issues.

By no means does this mean that Horimiya is devoid of flaws; certain jokes - like Shin, who definitely shouldn't be a teacher in normal society - can come off as culturally dissonant if not straight up tasteless. People into the series strictly for Hori and Miyamura's dynamic and who don't care for the side cast often dislike the manga's second half for feeling - although they are wrong - like it is padding up time, instead of approaching it as being characterization-rich in a more interwoven way, where characters and dynamics often spring up everywhere, many being unexpected. A legitimate web can be made of all these characters and their relationships with one another, emphasizing this connection; one point the series makes is by making sure that every chapter in some way surrounds high school students, and while this can be easy to dismiss due to the proliferation of high school animanga everywhere, here it's an intentional thematic point emphasizing that regardless of who you are, it's not too late to form connections with others. And, come the ending, this point wraps up in a manner I can only describe as poetic, with one phase of life ending and another beginning.

There's even more to praise about Horimiya; the artwork courtesy of Daisuke Hagiwara is gorgeous, with evenly spaced pages that make reading dialogue heavy scenes easy, complimented by simplistic yet increasingly beautifully drawn distinct and memorable character designs. The fact that the artwork only continues improving over the course of Horimiya's run is insanely impressive, and worthy of serious praise; it goes without saying that I wish both HERO and Hagiwara the best of luck in their future endeavors.

Horimiya is a proud, new classic of the romance genre in manga, and one whose marks will be felt for years to come. The story and characters crafted here is a memorable one, one that audiences can easily remember long after they're done with this journey. The series is a must read for any and all romance fans, with plenty of appeal regardless of taste.

I cannot recommend this highly enough.

Thank you for reading my review, any and all feedback is welcome.

If the high ranking and overall rating doesn't convince u to take a peak at this manga then i don't know what will. It's hard to convince you that this is an extremely good manga without spoiling it but i will do my best.

First off, the manga is completely average in almost every aspect. How come its so good if it's average? The main aspect of this manga are the characters and the reader's enjoyment.

-Story-
Horimiya is a romantic comedy. Romantic comedies are similar and easily predictable. What's unique about Horimiya as a romcom is that the story doesn't focus on the romantic part that much ... and the comedy isn't focused around the romance either. Personally i can't stand in romcoms where something that isn't that embarrassing at all, is made into a huge deal. Rest assured, Horimiya isn't a manga where a character would be flustered if he/she is asked if the other person is their bf/gf. There aren't any big romantic scenes like the "dramatic first kiss." Like i said, Horimiya isn't focused on the romcom that much. In fact, it's more of a slice of life genre. The couple and their friends go through their last year in high school, having fun and hanging with a bunch of comedy. You also get the see the couple being together early on and enjoy how their relationship last. It's hard to describe the story any more without spoilers but i think you got the gist of it.

-Art-
Romcoms typically have similar styles of art and they are generally all pretty well done. Horimiya has nothing special in particular about the art but the expressions portrayed by the characters are priceless. The comedic scenes feel natural and not so forced if ya know what i mean. I don't see any flaws either.

-Characters-
The characters are what makes this manga above average. Especially Miyamura Izumi. In school, he is seen as a shady guy with glasses and a possible otaku. Looks can be deceiving though. Miyamura is in fact, not a otaku and looks like a a punk rock kind of guy with 9 piercings and a bunch of tattoos. In reality, he is actually an airhead that only excels in physical education and health despite his looks in school. Hori Kyokou is the MC (you read most of it in her perspective) of the manga. In school, she is cute, smart, and popular. After school though, she goes straight home and becomes similar to a housewife. She is also a sadist (but this is a realistic manga so it's more of the usual sadistic nature of some people in real life which i prefer). The overview of this manga makes a big deal about their split personalities but honestly they're more like just part of their life. They have different personalities and backgrounds but they're just normal people. They don't go into extreme ways of hiding their secret nor do any situation arise that could cost them their secret. Like i said, this is more of a slice of life manga and everything is realistic. Each character experiences a well developed character development including all the supporting characters.

-Enjoyment-
Who can't enjoy this? It's a nice, refreshing, slice of life/romcom manga without all the annoying bits in a typical romcom. For me, reading it was actually fun. I laughed my ass off so many times. I don't ever remember laughing so much in each chapter or each episode of an anime. Although i just finished reading all the way to the last chapter out (chapter 29), i want to go back and reread it again. This is a manga where you can reread multiple times and still enjoy it and get the same feelings as if you're reading it for the first time.

-Overall-
Overall i am rating this a 9 although i rated it as a 10 on my list. There isn't really a particular reason why im rating it a 9 instead of a 10. Honestly i can't think of any ways for this manga to improve. It is perfect the way it is. Even if they dragged it on, it would still be really good and consistent with the overall ratings. The one flaw might be the fact that there's no set goal. Unlike romcoms, Horimiya doesn't focus many chapters on getting the two to be together. They got together quite subtly and early on. Personally i prefer this. It's fine with no specific goal cause this manga is more of a slice of life genre. It's just their typical, pretty happy, life in school.

I hope you all like this review and i hope lots of manga readers read this and enjoy it as much as i do.

I was drawn to this manga by the stellar reviews it had. Seriously, very few ratings below 7 ("Good") here. And, well, after reading 78 chapters within 24 hours, I feel like this manga needs a candid response to it.

Story: 4/10

Typical "opposites attract" storyline. The girl's popular af and the guy is basically an outcast. The twist? They are completely different people outside school, who start interacting through a chance encounter and thus starts their story. There's less "will they/won't they" moments here, and well, they actually get together and the manga goes on.

