A Town Where You Live (2023)

A Town Where You Live (君のいる町 Kimi no Iru Machi) is a Japanese shōnen manga by Kouji Seo based on the author's actual hometown in Hiroshima Prefecture. Noted as the author's 3rd instalment, the series is the first continuity after the previous Suzuka series, taking place in the same universe and a few years after the series' epilogue.

It was serialized in Kodansha's Weekly Shōnen Magazine from May 2008 to February 2014 and the chapters collected into 27 tankōbon volumes. The series follows the daily life of the self-conscious teenager, Haruto Kirishima as he becomes enamored with Yuzuki Eba, an extroverted teenage girl who moves from Tokyo to the Kirishima household in Hiroshima.

The anime adaptation started with a 2-part titled A Town Where You Live: Twilight Intersection by Tatsunoko Production in 2012. The official anime television series adaptation animated by Gonzo aired from July to September 2013, later spawning a radio program, drama CD, and an image song album.

Plot

The plot follows the two characters Haruto Kirishima and Yuzuki Eba. Yuzuki moved from Tokyo to her father's rural hometown in Hiroshima Prefecture to attend high school. Given that Haruto's father is an acquaintance of Yuzuki's father, the Kirishimas take her into their home. Haruto is not keen of the situation because he believes that Yuzuki is a complete stranger and that a girl his same age, who is not a relative, living in the same home will cause complications for him. The misunderstanding he wants to avoid the most is that they are a couple because he already likes his classmate, Nanami Kanzaki. The problem is that Yuzuki has romantic feelings for Haruto and is not timid in pursuing a relationship. It turns out Yuzuki is no stranger: She visited Haruto's city in her childhood. During the summer festival, Yuzuki was on her own and crying. Haruto approached her and made her happy. Also Yuzuki never got along with her family since she was treated like the fifth wheel by her step-family.

When Haruto finally confesses to Nanami, he is rejected. He does not understand for a long time, until Nanami opens his eyes: Even though Haruto pretends to love Nanami (even to himself), his actions said otherwise. Whenever he had to decide between spending time with Nanami or saving Yuzuki from one of the situations she would keep getting herself into, he would choose Yuzuki. After finally admitting to himself that he has fallen for Yuzuki, he tries to pursue a relationship with her - only to find out that she has somewhat given up and decided to go back to Tokyo, to patch things up with her family. After many complications Haruto confesses his love at a festival before Yuzuki is to return to Tokyo and they both start a long distance relationship.

The long distance relationship becomes a problem when Yuzuki suddenly stops all contact to Haruto, presumably after having fallen in love with a boy from her school. Haruto doubts this and believes Yuzuki is in trouble instead, and decides to go seek her to help her out. He persuades his parents to allow him to move to Tokyo in order to pursue a career as a cook. Finally in Tokyo, he soon makes friends with Asuka, a girl, and Kazama, an open hearted guy who is always in high spirits. Kazama wants to become a professional biker and asks Haruto to open a restaurant, so Haruto can become Kazama's sponsor. Haruto soon finds out that Kazama is terminally ill and will die in a year; however, Kazama is also the new boyfriend of Yuzuki. Haruto learns from Yuzuki that she is with Kazama only due to his illness. He decides not to lie to his friend Kazama and fight for Yuzukis love openly. It turns out that there is a surgery that can possibly save Kazamas life - or pass away during the surgery, if things go back. After a heated discussion, Kazama decides to take the surgery. Coming back from the successful operation he first writes on his helmet "this space is reserved for Haruto-kun's restaurant", but dies the night after due to the stress the operation has been for his body. On his funeral, Haruto sees the Helmet and cries. Due to the experience they made with Kazama, Yuzuki and Haruto decide not to see each other again.

In the following time, Asuka and Haruto become very close and eventually start to date. As graduation comes closer, all of Haruto's childhood friends decide to go to the same university as him, among them Nanami and his closest friends Takashi and Akari. In order to pay for a trip that they want to make, Haruto takes a job at a supermarket close to Yuzuki's home. Yuzuki and Haruto meet each other frequently and become friends again. After a few misunderstandable situations between Yuzuki and Haruto, Haruto finds that he still has strong feelings for Yuzuki. He lies to Azuka to be with Yuzuki who finds out about this. Haruto confesses his feelings for Yuzuki to Asuka and breaks up with her, causing all his former friends to turn their backs on the couple. Haruto, who knows he will be happy with Yuzuki, accepts and endures this for a long time. After going to Kazama's grave together a long time later, the two find out that their friends have finally forgiven him; However, Akari's father becomes sick and she decides to move back to Hiroshima. It is also around this time that Haruto realizes his dream to become a chef.

When Haruto and Yuzuki get together, Haruto decides to move out of his sister's apartment, and get his own place in Tokyo. The main reason for this is because he is constantly reminded of his time dating Asuka, which is painful and awkward for them both. After he moves in, Yuzuki's father finds out that they are dating, and because Yuzuki lied to him about it (and because he is jealous of Haruto making her happy, while he couldn't), her father decides that Yuzuki will stop seeing Haruto altogether. Because of this, Yuzuki runs away from home to live with Haruto, again. She and her father eventually reconcile, with him giving his blessing to the couple. The two become good friends with their neighbor, Miyu Hoshina, a timid and insecure girl, who goes to the same college as Haruto. Though she is afraid of men, she warms to Haruto after he helps her a few times, for no apparent reason. She causes many humorous misunderstandings between the three of them. Together with Haruto and Yuzuki, she plans a trip to Okinawa, in order to cement their friendship. When they return, Haruto ponders what it means to fall even more in love with someone, and how he can express it to Yuzuki. He eventually realizes how, and on their one year anniversary of being together in Tokyo (as well as the 200th chapter of the series), they finally make love for the first time.

Later, Haruto has several ups and downs in looking for work, makes new friends at his university, and finds himself in a rut before his junior year. Feeling behind in his search for a career, Yuzuki supports him as they begin to look into the workforce. Yuzuki decides she wants to be a teach, and Haruto decides that he will work where he can in order to support himself and Yuzuki.

In their college years, Haruto and Yuzuki grew closer, while Takashi had a child with his girlfriend, and Kanzaki met her boyfriend, and Akari married an old friend. Now that college was over, Haruto began work in Koshi, almost 300 miles away from Yuzuki. Feeling the strain of a long distance relationship again, Haruto decided to propose to Yuzuki, but at the last moment, broke up with her, knowing she'd give up her beloved job as a teacher to join him.

Years later, Haruto found success at his company, and even made a drink called Yuzu no Hana. (a play on Yuzuki's name) His success earned him a transfer to Tokyo, where he began living. He remembers that he and Yuzuki promised to see the cherry blossoms every year at the park, where they reunite and find themselves together again.

The series then goes on to see Haruto and Yuzuki marry, and Haruto opens Kirishima Restaurant, before the family moves back to Hiroshima, to the town where they live.

Characters

• Haruto Kirishima
• Yuzuki Eba

Hiroshima characters

• Takashi Yura
• Akari Kaga
• Nanami Kanzaki
• Shiho Amagi

Tokyo characters

• Rin Eba
• Asuka Mishima
• Kyousuke Kazama
• Mina Nagoshi
• Kiyomi Asakura
• Shiori Amaya
• Miyu Hoshina
• Chisa Miyanaga

Reception

The manga was mixed with reviewers praising the plot for its realism or panning it as predictable and cliché.

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References

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