TL;DR mid story could be better go read Aono Kun instead. I was recommended this by a friend I met up with recently, and being the sucker for tragic stories dealing with grief and connection that I am, i feel obligated to yap about my thoughts on it. The story was one dimensional and the characters felt forced. It felt like bad things kept happening to characters for the sake of them happening rather than a natural progression of plot. I found it hard to sympathise with a female lead that has loving parents and a seemingly well-off household when the reasons for being ostracised at school were such menial, flimsy reasons like... being the new kid.... having a nosebleed... and her own social ineptability. The internal dialogue just comes off as excessive self-wallowing written by an author whose worst life trauma was mild depressive anxiety and teenage angst. Their history together just felt shoehorned in to give the two more reason for falling in love with eachother. Hell, we dont even know the name of the Counselor that told Shida about it, shes barely a character at all. We know almost nothing of Sato as a character, what he was like when alive, what his passions were, why he struggled so much with vulnerability despite seemingly being someone that valued openness as a child. It irritated me when she started falling in love with Zombie Sato because you are literally falling in love with the Idea of Sato and not actually getting to know him! WHY add dialogue about Shida wanting to get to know the "Real Sato" when you barely make effort to explore pre death Sato as a character? Like 90% of dialogue about sato is "omg he rlly is dead his body is so cold wow his body is so abnormal his body can you believe his body isn't alive anymore"
Its melodramatic, clichéd, and took itself way too seriously for such a simple plot line. But still, the premise was decent and I liked the message. (Even if said message was obscured by the romance aspect then immediately made vain by ch 7.5. She shouldn't have added that last scene that made FL blush. Whyd he come back as a little boy? Gross.) If you were also dissatisfied with this story but like the concept, Id recommend reading "I Want to Hold Aono-kun so Badly I could Die". And if you want a better executed version of that awful extra chapter, read "Half-Shadow of an Empty Baked Shell"
TL;DR mid story could be better go read Aono Kun instead.
I was recommended this by a friend I met up with recently, and being the sucker for tragic stories dealing with grief and connection that I am, i feel obligated to yap about my thoughts on it.
The story was one dimensional and the characters felt forced. It felt like bad things kept happening to characters for the sake of them happening rather than a natural progression of plot. I found it hard to sympathise with a female lead that has loving parents and a seemingly well-off household when the reasons for being ostracised at school were such menial, flimsy reasons like... being the new kid.... having a nosebleed... and her own social ineptability. The internal dialogue just comes off as excessive self-wallowing written by an author whose worst life trauma was mild depressive anxiety and teenage angst. Their history together just felt shoehorned in to give the two more reason for falling in love with eachother. Hell, we dont even know the name of the Counselor that told Shida about it, shes barely a character at all. We know almost nothing of Sato as a character, what he was like when alive, what his passions were, why he struggled so much with vulnerability despite seemingly being someone that valued openness as a child. It irritated me when she started falling in love with Zombie Sato because you are literally falling in love with the Idea of Sato and not actually getting to know him! WHY add dialogue about Shida wanting to get to know the "Real Sato" when you barely make effort to explore pre death Sato as a character? Like 90% of dialogue about sato is "omg he rlly is dead his body is so cold wow his body is so abnormal his body can you believe his body isn't alive anymore"
Its melodramatic, clichéd, and took itself way too seriously for such a simple plot line. But still, the premise was decent and I liked the message. (Even if said message was obscured by the romance aspect then immediately made vain by ch 7.5. She shouldn't have added that last scene that made FL blush. Whyd he come back as a little boy? Gross.)
If you were also dissatisfied with this story but like the concept, Id recommend reading "I Want to Hold Aono-kun so Badly I could Die". And if you want a better executed version of that awful extra chapter, read "Half-Shadow of an Empty Baked Shell"