This is it. This is the final volume in the series. Oh all the feels. Let me try and capture how awesome this series was.
So, if you saw my first review of volume 1 (only posted days ago because I couldn't put these manga down!) then you got the bare bones of how the story starts. Let me give you a little more of a recap. Shoya was the middle school daredevil, the kid that jumped off bridges to prove his worth to the other boys he considered his friends. He hated boredom. So when they get a transfer student who happens to be deaf, Shoya makes it his purpose in life to torment Shoko and pit the other classmates against her. Even though it works, all the other students, even the teacher, bully poor Shoko, it all backfires terribly when Shoko's mother demands recompense for the numerous hearing aides Shoya has destroyed. Suddenly Shoya finds himself on the other end of the stick as the others in his class begin bullying him. Unable to take it, Skoya lashes out at Shoko one final time that causes her to finally leave the school.
The meat of the tale begins when Shoya, having had enough of the loneliness he has had to endure over the years since his actions, decides to take his own life. Getting his affairs in order, Shoya realizes there is one last thing he must do before he ends it all: apologize to Shoko for what he did. But when he goes to confront her she is understandably upset, and when he "speaks" to her (because he actually learned sign language to get his message across) he realizes that he wasn't the only one just done. Deciding to try and right the wrongs he caused this girl, Shoya resolves to push on, resulting in one of the most incredible pictures in manga that I fell in love with.
The rest of the series is about their growing friendship. That's not to say everything is rainbows and unicorns from there on out, oh no! Shoko and Shoya both have a lot of pain that lies just beneath the surface, and sometimes it rises up and people get hurt. They also have a lot of people they have effected over the course of time they have known each other, and not everyone is as forgiving as Shoko or as determined to make amends as Shoya. The ride is bumpy and incredible.
To say I loved this series would be an understatement! The story was so real, from the bullying to the difficulty in making things right; the characters were real, from Shoya's complicated feelings about Shoko to the mothers who are trying to raise difficult children alone; the plot was real, and all of it came together to form a story that will stick with me for some time. This is a series I plan on buying to reread in the future and recommend to everyone who reads manga. This one was just amazing! So if you haven't read it yet, go find it, now! And if you have, tell me what you think. I would love to talk about this one all day!
