Mika Yamamori

Story: [Concerning the first 14 chapters; review from Sept 14, 2015]
I liked this series from the get-go. The first chapter/oneshot was so enjoyable that I found myself immediately interested in reading the rest. Sugars is a series of connected one-shots all set in the same school-like setting, which is not annoying in this case, with recurring characters. All of the love is pure with nothing obscene or demeaning. The humor is great too. I cracked up at the 'recipe for life' in the third one show more shot. I enjoy that this manga touched on "true love fading" and new love arising. With shoujo you're often coined into thinking all relationships are eternal (unless it's a love triangle). I am excited to see the rest of the development on that.

Art:
The artwork is beautiful, and I usually dislike the pouting boy look featured in shoujo, but here it made the characters look cute. SN: I loved the fashion too! Every character is so stylish. It makes me want to shop for some clothes.

Characters:
Yes! There were no whiny losers here. The few tears that were present weren't bordering on excessive shoujo tears and some were realistic. The resident tsundere Mami wasn't an irrational witch either. She also helped the first couple get together. Mami was nothing short of a non-sweet tooth genius.

Thankfully, the boy character archetypes extended beyond bad boy, tsundere boy, smart dude, and I-hurt-you-because-i-love-you-and-i'm-hot-so-you-don't-care. Now, there was a genki boy/overly cheerful, but he had a flash of maturity, which broke him away from that all-consuming mold. And ... The one bad boy turned out to be more than what met the eye, so he was pretty fleshed out for a one-shot character.

For the girl characters, Akira, Emma, Mami, and Sakura stood out from the norm of shoujo leads.

I like all of the characters so far!

Romance:
The perfect mixture of sweet and humorous is a recipe for love! Again, I like how there's young love, love that faded, and heartbreaks/one-sided love. The smallest of gestures and interactions can turn into love here. These stories will get your romanticism going until you're thinking, "Hmm... The person that served my bagel? I wonder if they are my future lover? The individual who gave me directions ... will they be my 2nd husband/wife, assuming the first doesn't work out?"

Overall:
Please give these one-shots a shot! You can read them in a single sitting or as a stand-alone. Sugars is a fun read to pass time and savor. They are all heartwarming and may give you feels. Plus you can keep your hair intact from not having to rip it out from chronic SCS (Shoujo Crying Syndrome) girls'/guys stupidity. show less

Not really bad, but oh so generic in execution. Suzume is a country girl transferring to a big city high school. She immediately finds a couple romantic interests and a frenemy. Unfortunately, one of the love interests for this 15-year-old girl is her 24-year-old teacher. It's a crush on her side, but there are a couple moments where the teacher internally starts to reciprocate interest. So knowing nothing else about this series I predict he will behave appropriately outwardly but groom her show more through her high school years and marry her upon graduation. All very romantic in the creepiest of ways. Why do so many Japanese manga series do this March-July romance thing? (Just off the top of my head: Cardcaptor Sakura, Bunny Drop, Me & My Brothers, Love @ Fourteen, Ran and the Gray World, Takane & Hana.) show less

As much as I think this series is very well written with beautiful artwork, I absolutely cannot give this volume a good rating because of the terrible, terrible teacher/student age gap relationship here. It's a personal rule not to give a series with that type of relationship more than 3 stars no matter the quality of the story, and the way the Yamamori is presenting it here is so egregious that I would normally just abandon the series and never look back. However... it feels like there's no show more way the teacher/student relationship is going to be endgame here. There are enough alternate love interests already that it feels like the author is prepared to include some character growth and transition the characters into more age appropriate relationships. So I'm going to keep going and just hope that I'm not eating crow by the end of this series with the teacher and student getting married or something horrible like that. show less

I REALLY can't stand the "romance with a teacher" trope and normally that would stop me from reading a series, but this is so well written that I can't help but keep going (although my ratings will reflect my disapproval). Fingers crossed that they don't wind up together in the end, but I'm not optimistic.