Seinen A Girl by the Sea by Asano Inio

[Kaiten]

A Girl by the Sea
By: Asano Inio
Genre: Drama, Romance, Slice of Life
Serialized In: Manga Erotics F
Mangaupdates

The main character is a girl named Koume Sato who lives in a sleepy seaside town. After getting used and dumped by the boy she likes, Koume decides to start a sexual relationship with Isobe, an introverted boy from her class. It’s supposed to be a no-strings-attached kind of deal but of course things get more complicated quickly. ~Kotonoha

Warning: This Manga Contains Adult Content and Themes. This Is an Emotionally Raw and Realistic Manga That Will Not Appeal to Everyone.

 

[barbapapa]

Re: [NEW] A Girl by the Sea by Asano Inio

I'm not gonna start it yet, but Asano writing for a magazine that has Naoki Yamamoto in its staff? Sounds delish.

 

[Kaiten]

Kotonoha released chapter 4-7 yesterday!

---------- Post added September 07, 2011 at 12:07 PM ---------- Previous post was September 06, 2011 at 03:04 PM ----------

With 2/3 of the only collected volume translated, I think I like A Girl By the Sea more than Punpun. The relationship between Koume and Isobe is so petty, passive-aggressive and mean. Just like teenaged friends with benefits in real life. They both are so horrible at hiding their real feelings too. Koume claims she has no feelings for Koume, but is over at his house every day. And not just for sex, she genuinely seems to enjoy talking to him, spending time with him. He claims to have feelings for her but seems uninterested in anything but sex, completely tuning her out in between.

I love that she'll have sex with Isobe but won't kiss him. What a callous way to deny someone intimacy, to reduce sex to something mechanistic.

After the last batch of chapters it is clear that Koume is not "the girl by the sea", that it is the girl who's picture is on the thumb drive. Maybe she has some connection to Isobe's brother? Maybe not, but her picture seems to mean more to Isobe than a random pretty girls would. I wonder how he will react to Koume deleting her from his hard drive. Even if she does not like Isobe, as she claims, Koume certainly hopes to possess him. She is clearly jealous that he is looking at another girl. Not only did she delete the file, but the girl by the sea made her insecure enough that she took her top off for the first time. I wonder what consequences Kashima seeing them together will have? If a rumor starts it does not bode well for their relationship. She certainly will not have any of it, denying her interest in him publicly. And he is sure to become more passive-aggressive over her denial.

 

[xmaou]

..Where can you read this? I find this manga very interesting.

 

[Kaiten]

Follow the links in the OP. Mangaupdates links to every known Manga Editor and announces new releases.

 

[Estranho]

Does anyone know the status of the series in Japan? If it's monthly, weekly; when the second volume will come out; if the story is closing to an end...

 

[PaperMaster-Yosh]

Chapters 8 through 10 have been released by Kotonoha. That was a really great cliffhanger. I think I may look for the Raws of the next chapter. I, too, would like know the status of this series. Mangaupdates has had it on one volume (ongoing) for some time but it started serialization in 2009. Does anyone know how often Manga Eroctics F is published?

 

[Kaiten]

I'm looking forward to the new chapters! I did not have the time today but will definitely read tomorrow.

Manga Erotics is bi-monthly, released in odd numbered months. If I had to guess there are three or four uncollected chapters as of the September issue.

---------- Post added at 11:46 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:41 PM ----------

Does anyone know the status of the series in Japan? If it's monthly, weekly; when the second volume will come out; if the story is closing to an end...

A Girl by the Sea is definitely ongoing. They have not announced when volume two will come out yet. Hard to say if the story is close to ending or not though I would doubt there is any intention of making this a long running series. Inio only has one manga longer than two volumes and Manga Erotics is not known for releasing epic length series.

 

[barbapapa]

Now that the entire first volume is out, I'm gonna load it onto my iPad and finally give it a go.

 

[Kaiten]

It's worthwhile, one of his better manga. I'd rank it ahead of anything other than Holograph and Solanin. It probably has the most nuanced story telling of all his titles.

---------- Post added at 11:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:00 PM ----------

Chapters 8 through 10 have been released by Kotonoha. That was a really great cliffhanger.

Chapter ten was crazy, this whole batch was crazy. Isobe is an even bigger prick than he seemed, I almost cheered when Kashima beat the shit out of him. Had it not been for the fact that Kashima is a little prick too it would have been a truly triumphant moment. I can't wait for chapter 11, I'd like to see what state Isobe and Kashima are in. The latter looks to be in truly pitiable condition.

