Akari is a typical girl trying to fit into her clique in Japanese high school. All the boys look the same to her. None seem hot to her. But Yuki intrigues Akari. Yuki doesn’t feel the need to blend in with the other girls. In fact, her calmness makes her a standout—at least in Akari’s eyes. So starts the romantic triangle manga, She, Her Camera, and Her Seasons, Volume 1.

This manga does a good job depicting the tortures of high school. Navigating your first crush is hard enough without it being a socially unacceptable same sex attraction. And what is with the boy trying to complicate things by inserting himself into the emerging couple.

I liked the camera facts scattered within the book. Though I’m not sure about my first real camera being called ancient by Yuki. The story seems realistic if a bit simplistic. Overall, She, Her Camera, and Her Seasons, Volume 1 is a good choice for teenage romance manga fans. 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 stars!

Thanks to Kodansha and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.

Thanks, Negalley and Kodansha for this advanced copy.

It's been a while since I read romance manga and I really love this manga. And there is this "one thing" that I really love about this manga :

Well, it's not a secret if one book has same sex romance, the author usually make the rival's gender as the opposite of the main character's gender. Yeah, something like that. Like in yaoi or shonen ai manga, we used to see the rival is a woman, same goes to yuri or shoujo ai manga which has the rival character as a man. That's not wrong, yess... but, some authors just make the rival characters as the worst or the most evil character in the book. It just gets me feeling like "straight person" is evil in same sex story

But, this one different!!! The female main character falls in love with Yuki, and there is another boy who falls for her. But, this rival character is not a bad one. He is so gentle and caring Yuki too. I really love that.

Overall, this manga has a cute storyline, slowburn romance and all the things I used to love about romance manga. Can't wait for the next volume

This had a slow beginning but once it started going it was really cute. Mature material inside but nothing crazy. And I dont like love triangles so I probably wont keep going but its obvious yuri endgame.

Miyama finds herself falling for her classmate Yuki and learning about photography along the way. This is such a relatable story with beautiful artwork! This absolutely captures the scary cycle of being a teenager with a crush. I can't wait to read the next volume!

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me the opportunity to read and review.

A not-so-typical high school romance.

Our story follows Akari, a student who becomes "tired" of doing everything norm. She surrounds herself with people that expect her to follow the paths of heteronormativity, however- that's not what she truly wants.

She meets Yuki, a quiet girl in her class, when she catches her taking a photo of her without her permission. Akari confronts Yuki, then finds herself being immersed in the art of photography. She experiences things through Yuki's lens, such as camera cafes, taking photos of pedestrians, and seeing things from a different perspective. In turn, Yuki learns about Akari, who's upbringing wasn't too well off compared to her own. Yuki finds Akari to be a breath of fresh air, experiencing her loud family, clumsy mistakes, and even taking a shift for her at her part-time job for her.

We also meet Rintarou, a boy that grew up with Yuki who we know to have feelings for Akari. By the end of this first volume, readers will find themselves trapped in a love triangle between Akari, Yuki, & Rintarou. Who will fall for who? I don't know! But I will definitely be checking out the next volume to learn more about these characters. I am curious to see how Akari will continue to grow as person, both into her last year of high school, as well as learning more about what she wants in life and who she really is.

All in all, I would give this title 4.5/5 stars & classify it under the josei category, despite it being set in a school since there is talk of sex and slight nudity.

I’m so invested in Yuki and Akari’s love story. I can’t wait for the next volume. I don’t know a whole lot about photography but centering the story around provided such a unique setting for the characters to interact within. It made this more than just another romantic pining manga and gave it more depth which I really appreciated.

This hit me right in the feels and I highly recommend it!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC.

This book was fairly sweet and slice-of-life, and I appreciated the sapphic pining/potentially bi rep. Overall, it was a bit to slight and meh for me, but I'm very glad it's out there.

I really liked this first volume! It's a great introduction to Akari and Yuki's story. Akari is more of an outgoing lead while Yuki is withdrawn and more interested in her photography. I enjoyed how they became friends and got to know each other and the portrayal of Akari realizing her possibly romantic feelings for Yuki. There is a potential for a love mix-up with Rintaro since he's Yuki's childhood friend, but I'm looking forward to reading future volumes. The art style is very captivating and it's the perfect medium for this high school gl story.

