Adachi to Shimamura
Adachi and Shimamura

Edit

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsType  

My decision to start reading this novel was after I started reading the manga adaptation (Moke's version), as a friend's recommendation, she said I was missing a lot of the point of view of the two MCs. She was completely right.


It is from the perspectives of Adachi and Shimamura, two friends who met at the start of the high school year. The first volume starts about a month after that. The premise is relatively simple but the way it is executed is simply magnificent.

This is not like in other books. In other Japanese romance books, both sides are usually at least a little interested in each other by the third volume. I'll just say that this one is a bit slow. It may sound like a negative characteristic, but is exactly the opposite, the story is extremely well written and realistic.

We have two extremely different main characters, with their own worldviews, personalities and tastes.
Both Adachi and Shimamura are exceptionally well-written characters, they have depth, sometimes I feel like both are real people. It really is a delight to enter the minds of these two, the alternation between the two points of view is something that makes the reader captivated, excited, begging for the next chapter to know what's going on in their minds.

(Hougetsu is my favorite, the chapters from her point of view are great)

AdaShima is a masterpiece that I recommend to everyone.

Well, this is my first review and I am not fluent in English so please forgive my typos.

Story: 9/10
Characters: 10/10
Art: 7/10
Enjoyment: 10/10

Overall: 10/10

Helpful

read more

Honestly, Adachi and Shimamura’s story is one of the best out there in the yuri/lesbian media. It’s not your typical slow burn, angst-romance story. Something I really get annoyed with is that 90% of female characters in shoujo act like genuinely good people. I know that’s something weird to get annoyed with, but it just doesn’t feel real or human. Everyone has selfish desires, everyone goes through this limbo of not knowing what to do with their lives, we question our existence and we wonder whether we are good people despite our flaws. Adachi and Shimamura's story not only takes time to build the most beautiful love story ever, it also takes time to build up the ugly tears and the thoughts of any teenager who doesn’t really understand why we have to interact with other people to keep ourselves sane. I’ve never related more to a couple of characters, even when they are so different. Adachi's gay disaster tendencies, Shimamura's existential crisis, and their fear of loss. What a great story Hituma Iroma has written.

Helpful

read more

A good yuri slice of life. It justifies both of those genres.

It's rare to see true slow burn yuri. Most of these usually end up being yuri-bait. But this series feels like a yuri even without the need to interject makeout scenes.
The character are realistically dense. Within the first volume both characters have a thought of the other/themselves potentially being gay (though they try not to give much thought to it as that'll cause problems). It's rare for characters to have this kind of awareness.
Finishing each volume, you can always feel a step of progress, however slow it may be. This is a very slow romance yet you can feel a satisfactory level of progress, and it feels like the author will actually eventually go all the way. With most slow yuri romances at a certain point you feel a lost of hope for the pair reaching true romance but this series progresses towards it so naturally that it's easy to continue rooting.

Plot wise. It is a rather dull concept, but it is entertaining how the author develops this concept as much as they can. Most slice of life are pretty much just pure comedy, which is not the tone I'm looking for in slice of life. This series has a more relaxing feel more it, perfect for a slice of life. The two main pair have an interesting relationship, their friendship was barely established and they haven't been friends for long. At times they mostly just say what they feel like and then just rest in silence. It's like they have a silent agreement with each other? Well their interactions make for a nice slice of life feel.

Can I also say how relatable this is? This book is pretty good at describing what first romances are like. Even the part where you can even be a little creepy about it lol.

How the author writes the characters are great too. They all feel realistic with their own unique values. They always do things that line up with their natural values. Though they can be out of character which just adds onto the realism. They also seem like teenagers, not like some mature adults or little girls. They seem like fully aware teenagers, maybe a tad bit philosophical at times but fully natural otherwise.

Though if I had some complaints, there is one certain out of place character that, in the first volume they seemed too involved. But they aren't as much of a problem past that point.

Now I'm going to compare the Seven Seas translation and the Fan Translation. I prefer the Seven Seas translation for the voices of the characters. The fan translation makes them read kind of too stiff and formal and the air can be kind of stuck-up. The Seven Seas translation makes them feel more like proper teenagers, using proper slag that somehow isn't obnoxious but feels natural.

Helpful

read more

Adachi and Shimamura is, simply put, yuri's masterpiece - if not perhaps one of the greatest romance series to grace light novels as a medium. It is a shame that it remains little known and that most people come to the series by way of the incomplete anime and manga adaptations, which fail to grasp most of the nuance and introspection from the novels. Do yourself a favour and read this, even if light novels aren't usually what you opt for. It's just that good.

-Characters- 10/10

The main duo are the highlight of this series, and certainly some of the best written and most relatable out of all the yuri I have read. Both are extremes of emotional states all of us have felt at one time or another, and both are fundamentally flawed human beings, an improvement over the contrast of plain and perfect that makes up the usual leads in romantic fiction. Both main characters are delinquents (in their own words) at the beginning of the story. It is their gradual emotional development, both in general and towards one another, that makes up the substance of the series.

