Print Review: Marmalade Boy volumes 1-6

Review Marmalade Boy volumes 1-6Written by WarpshadowRating very good

This is one of the slightly older shojo manga stories that have stood the test of time. That generally doesn’t happen unless the story is good.

When Miki’s parents went on a vacation to Hawaii she didn’t expect them to come back divorced. What’s more they fell in love with another couple who also divorced. The four of them plan on living in one house together with Miki and the Matsura’s (the other couple) son Yuu. The whole situation drives Miki up a wall but she grows to accept it mostly thanks to Yuu. She finds new problems with Yuu which originate from his personality. She calls him a Marmalade boy, meaning that he is worse than he first appears. Still she does have some feelings for him that she can not explain.

Marmalade Boy is a soap opera type of shojo manga and a pretty good one at that. What this manga lacks in originality it more than makes up for with energetic and likable characters. Maybe calling this manga unoriginal may be a bit much but this is a very traditional shojo story. This is also a story that never stays still long enough to become boring, not only to events resolve themselves in a timely manner there are usually about two or three plots in play at any given time. This is a manga that I would recommend to anybody who likes romantic stories.