Thank you to Kodansha and Netgalley for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

She, Her Camera, and Her Seasons is a great title in the Yuri genre. Reminded me a lot of Bloom into You, and that's a high compliment. Akari just coasts through school and blends in with the popular crowd. She doesn't really have the same taste in things as her friends, but it's comforting knowing she has a group to follow. That's until she becomes interested in another student named Yuki. Yuki is mysterious and she loves photography. She likes to capture those unplanned moments. Initially, Akari believes her interest in Yuki is only because of how mysterious she is, but soon she realizes her feelings for Yuki run deeper. It's an intriguing first volume and I'm looking forward to future issues of this one!

It was very prettily drawn, and the story was relatively sweet, just not for me personally, but that’s okay, they’ll be other people who love it

[Thanks to Kodansha and Netgalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.]

Akari’s got one thing that she does really well and it’s conform. But when she winds up getting to know her short-haired, aloof classmate, Yuki, she learns the value of being your own person and maybe the dangers of standing out too…

This comes just shy of ticking all of my boxes as far as yuri content goes, falling a little short of the highest highs of the genre. Still, it does some truly spectacular things over the course of this volume and some that are… not so much.

Both our leads are (mostly) great - I was worried from the cover image that Yuki was going to be this basic boyish type with minimal expressions, but that’s only how she comes across in class and it’s not because she’s cold, she just marches to the beat of her own drum.

That makes her a great foil for Akari, who seems pretty dang gay, but also has a lot going on. She’s easily one of the most complicated leads I’ve encountered in a while, and a good portrait of just what a colossal mess you can be in high school.

Akari does not want to make waves, for good reason, as it turns out, but once she gets involved with Yuki she can’t really help herself. Intrigue turns to infatuation to something more as her new friend’s vibrant outlook and personality start to change things around her.

It’s hard not to emphasize the word mess because there’s a lot to suggest that this isn’t the healthiest relationship going - Akari has a lot of shame because of her family’s economic status and when she finds something else in the form of Yuki, she clings to it like a life preserver.

Akari as a portrait of young, out-of-control feelings is very well done. You can tell just how overwhelming all this is for her, doubly so when her “friends” start in with the innuendo and flat-out torment. And there’s also Rintaro.

Rintaro comes on the scene as an obnoxious jerk who thinks he’s god’s gift to Akari, but he turns out to be more teenage boy thoughtless than a malicious sort. He’s a pushy try-hard, but the friendship that develops between the two is interesting.

It’s especially notable because Akari finds herself drawn to Rintaro in ways that don’t quite fit into friendship, though how far this will venture into an examination of bisexuality is hard to say (manga doesn’t normally operate on a spectrum, I’ve found). Either way, it adds an extra layer to have a guy this involved in a story in this genre (to say nothing of him being a childhood friend of Yuki’s).

The biggest problem with the story is, ironically, Yuki herself, who is such a free spirit that this sometimes leans into some non-consensual territory. It’s one thing to be taking pictures of people without permission, quite another to barge into the bath and do it while being told to stop (this scene is very well done otherwise, so her persistence is a real bummer).

And if that wasn’t bad enough, she later provides a good reason why you never let anybody take those kind of pictures. She means well in the instance, and Akari isn’t half as mad as she could be, and should be, but it’s definitely something that didn’t sit really well with me.

Still, it’s overall a really good start and provides lots of lessons in how petty and fickle people can be, especially at this age. I like that Miyama and Yuki, though things remain undefined (even in light of some very definable actions), are not perfect together.

They may turn out to be perfect for one another, but they still have the minor skirmishes and spats and all the awkward miscommunications you’d expect even as they exemplify some of the heady emotional drunkenness that marks the beginning of a relationship.

4 stars - this story is very well done, minus that rather large caveat, and I’m definitely going to follow these two (three?) forward. There’s a lot it gets right and it addresses some things that don’t normally come up in stories like this, even as it’s hitting all the regular notes too.

[Rate: 4.5/5] It was honestly a very good manga! It's refreshing to read a wlw/yuri romance (this is my first time), and it's nice to start with this one.

We actually get a lot of things happening without still not going too fast in the romance. We're mostly watching Akari getting to know Sendo and understand her feelings about her, while still being confused about a boy who's too caring for both of them. I'm super glad there were no internalized homophobia from Akari when getting to understand she has feelings for a girl, and also no homophobia from people around them (the friends, Rintaro, even Akari's mom) - that's great!

