Review: The Summer Hikaru Died vol 1 – Mokumokuren

Well, ok, that was terrifying. This isn’t the gory kind of horror or even extreme psychological horror. It’s the juxtaposition of usual summer life in rural Japan – eating watermelon, grocery shopping, hanging out a friend’s house – with OH GOD WHAT. It’s my favorite kind of horror so I of course I loved this volume!

It’s been six months since Yoshiki’s best friend Hikaru disappeared in the woods for a week. Everyone else seems to have accepted his miraculous return and things have gone back to normal. It’s only Yoshiki who suspects that something is wrong – and has the courage to confront his friend. Dealing with the knowledge that his friend is gone but something with his friend’s memories is still walking around and desperate to be friends with him – well, Yoshiki’s having a rough time. Can the strange things happening around town be blamed on Hikaru? And what kind of relationship does he have – should he have – with his “friend?”

Yoshiki and Hikaru have been best friends since elementary school. The two boys still consider each other “only” best friends, though there’s enough tension and longing to make this count as at least a crush in my eyes. Hikaru insists that he needs Yoshiki and has a habit of making comments that could easily be misinterpreted as declarations of love, not to mention several teasing innuendos. It’s no surprise that Yoshiki’s conflicted about his feelings for Hikaru. Perhaps the most emotional part for me was the heartbreaking sadness of Yoshiki confirmation multiple times with Hikaru that his friend is truly dead and not coming back. The grief, confusion over Hikaru’s actions, not to mention worry over his intentions is absolutely overwhelming and depicted so well.

The art is unbelievably gorgeous. The character design is stunning and the varied emotions are depicted so well: fear, confusion, yearning, embarrassment. My personal favorite was the depiction of the being inside Hikaru. It’s both horrific and beautiful and something that had me pausing to inspect carefully every time. It’s no wonder I found it easy to empathize with Yoshiki.

Most of the story is from Yoshiki’s POV so a lot of the horror comes from the tension in the relationship between himself and Hikaru. It’s that sinking feeling when you know you’re making a bad choice but can’t help yourself. There are of course dire warnings of some sort of great evil and the unsubtle suggestion that whatever’s inside Hikaru will harm him, but compared to Hikaru’s grand declarations, well, it’s hard to believe, right?

Overall, this was an amazing start to a series and I’ve already checked out the second volume from the library – and preordered the third!

Content notes: View Spoiler »death (including murder), body horror, grief « Hide Spoiler

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