Holy shit did I cry so much reading this.

Before we get into the book I'd like to say why this resonated with me so much. Both characters in this book share traits that I see in myself. I'm a nerd, and unlike now days, growing up isolation and picked on went hand in hand with being one. However, I balanced it out with having close friends while also not trying to be a complete hermit. In doing so I spent a lot of my free time either reading novels, comics, watching tv shows, anime, or playing games. So similar to our main character [No Name]-Kun it made me really connect with his view on life at first when I was his age. Basically, I don't find myself interesting, so why would anyone else? So why find anyone else interesting either.

On flipside we have Sakura who, and this isn't a spoiler, has pancreas disease and is dying. She's outgoing, and uses her humor to cover up her pain. She loves people close to her and would do ANYTHING for them. Even shield them from the pain she's going through. This is something I do, and can relate to as well. So watching how she dealt with this terrible disease I can put myself in her shoes 100%.

Now on to the story. See the reason I put [No Name]-Kun is because our hero doesn't give his name out. Well he does, but every time someone says it he pictures hearing what THEY think of him. So it makes for some funny scenes, and at the same time makes you feel awful for him. This is a clever story idea, similar to Silent Voice (another great manga) in which the character when looking at faces sees a huge X on them because he's too scared to actually look them in the face after being bullied for so long. So when No Name-kun finds the diary of Sakura and learns she has this disease she decides to befriend him completely. Seeing as he'll be the ONLY one she knows besides her direct family that knows about her dying.

This book doesn't cover up the fact, or say maybe it'll turn around, that our main heroine is going to pass away. But the amazing thing the book does is take you on a life, however short it is, to see how you can enjoy it. And it gives you a reason to question what life means to you, and the people around you. It hits every single emotional bit it is supposed to.

But what REALLY worked well, more than anything was the dialogue. A lot of manga has to be translated and sometimes the jokes aren't as well crafted here. But man oh man, was I smiling, smirking, laughing at multiple scenes here. On top of that the actual serious moments made me glued to the page and this is like 400+ pages I read in one sitting. Yeah. It is THAT good.

Listen, I can sit here and talk about this forever. I laid down last night at 8:15PM and finished around 9:45PM. And one point I had to put the book down because I was crying and tears were hitting the page. My wife was looking at me like I was crazy and I told her "This is on the level of Saga volume 7 ending" and she gasped. Yeah guys, this is the one.

This might be one of my favorite mangas ever. As good as Your Name and Silent Voice easily, and a MUST read. A 5 out of 5.