Cried a little towards the end. Art wise this isn't my cuppa tea but storyline isn't shabby. A bitter sweet romance filled with doubts and unhappy past. I was actually bored at the beginning, luckily the pace picks up somewhere in the middle and then the best part was towards the end. At least the courtship was kinda fun to read. Togawa was pushy in his pursuit of Shima. On the other hand Shima who was still recovering from a bad breakup was shying away from Togawa's attention. He is determined to stay away from straight guys at all cost. Straight as a rod Togawa was exactly the kind of guys Shima vowed to steer clear off. I did find Togawa's sudden sexual interest towards Shima a little difficult to understand even if he has just discovered his attraction to guys and that he is bisexual. The lack of self doubt on his part made me question the plotline. Perhaps Togawa's transition to a bi wasn't tackled well. When I found out that this manga was going to be released in Germany, too, I got myself the German edition because apple and sho really strongly recommended this as one of the better salarymen yaoi dramas they'd read (according to the mangaka it is her first personal project - and according to her page here at GoodReads she's been an artist for other writers).What is strong, apart from the elegant but not too feminine or flowry artwork, is the cinematic sense of timing that Yoneda-sensei has. She starts with Shima, the fragile admitted gay character who has left his good job at another company due to being mobbed by the man he had an affair with, waking up after a night with his current direct boss Togawa and attempting to smoke a cigarette.Now this is a start I've seen before in other yaoi. Only in reading the book and following their initial meeting and impressions of each other, reading along with their developing relationship, did I realise how important smoking is for Togawa (whose family are all dead, the younger brother dying in a house fire(!) which ought to have killed Togawa, too - and the mother suiciding - all this after having lost the father in an accident) and how much the fact that he decides to cut back on smoking and drinking shows that his feelings for Shima are true and strong.Shima, who really hates smoke and alcohol (he can't stand the smell in the clothes and the taste in a kiss, and he can't handle alcohol himself, so...) was really brainwashed by his former lover and is understandably afraid that he is making the same mistakes at the new employers but he can't keep his eyes off Togawa.So we get the back and forth dance of attraction and are wondering how much there is in truth to the feelings - mostly on the side of Shima - and then Yoneda-sensei does a clever switch, revealing a lot about the background of Togawa and showing how desperately he has gone beyond just the fascination with Shima's face and body, trying to find compromises to show him his sincerity.And Shina breaking it all off in fear of getting hurt, but selling it as a way out for Togawa before he is outed to the world and might be hurt himself. I really liked that Togawa is not a martyr and accepts the slap with dignity - and would not have returned to Shima if he hadn't gone after him finally.Is there a weakness? In the construction of Togawa falling in real love for Shima the flip of the reader getting a solo scene for Togawa where he brokenly admits his utter love for Shima is not so well prepared as Shima's slow fascination with Togawa. Shima himself remains a bit of a cipher: I can't quite get why Togawa would flip so much because of him.This is no Future Lovers - which is for me the top standard of fairly realistic men in working positions falling for each other where one of the guys has been straight so far (but then I'm not all that widely read in yaoi manga) - but a strong single title nevertheless.
Do You like book No Touching At All (2010)?
I haven't read something like this before, it was a really good bl. I'll miss it.
—RebeccalShell
Beautiful artwork and well-developed plot. One of my best BL manga :)
—jameslm