First, we have Shimamura. Shimamura is a reasonably functional and sociable teenage girl who just has no real attachment to life. Relationships with others, hobbies, school - she is unwilling to put in anything beyond the bare minimum effort towards them, being herself completely disinterested in all things. She is passive, never taking initiative, never voicing any preference or resistance about where the flow of time carries her. If you had to sum her up in a word, she is listless. It is this listlessness which causes her to skip class, and it is her indifference which initially causes her to accept Adachi's own flaws and behaviour without a fuss.

Adachi, on the other hand, is Shimamura's opposite. She is painfully unsociable, and aware of it. She finds herself totally incapable of connecting with others or even conversing with them smoothly, the entire experience of it is grating and difficult to her. She is a loner in every sense of the word, without a single substantial relationship in her life, even with her own family. It is this suffocating loneliness which causes her to skip class, causing her to encounter the indifferent and all-accepting Shimamura, the first person she ever truly wants to interact with.

The main pair are complemented by a suite of minor characters, who appear both in their own self-contained mini-stories and in the main chapters. Namely, there are the main pair's classmates who attempt to befriend Shimamura: the cheery and petite Hino, and her childhood friend the busty and airheaded Nagafuji. These two are very entertaining and often the source of comedy in the series, and their grounded and open natures are the perfect foil to the main characters.

On top of those two, recurring characters are both main characters' mothers (who are decidedly present in the series and have characterization of their own, against light novel norm); Shimamura's estranged childhood friend Tarumi, Shimamura's shy but energetic little sister; as well as Yashiro, an enigmatic being who proclaims herself to be an alien that seems to be possessed of supernatural powers. While the latter might seem out of place in the series, her presence is oddly fitting. Yashiro is given a fairly large amount of the series' text and at one point or another forms bonds or interferes with every character in the series. Her guileless attitude and honesty often serves as contrast to the emotional deficits of other characters, to their benefit and to the benefit of the story.

-Story- 8/10

Fundamentally a slice-of-life series, there isn't much plot to speak of to the series besides the slow but steady advance of the relationship between the main characters as the months and seasons come to pass. The story is told primarily in the form of alternating moments of day-to-day life from either Adachi's perspective or Shimamura's. Almost all of the text itself is made up of the two's inner thoughts and dialogue, giving you an idea of how character-driven rather than plot-driven the story is. For people who don't normally enjoy slice-of-life, they may initially find this lack of anything substantial occurring to be dull. They may also find the rate at which the romance progresses to be painfully slow - whole volumes can pass without any sort of major development. However, though drawn out, there is substantial character progression in this series to make up for the lack of more dramatic plot.

Though it is slow-going, the romantic development in the series is painfully good. By that, I mean it is very realistic for a couple of awkward teenagers going through the unease of gay romance. Adachi especially spends page after page agonizing over her feelings, testing herself, trying to decide what it is she actually feels and how to communicate it. She is ashamed and unsure, and you can sympathize. Adachi is aware that she isn't very good at her romantic overtures, but she persists through all discomfort regardless. The result is both endearing and hilarious in various doses. Shimamura in turn is hard to hate, she wonders what it is she wants from Adachi, or from others more broadly, and how to react to Adachi's intense feelings and actions. Both make plenty of mistakes in these efforts along the way. You can find yourself laughing and having your heartstrings pulled in the same chapter, with both humour and heartache generally being caused by the aloof Shimamura's reactions to Adachi's angst.

There is also the subplot of Tarumi, Shimamura's best friend in elementary school. Tarumi and Shimamura try to awkwardly bridge the years they've spent apart, and both want to grow close to one another again - to the detriment of the jealous Adachi. She seems poised to play the roll of the rival-in-love to Adachi, but since the story is still ongoing at the time of this review, she has yet to play a major role.

Additionally, those larger chapters are usually interspersed by brief 2-3 page vignettes from the lives and perspectives of other minor characters, such as their classmates Hino and Nagafuji, Shimamura's little sister Shou, or the mysterious blue-haired alien girl Yashiro. And yes, you did just read "alien girl" again, there is some subtle and unique magical realism to this series in the form of not only Yashiro but also seemingly genuinely powerful fortune tellers, none of which is elaborated on to an extent that you'd call it a subplot. Like the main characters do, you are supposed to accept their existence at face value as a part of the scenery.

-Overall- 9/10

To summarize, of the dozens of yuri series I have read or watched, this is by far my favourite. It's been quite a few years since any novel made me laugh aloud and then nearly brought me to tears the way this one has. I wholeheartedly recommend it and can barely wait for translation of it to continue.

Helpful

read more