I really liked everything around the photography, and also the little infos we got in between chapters about the cameras used and facts around it.

What I didn't liked was the very lack of consent from Sendo, specially in a scene for a photography and showing that one to others. That's why this manga can't get a full 5 stars, but it was overall still a very enjoyable beginning of a cute wlw romance!

Admittedly the LGBTQIA+ tag and the camera where what drew me in and it didn't disappoint!

It's a fairly typical high school romance between Akari, the shy main character, and Yuki, the quiet outcast one, but it was very cute and fun I definitely look forward to reading more of their story!

Thank you to NetGalley for making this available in exchange for an honest review!

this was so cute! love triangles are generally really frustrating and seem only a hindrance to the plot, but the three characters here are all equally lovable and have their own personalities and motivations that just made this really lovely to read! it's a little fast-paced and layered with innocent naivete, but that's to be expected with a shoujo manga (marketed towards high school girls) and didn't put me off much. also, the characters all seem to care more about each others' perceptions of them rather than their own self-perceptions, which was written in a really interesting way.

the art style is super pretty, and paired with the all-too-familiar theme of young sapphic longing, i'm really looking forward to reading the second volume at some point!

This looks cute and different! I wasn't expecting some sexual contebt more explicit than what I am used to. I wouldn't mind reading the second volume!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

I went into "She, Her Camera, and Her Seasons" expecting a typical high school romance, but with lesbians. This is not a typical high school romance. The themes explored by Akari are a bit deeper and more adult than I expected them to be. Her longing for Yuki is overshadowed at times by her internalized heteronormativity, which is to be expected since she is a Japanese high schooler. It's also interesting to see moments where Akari is clearly jealous of Rintaro, but because she has that heteronormativity ingrained into her, she doesn't realize the emotion she's feeling is jealousy. The connection and friendship between Akari and Yuki have been shown to be growing deeper, in a completely organic way. This story moves fairly slow pace, but it doesn't feel like a slog. It makes all the relationships feel more natural and evenly timed. Nothing is rushed. The emotions Akari feels about several issues in her life are complex, and I'm interested to see if and how the manga explores them more deeply. I'm curious how this romance drama will evolve as the series goes on. I do also like the art style. It's a very common shojo romance style, but it completely suits this manga. It gives a bit of levity to scenes that involve darker or stronger topics. Even when a scene gets serious, the art style reminds you that this is still a high school romance, no matter how deeply dramatic it can get.

It's a very winsome, whimsical story that just makes one think "ah, yes, this is youth." The manga revolves around Akari, a directionless high-school girl who's spent majority of her life blending-in with the crowd—somehow she simultaneously is both very conscious about atmosphere and oblivious to behavioural cues. She develops a fascination and a crush on an indrawn Yuki, whose interest in photography is an interesting way to portray expression and communication for an anti-social character. Third primary character is Yuki's childhood friend Rintaro, who develops an interest in Akari, just as Akari develops a misunderstanding that Yuki is secretly in love with him. (I do feel bad for the guy, if this was a shoujo, he'd be the male lead.) The story is well paced and you as a reader feel that just as you get to understand Akari more as she falls in love, Yuki becomes more and more mysterious and inscrutable. By the end of volume one, the love triangle has been solidly established and none of the conflicts—Akari's plans for the future, Yuki's backstory, Rintaro's one-sided feelings—have been resolved.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an e-ARC copy of this book, in exchange for this honest review.

High school student Akari is drawn to Yuki Sendo, a short-haired standoffish girl who enjoys photography. After Yuki takes a photo of her, they become friends and Akari can't help but crush on her classmate even more. Yuki frequently takes photos of her childhood friend Rintaro who in turn seems to be interested in Akari. The book focuses on Akari's growing feelings and Yuki's passion for taking photos. I enjoyed how interesting facts about specific cameras are mentioned from chapter to chapter. I am interested in reading the next volume to see what happens with the rest of the story!

At first, I thought I missed something as Akari begins chasing after Yuki. But then I realized that the gaps told just as much as what was on the page, and I was able to tear through it very quickly. I found myself enamored with Akari and her earnestness, her warring desires to fit in and to stay with Yuki. I think the official synopsis presses a bit too hard on the love triangle, because that's not really how it feels until the very end of volume one. It just feels like Akari falling in love.

I'm not a huge fan of the art, but I think that's just a personal preference thing. Overall, I definitely would read vol 2 when it comes out!