The Evening and the Sea · review
I appreciate this more than I enjoyed this. It is trying to be something, something a little different to your typical 2 character manga. I'm not entirely sure it quite accomplishes it at a level where I could call it a good story. Some stories can have quite unrealistic relationships, in terms of closeness, love at first sight, drop everything to be with this person you just met, uproot your life completely because of this dude, that can be quite overwhelming. This does the opposite, but veers too far in its own direction and goes back to feeling too strange and frustrating. They want to beclose, they want to be together but they respect each other's boundaries; they respect them too much, and their relationship ends up feeling limp and unfinished. Its progression chapter-to-chapter felt unfocused and pointless. Overall it feels unfinished. Overall it needed more drama, more conflict, to challenge the characters, and it felt like the author didn't know how to add that here because they made the relationship so very delicate that if it was poked too hard it would simply evaporate, but if that really is the case, is that something worth caring about?
The art is amazing, though. Just by the art alone, I think this is worth reading.