Sugaru Miaki

4.0-4.5

An overall fantastic read, but it's too similar to his or her earlier novel, "Three Days of Happiness", which is the only other Sugaru Miaki novel I've read so far. (Spoiler alert for both this novel and TDoH).

Some of the similarities I've noticed:

- Protagonist lives an unfulfilling life, is unloved

- P. meets girl and falls in love, gradually gets closer as the story progresses

- P. encounters girl after making a major, negative life-changing decision that is caused by his dreary life

- Girl is equally miserable as P., though it's not obvious at first

- One of the two is dying, P. and girl try to develop a pseudo-romantic relationship in their last few weeks together

- Near the end, one of the two tries to do something (what they consider to be) positive to the other person (TDoH: P. saving girl's time, YS: girl trying to remove P's memories of her), but the other person flips it around.

None of this is an issue if this is your first Miaki novel, but if it isn't, you'll be able to predict at least some of the major plot developments after you've started noticing the similarities. That aside, I'll still gladly read Miaki's other LNs in the near future, simply because I enjoy reading books whose plot/setting is so uniquely depressing/emotional, though a little more variety would be nice.… (more)