by Luce, Staff Writer

Welcome back to the rollercoaster Yuri harem series, I Don’t Know Which Is Love, Volume 2.  In Volume 1, our protagonist is Mei Soraike, a girl who fell in love with a female friend at high school, and upon getting her heart broken, swears that she will reinvent herself and get a girlfriend in college! Within a few days of starting, she ends up with five candidates, all of whom are vying for her attention. At the end of volume one, Karin said they should just go out, and then Riri arrived…?

Within ten pages of starting, Mei finds herself between Karin and Riri while they’re asking who she wants to sleep with. Indecisive… and experiencing ‘too gay to function’ (Mei often experiences this), she elects to sleep on the floor instead. She ends up in a charged lecture with Prof Maria, and later, she finds herself in a three person play with Karin and Minato (somewhat for their own ulterior motives), joins Riri on a photoshoot to try and improve her acting, goes out to see a play with Minato to try and get her voice right, and ends up practicing with Kaori… and when the script says french kiss, she does! 

DareKoi remains an enjoyable rollercoaster, never lingering long on any one moment, although it doesn’t quite feel like it is rushing either. It knows what the reader wants – girls flirting and kissing, and by jove, you get that. Sprinkled on the top are some of the love interests wondering if they love Mei, too. What I like is that the harem have positive interactions with each other – while they are kind of fighting over Mei, they are also their own people. Minato and Karin knew each other before they knew Mei, and they remain friends, and Riri and Karin also seem to know each other. 

Honestly, I’d be quite happy with a polyamorous ending – it would be fun if the answer to Mei’s question of ‘which is love?’ is ‘all of them’, as I like to think love can take many different forms. It likely won’t, but the playing field is pretty even for the time being. Karin has asked Mei out, but Mei doesn’t feel like she’s ‘near her level’ – but that she’ll try! What I like about Mei is that although she’s generally passive in so much as everything seems to happen around her, she is trying. She only has one frame of reference for love, being her old friend, so her inexperience makes sense. Speaking of that old friend, her face hasn’t been shown as yet – I’m not sure we even have a name – but I can only assume that she is going to pop back up at some point. I hope Mei does okay when that happens. She’ll probably be either on a date or in a compromising position, knowing this series, but it does it with such heart that I’m looking forward to it.

Ratings:

Story: 7
Art: 8
Characters: 7
Service: 5
Yuri: too Yuri to function

Overall: 8

I Don’t Know Which Is Love, Volume 2 is available now in print and digital from Yen Press!