To all my readers here at Okazu, and especially to all of you who have been with me for years, my sincere thanks and love. We’re going to need each other in days to come. I will do my best to provide entertainment and thoughtful commentary and a welcoming community. Please feel free to vent in the comments today.Hate speech and insults will be immediately and harshly dealt with. Expressions of mutual support are welcome. Stay respectful of each other and I’ll just consider it an open forum.
In the meantime, as thin excuse to escape reality, I would like to briefly discuss Himawari-san, Volume 7. One might be surprised to see this story, which was never about anything in particular, to be still in progress. Unusually, as it reaches Volume 7, it appears to be about something after all. This story is about the humanizing of Himawari-san, “An introverted young girl and her older brother have their lives radically altered by a bookshop owner and a professional writer, respectively.”
In this volume we see both Matsuri and Himawari-san from the outside and we can see that they, almost despite themselves, have been really good for one another. And we can see that they are coming to that same conclusion.
Ratings:
Art – 9
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Yuri – 2 (I’m starting to think Himawari-san and Yuu might be a good couple, too)
Service – 1
Overall – 8
These past two days have reminded me starkly of the importance – the lifeline – books were to me as a young person. As an adult, they’ve become more of a pleasure, but as a child and a teen, they were the single thing that kept me sane and out of trouble. I’m going to start working on my Gift List shortly, and hope that we can offer some solace and lifelines through manga in the days to come. Feel free to make suggestions in the comments as well.
ere’s a handful of days left in the 
