Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru

When it comes to romance stories, I've always enjoyed "forbidden love". Be it between the same sex, step-siblings, student & teacher or cousins; I tend to enjoy these flavours over the vanilla stuff. So here I have Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo suru. A Shoujo, Romance, Drama themed around the forbidden love between siblings and yet I did not enjoy this as much as I hoped.

Although Boku wa Imouto is a shoujo manga, it mostly follows the point of view of our male protagonist Yori Yuuki, where it is immediately apparent that he feels strongly for his twin sister Iku. So strongly in fact that he decides to act upon these feelings, but she is not all that accepting right away. So Yori ends up thinking of some contrived and immature ways to acquire his sister's affection, all without being found out, which is where the majority of the story's early drama comes from. However what's nice is that even if Yori is the main focal point of the story, situations are also given from Iku's point of view, making it a more interesting story in the process. Unfortunately that feeling does not last the full duration of this manga's story.

The main dilemma between the pair continuously changes as the story develops, like the inclusion of a 3rd or 4th party, yet it's obvious that it's the mangaka's way of trying to extend the life of what should be a really short manga. It eventually degrades into some Twilight-esque drivel. Two attractive young males, vying for the affections of some stupid little girl; even though it's all kind of pointless, since she obviously likes one over the other.

This is what led to the characters being the weakest aspect of this manga for me. We have Iku the ditzy blonde sister, Yori the dark-haired control-freak of a brother & his best friend Yano who's character confuses me the most. And we're supposed to believe the forced love triangle between the 3. I know I shouldn't be spoiling this love triangle for those who've yet to read it, but if you've read enough shoujo manga, you'd have seen this love triangle coming a volume or two before it even occurs. There are other characters to mention, but some you'll just despise and others that won't even become relevant until the final volumes.

Now when looking at Kotomi Akio's other works, I noticed that she happens to be the author for one of my favourite shoujo manga, which is a bit of a surprise because the artwork for Boku wa Imouto is painfully average. From start to finish, it just looks like any other shoujo manga that is playing it safe and not trying to stand out from the crowd. I can only take solace in the knowledge that Kotomi Akio has improved, since the creation of Boku wa Imouto...

To summarize, Boku wa Imouto is a manga that initially grabbed my attention with the way it handled this particular form of forbidden love, and how such love is never a smooth experience. Unfortunately story winds up degrading almost into soap opera territory, rife with the some of the usual tropes. This and several other issues I mentioned are what hampered my overall enjoyment of what should have been a rather enjoyable manga.

*SPOILER ALERT*

Never done a review before, and normally I would format it a bit better but I can't be bothered since it wasn't really worth my time reading 49/58 chapters thus so far. The only reason I read it was because I thought it was this manga I read a long time ago, but it didn't turn out to be and I thought I'd at least finish it. I thought I'd at least write a review to get a different opinion out there. Albiet, this is a work of fiction, it's still incest and I believe it should be taken seriously, so here is a real, serious, review.

Story - The synopsis on this site isn't too far off, fortunately, but it should be noted that this is not a love story. This is traditional smut, expect the characters to make excuses to have sex, expect the story to twist and turn, and lose original path to make sure there's sex.

Art - 7/10. It's mediocre, typical shoujo

Character - Iku, our "heroine", is a mary sue. Like most shoujo, she lacks a lot of character, though she does show some during comedic moments, but that's all she's for really. I had a hard time relating to her, because her dynamic was completely non-existent.

Everyone else was fine, minus Tomoka-chan, the rival girl. She's your typical stupid rival butting her way between the main couple, I do feel sorry for her that Yori did use her, but she goes overboard, like most of the awful rivals. She never really gets the tables turned on her, and her problems never really get resolved.

Overall - I probably sound like a hard critic. I guess what bothers me most about the manga is that all this started because they 'loved each other'. But they don't really. They make all this commotion, all this fuss, even going to the extent to lie, hurt, and cheat other people, all over lust.

This is not a touching story of a boy accidently falling for his younger sister, and wanting to desperately confess and cherish her. It is not a story of a boy accidently interpretting his sibling love as real love. This is a 'relationship' built on lust.

In the beginning, when Yori describes what attracted him to Iku it was near poetic, such, it would have been if it weren't incest. But that all was completely thrown out the window once they began to touch each other. They craved touch, there was no real love outside a deep sibling love.

In Chapter "43", Yori states: "The reason I left that house is because my parents would've figured it out soon if I'd stayed with Iku. In that case, we wouldn't be able to be together anymore. I didn't want to see that happen, so I at least wanted to protect ourselves by staying apart. And yet, -chuckle-, how ironic, only two months and even my mom already noticed. Ah, After all, what was I trying so hard for... In the end I.. In my eyes, I can see the ending of this love."

Then, he bursts into tears. He states that he worked hard, but he defiantly broke the rules of the dorm, thus getting himself caught. The couple didn't even try to sneakingly hide it at all.

They say that when you commit a sin, the punishment is the sin itself. Meaning, certain sins have a punishment built into them. For example, having sex. The night they committed a taboo, for Iku, the sin was becoming attached to Yori. She may have already loved him, but that attachment grew after they committed that act.

They may already have been attached at the hip as siblings, but Iku did not have a complete dependancy on Yori. After they had sex, she only looked at him. It was like her existence relied on him being around, craving him and his touch. It's sickening to see such a potential of a character just being tossed under the bus. Expect her to consistently be extremely annoying.

All in all, I guess I'd rate this a 5/10. Read it, only, if you're looking for baseless characters, eyecandy and the like.

This is a beautiful story about a twin brother and sister falling in love. Even though some people may not be into that kind of love taboo, this story is so great that you can't help but love the main couple!
Iku, the girl twin, doesn't at first reciprocate her Yori's , her brother's, liking for her and is very confused with his and her feelings... but she doesn't want to lose her big brother who has seemed to be drifting away from her lately. And with her friend Tomoka liking her brother as well, everything is a mess... but that doesn't stop Yori from loving Iku all the more for her slight jealousy...
This really is a must read manga, so if you haven't done so already... READ IT! It's much better then the synopsis and this review!!! Even the anime doesn't compare! (Yes, there is an anime...) so please enjoy the read!

My inital review of this manga was rather poor, but now I'm glad that I've finally finished the whole series. I have to say that the later chapters have the "roller-coaster" plot that kept me going.

Yori's love for Iku was that of sacrifice, for a better future for her; while Iku had to find her own strength and determination to prove her love for Yori. Their deep love came with a hefy price tag; alongwith challenges which will test if their love was true.

The author left the ending to reader's imagination; thou not the perfect ending but I think it is good enough.

SO, GO READ IT AND DECIDE FOR YOURSELF IF YOU WILL WISH THEM HAPPINESS. ( I do. q/(*.*)p)

My first impressions of this manga were pretty poor, but now I'm glad I finally finished reading all this work. I have to say that the chapters are quite repetitive as a roller coaster going up and down but always in the same direction.

Yori's love for Iku was a sacrifice for a better future for her, while Iku had to find her own strength and determination to prove her love for Yori. Their deep love came with a high price along with challenges that will test whether their love was true.

The author left the end to the reader's imagination, many did not like it but I think it was good enough.