Koe no Katachi (A Silent Voice) by Yoshitoki Ōima
Was published in English by Kodansha Comics USA as A Silent Voice from May 26, 2015 to May 31, 2016
Genre: Drama, Shounen
7 book series
Format: eBook
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars (MAL 9/10)
Find on Goodreads
Get it on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3cyfuqa

LEARNING TO LISTEN

Shoya is a bully. When Shoko, a girl who can’t hear, enters his elementary school class, she becomes their favorite target, and Shoya and his friends goad each other into devising new tortures for her. But the children’s cruelty goes too far. Shoko is forced to leave the school, and Shoya ends up shouldering all the blame. Six years later, the two meet again. Can Shoya make up for his past mistakes, or is it too late?

Review

It’s been quite a long time since I indulged myself into reading manga even though I never stopped watching anime, haha. I guess it’s time to catch up with my manga reading list eh?

Koe no Katachi or is also known as A Silent Voice wasn’t really on my list, but I’ve been seeing a lot of posts about it on my Facebook feed and there’s a movie that just came out. They said it’s going to be a story that we could all relate to so I realized that I need to try and see what the fuss is all about. Besides, it’s only 66 chapters.

Btw, this review is going to be really long if I’ll review each chapter one by one, so instead, I’m going to write this review as a whole.

This story started a flashback of Ishida’s elementary years when their teacher introduces a new transferee student named Nishimiya Shōko, who became a target of bullying because of her disability. It was ofcourse started by Ishida and reading about what he did to her really makes me mad. Back then, Ishida really hates her. He thinks she’s a nuisance and he blames her for everything that is happening to him and for ruining the whole class. His bullying escalated until the time came that he became the target of bullying too. That intensified his anger towards her that they’ve been engaged in a fight. The next day, they just found out that she transferred. That’s also the start where he was bullied big time and left alone with no friends to speak to and absolutely no plans for the future.

All were explained properly on how the bully was now the one being bullied. Well, karma is a b*tch they all said, and I think he just got his share much sooner. And I would be lying if I said he didn’t deserve it, because he really did. I know, I know, no one deserves to be bullied and even though I think he deserves it, I still feel sorry for him especially that even his teacher didn’t believe him. The teacher even said that he deserves it. What da?! That teacher doesn’t deserve to be a teacher at all! Isn’t he an adult?!

I really want this review to be spoiler free, but it can’t be helped. So I’m going to speak straight and tell you what I really think of this story 😉

Ishida is now a senior in high school and he practically planned everything and saved some money by selling all his belongings to maybe not feel guilty about what he’s going to do. He’s not as angry at Nishimiya like he did before but he is now guilty of what he did to her. After saying sorry to Nishimiya in person, he’s planning to jump off the bridge and commit suicide. Yep. This story is kind of dark, well, what do you expect? Bullying sometimes leads to suicide, but instead of the one being bullied, it’s the bully who’s committing it. But after meeting Nishimiya again and talked to her, he kind of changed his mind. I really thought that she would kick his butt after what he did, but she just smiled. Wow, this girl is really so nice and so innocent even after all that happened to her.

Their first meeting after 5 years didn’t just stop there until they finally became friends, isn’t that just nice? I’m still supposed to hate Ishida because of what he did to Nishimiya before but after what he endured and he finally decided to live his life repenting and making sure she’ll be happy again, I guess that should be enough for me eh?

Ishida then helped Nishimiya to reunite with Sahara, their classmate in elementary and every kid that was supposed to be close to her. All was doing great actually and btw, we’ve got to meet Nishimiya’s younger sister Yuzuru too. She was bullied too before because of her sister’s condition so I really thought she’ll resent her for that, but instead she’s protective of her that she even looks like a guy now because of her short hair. After the incident at school, she did her best to make her sister happy. But I guess by now she understands that she became more happier now that Ishida is here. I know it’s bound to happen but I still can’t contain it when Nishimiya tried to tell Ishida that she likes him. Aww, young love indeed.

Nishimiya was then reunited with Ueno and Kawai but it wasn’t that pleasant like it did with Sahara. These kids really have a lot of issues to themselves and are acting like they didn’t do anything wrong to Nishimiya. Ofcourse it was Ishida that should be blamed the most but those two including his former “supposed” friends are to be blamed too. They did some nasty things too anyway. It happened too fast that  I was surprised when Nishimiya tried to commit suicide ’til Ishida came to rescue her,  but then he fell and was comatose. I know Ueno was a b*tch but she became nastier after the accident. My! I really wanted to get her out of the manga and strangle her. So is Kawai, she’s acting nice and all but deep inside she’s really not that nice.

I think all of them have their own issues including both Ishida and Nishimiya’s mothers but I’m glad that in the end, they both settled it. I’m just happy that finally all of them are on the right track, especially Nishimiya.

I really like this story. I’ve been into romance lately and it’s really kind of hard to sway me away from that mood, but this story just did that as early as its first chapter. I love the message of this story. It is really something that all of us should ponder and learn, especially younger readers. It doesn’t just talk about bullying, redemption, family but also about friendship and how to overcome your fear. All of us can totally relate to each character, you could either relate to Ishida, to Nishimiya, Nagatsuka, Ueno etc.

It was also great that the author added the part about Nishimiya’s mom; on what happened why she’s so strict with her and even mean especially about her haircut when she was in Elementary. And speaking of haircuts, I think it’s because of Ishida’s mother that she’s influenced to take hair dressing too. 

It was actually my first time reading a story where the main character has impaired hearing and it was really kind of nice. Well, scratch that, it was great! I am giving this story a 4.5 stars for now because I’m waiting for some new updates. Hope this time Nishimiya and Ishida will finally be involved romantically? Wishful thinking.

So that’s it. Now I’m ready to watch the movie which I will be adding the trailer below 😉

Challenges

• 2017 New To Me
• 2017 eBooks Reading
• 2017 You Read How Many Books?
• 2017 Review Writing

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Movie Trailer

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