written by Chika Umino

It would probably be too simple to call Honey and Clover the Melrose Place of manga, even if that is fundamentally true. That said, Chika Umino’s long-running series—which has been adapted for anime and a live-action feature in Japan—is a distinctly literary series, elliptical, poetic, and masterful at capturing the ennui and sudden shocks of drama inherent to twentysomething lives.

In the manga world, Honey is also distinctive because it is a book primarily for girls, but told from the point of view of its male characters; it is set in the world of college life, not the more typical high school setting; and its artwork is sketchy, loose, almost unfinished in appearance, perhaps reflecting the work-in-progress nature of its major characters.

Those three characters all live in the same Tokyo apartment building. One is Yuta, a determined but decidedly “normal” young architecture student who falls unrequitedly in love with Hagumi, an 18-year old art student. Shinobu is a carefree dude’s dude, fairly mysterious, and also smitten with Hagumi, whom he believes could very well be a Koropokkur, or fairy. The third male roommate is Takumi, a neutral party in the Hagumi love triangle, a good friend who is frustratingly infatuated with a coworker at the design firm for which he works.

Fascinatingly, Honey’s characters are largely interchangeable at first, only coming into sharper focus as their desires are more explicitly revealed. Still, Honey and Clover—unlike the soapy Melrose Place—is very episodic in nature, almost picaresque, with brief episodes quote-unquote happening, then dissolving into a shrug, before resonating chapters later. (For better or worse, there are no homicides or car crashes in Honey).The storytelling works brilliantly as a rendering of post-adolescent angst, ennui, and alienation. Umino’s characters sometimes barely have pulses, their goals seem mostly inconsequential, their hearts are shadowy and elliptical, and then their romantic longing sharpens their intent and their meaning. Having male characters tell this romantically inclined story, when most other manga would have turned narrative chores over to female characters, is a bold and effective stroke. Male readers may be more likely to connect with the story, while few female readers are likely to be repelled.

If you’re looking for a manga to wow you with sensational art and sensationalistic storytelling, this is definitely not the book for you. Honey and Clover is hushed, searching, and grounded—no spells, swords, or conspiracies—though the mysteries of the heart are as apparent, and compellingly revealed, here as in any other manga. A fine book for older readers.

-- J. Rentilly

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