Now this could have been very good, BUT. But. ... There is basically no plot!? After Hori and Miyamura get together there is like almost zero progress. What is the manga going for? Where is the story going? Nowhere! I don't see an endgame in sight. They already got together a long time ago but now what? Are the further chapters going to, I don't know, make actual progress between them or are they going to continue being like little balls of fluff, with no substantial content? Are there identifiable "arcs" here? Who knows! I felt kind of betrayed.

Art:5/10

All I have to say about the art style is that it is very mediocre. There's nothing really that attractive about it. Sure, it's neat. The characters look good. But sometimes I felt like the artist wasn't even trying with the backgrounds. You can find a plethora of scenes in which the characters just stand in front of a white or grey background. That was definitely annoying.

Characters: 6/10

I came here for Miyamura and Hori's story, but all I keep reading about is Hori's dad and brother, and their friends Ishikawa, Yoshioka, Sengoku plus a dozen more characters. The main characters, after getting together, just take a step back and let the side characters run the show. Annoying!

Honestly, they had so much potential. Especially Miyamura. His character was so intriguing - parents run a bakeshop, but here he is with tattoos and too many piercings and long hair. Seems like an otaku at school, but actually is a decent yet slightly depressed guy. Oh, and his little quirks, how he is kinky without even meaning to be - very sexy and adorable at the same time. Hori's character was a less interesting character though. Good looking, popular, good grades - but at home she does housework, cooks, and takes care of her little brother. I really don't see the big deal of doing housework and cooking, it's not like she's a maid or anything. She doesn't want her friends to see her without makeup either, and is relatively ambition-less. Get's jealous easily and secretly likes domestic abuse?! And that's... basically all that there is to them. Very stagnant progress between them. 78 chapters in and Hori still doesn't know the actual reason for Miyamura's piercings and depressing past - the question isn't even brought up. Miyamura didn't even introduce Hori to his mom yet; although he is always staying over at her place. Kind of unfair? And the fact that Hori doesn't know Miyamura properly has been brought up in the manga, but it hasn't been explored one bit. I really want the author to further elaborate on Miyamura's past, or just elaborate on their existing relationship and just tell us about THEM! FOR HORI AND MIYAMURA TO ACTUALLY KNOW EACH OTHER! But still can't see that happening. Sighs

Enjoyment: 7/10

To be honest, it was a decent read when I was binge-reading it, although as an overall story it is kind of a let-down. Horimiya is 7/10 Slice of Life, 2/10 Romance and 1/10 Comedy, if I were to dissect it. I particularly enjoyed Miyamura's kinky side with Hori, and the mild sexual implications the manga made. Will I continue reading this after it gets updated? May be. Will I recommend it to anyone I know? Nah, not really

It's very rare to see a series getting stripped of its excesses with its essence remaining intact. Hell, I don't even remember the last time I have read something that used simplicity rather than dramacity working on its favor - that is, before I got around to reading Horimiya.

What really makes Horimiya stand out among several other shoujo romance stories is the way they use the natural flow of events rather than misunderstandings and excessive drama to make the story move foward. It's slow paced, light-hearted and feels more slice-of-life focused, which gives off a very refreshing feeling. Even though the plot is nothing new ... (high school boy meets high school girl), it feels different since it's so natural.

"Natural" may be in fact the keyword as to why Horimiya works so well, along with something else that's really important: "Intimacy". It's very rare to see a shoujo where you can feel the characters growing closer and intimate and actually getting to know each other well instead of that sort of love/crush that blooms when the characters have barely interacted at all. Hori and Miyamura don't just see each other under a cherry blossom tree and fall in love because he was nice to her once, or because she seems different from the other girls in school; Seeing their friendship gradually growing into a different kind of relationship is rewarding and makes for an extremely heartwarming romance.

Speaking about the characters, the author really did hit the nail on the head with them. Our protagonist, Hori, for once isn't a clueless shoujo girl who acts like a lost sheep once she falls in love. She's kind-hearted and family-oriented, and also irritable and borderline violent at times (without falling victim to the tsundere trope, thank god), but overall very bright, outgoing and friendly. She's a good-natured girl with a palpable personality, and she's easy to relate to. Miyamura is almost her polar opposite: gloomy to the point his classmates suspect him of being a creepy otaku (or so he appears), reserved and timid. He's somewhat of a scatterbrain and a really easy-going person, and kind to a fault. They mash really well together in their interactions while still exist outside of their romance as unique characters with their own personalities, hobbies and goals.

The supporting cast is full of colorful and likeable characters. Hori's father is probably my favorite out all of them, seeing as he's always made me laugh whenever he appeared. The rival characters like Ishikawa and Sawa are also refreshing in their own ways, being sensible and easy to like, rather than causing over the top drama and fitting sexist tropes. The side cast is not as developed as the main two, but they make for a solid group of characters who stand well on their own.

The only thing that unfortunately falls a bit short are the subplots involving the side characters. That's not to say they're bad, but it's very clear how inferior they are to the main romance, and feel more shoujo-ish in comparison, almost like one-shot specials. There are also a couple of moments in the main story where there's a break of flow, but fortunately the manga picks itself back up fast enough so that these cracks won't interfere too much in the quality and enjoyment as a whole. There's a scene in particular in the latter chapters involving Miyamura and Hori's brother that felt a bit unnecessarily nerve-wracking. But thankfully it's not a long scene, and soon enough things are back to their tracks. The art is also something one could complain about since it doesn't really have anything to stand out, but it certainly doesn't look bad, and it fits the mood of the story well.

All in all, Horimiya is a shoujo romance that does a lot of things right, escaping the usual feeling of frustration that comes with the genre and giving off a light, natural and fluffy feeling instead. It's definitely worth checking out, whether or not you're a fan of shoujo manga.