 

[Josef]

Yeah so I started reading and got till chapter 3, the manga was amazing but I was hoping for the focus to be different, I started reading the second batch and it was kind of disturbing at that point. I mean it is a somewhat maybe even more than somewhat realistic view on this topic for today's standards. It's just that it kind of got disturbing with the main focus being the odd relationship between the two. It seems the mangaka focused too much on the two rather than stretching out the story. And that kind of closed setting is where I had the problem actually. Mixed with the raw graphic scenes it did not go well in my view. The mangaka should try and refresh the story at times.

 

[barbapapa]

Oh right I read this yesterday. As usual quality stuff by Asano, can't really add much new in terms of discussion to the mix.

 

[Kaiten]

Yeah so I started reading and got till chapter 3, the manga was amazing but I was hoping for the focus to be different, I started reading the second batch and it was kind of disturbing at that point. I mean it is a somewhat maybe even more than somewhat realistic view on this topic for today's standards. It's just that it kind of got disturbing with the main focus being the odd relationship between the two. It seems the mangaka focused too much on the two rather than stretching out the story. And that kind of closed setting is where I had the problem actually. Mixed with the raw graphic scenes it did not go well in my view. The mangaka should try and refresh the story at times.

I think the closed setting was the point, he wants to highlight how dysfunctional and claustrophobic there relationship is. Neither are able to properly express honest, adult emotions instead wallowing in a combustible mix of sex and childishness. If love should make your world larger, there relationship makes their world smaller.

Inio great subject is adulthood, the struggle to get there without being consumed by the petty stresses of life. His more recent manga, Oyasumi Punpun and A Girl By the Sea have both explored the dark side of growing up with characters unable to grow up. His earlier series and one shots tend to be more positive, particularly Solanin.

 

[Josef]

I have never seen someone have such a take on childhood, it is dark and gloomy but somewhat realistic. It probably is due to the parents of these children. Maybe he it stressing out that no attention to kids leads them to this? They did show the girls parents I believe? I say this because in general such things do not happen among children that often, this has to be an exception with some reasons and to make the story more deeper and dramatic.

I think I started Oyasumi Punpun once, it had comedy as well, unless I am mistaking?

 

[barbapapa]

Punpun is pretty funny at the start, but it gets really dark later on.

 

[Kaiten]

The early chapters had more humor but it was somewhat black humor, at least by his standards at the time. That is a discussion for another thread though.

---------- Post added at 01:50 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:46 PM ----------

I have never seen someone have such a take on childhood, it is dark and gloomy but somewhat realistic. It probably is due to the parents of these children. Maybe he it stressing out that no attention to kids leads them to this? They did show the girls parents I believe? I say this because in general such things do not happen among children that often, this has to be an exception with some reasons and to make the story more deeper and dramatic.

I think I started Oyasumi Punpun once, it had comedy as well, unless I am mistaking?

At least in Japan (and the States) teen sex before dating and outside of a relationship is not an uncommon thing. It pretty much always goes the same as portrayed here: inability to express real emotions, sex as a barrier to communication, and emotional dishonesty gradually build when there is no real foundation for the relationship. Someone always likes the other more than they want to admit, someone always seems to like the other less than they say. And there is rarely a strong foundation for the relationship, neither love nor friendship.

 

[Josef]

Truth be told! Indeed that balance in real life is present as well, it makes the one look desperate in this case it is the boy? Hm, not sure but the girl is allowing him a lot, which means she is equally desperate. Haven't these kids heard of Platonic love? Oh who am I kidding, they are too young to understand it, of course even among adults Platonic love is impossible. In these modern times where sexual freedom has been mounting since the second half of the 20th century I guess it does seem normal.

I may be going off the bat here, but society in portrayed via school, their parents and friends does not help much? I mean they are under constant pressure in this manga, the girl's parents seemed liked that to me. Just shows what a totally free child can do. Seems somewhat natural though, as a consequence of being free.

 

[Josef]

Yeah totally expected this kind of thing from this manga. I did not expect the boy to be such a lust monster? But I think his issue is more psychological than anything, I mean he seems to be in a stage where he is not sure of his sexuality, interesting development on his part, yeah it had to have been graphic to show off his lust I suppose, but it is more confusion than lust in my opinion.

On the other hand the manga also got another plot element with the ending of the volume, so it is expected this to turn into something darker now. Aside from that I do enjoy how the mangaka seems to have his own art style and paneling to get the atmosphere of the story, nice job, still and iffy manga for me. D:

 

[Josef]

Look at this in retrospect it really can come back to bite as a work when faced with a real life situation like so. Scary. :O Like all great works this suddenly stopped? Not really fair though, just when I started to like it a bit.

 

[Kaiten]

It's still ongoing. Volume 2 has not yet been published and Kotonoha do not use magazine raws. Manga Erotics is a bi-monthly magazine, making serialization slow.