Ichigo Channel~

Hey~ :D

It's been awhile since I've read manga, so I decided to read all of a shoujo manga that I haven't finished reading before called "Ichigo Channel".

The first time I read it (many many years ago ^_^"), I was only around chapter 11. This time, I read from chapter 1 to 49 in a few hours. It was really good, but I'm only going to give it 4 stars out of 5.



Description:
The manga follows the story of a girl named Ichiko, who has a brother named Ken, who wants to be an idol really badly. During grocery shopping, Ichiko decides to take out some money from a bank and is suddenly held hostage. In self-defense, she slaps the man taking her hostage. She soon realizes that she was in the middle of a scene being filmed in the bank. The man that she slapped is her main love interest, Kanzaki. After she apologizes to Kanzaki, Kanzaki notices that she's cute and gets really close to her face. Ichiko blushes and moves away, thinking that he was going to kiss her. He then laughs and Ichiko pulls out some spring onions and points it at Kanzaki, saying that he's a despicable person.

After walking away, she decides that she wants to see the filming after all, but there are so many people crowding around the scene that she can't get a good look. Noticing how much trouble Ichiko is having seeing, a man decides to lift her up. Ichiko blushes and tells the man to put her down after the scene was done. Ichiko finally gets home when suddenly the doorbell rings. She answers it to see the man that lifted her up earlier. He introduces himself as Tendou and is a talent agent and is interested in forming a boyband group. Ken is super excited, but Ichiko is worried. Tendou insists that Ichiko be part of the group. But she's a girl! *cuts off a bit of her hair* Presto! She looks like a boy. After Ken begging her to join, Ichiko accepts.

Ichiko and Ken are then quickly carried away to a filming where they meet their 3rd member of their boyband group, Trijet. This 3rd member is none other than... *drum roll* Kanzaki! Even though they just met earlier, Kanzaki doesn't recognize Ichiko due to her hair being cut. (Really?) Tendou then introduces Ichiko as #1 and Ken as #2. Ichiko has no experience with filming and is scolded. She is told to take a break, but she instead decides to grab a wig and some clothes and run away from everything. After she successfully runs away, her heel gets stuck between the crack of a sidewalk. Desperately trying to pull it out, a man helps her, who is... *drum roll* Kanzaki again! He helps pull the shoe out, but the heel breaks so he carries her to the nearest shoe store. Before leaving, he asks for her name and Ichiko tells him that her name is Ichigo (the Japanese word for "strawberry"). Is Ichiko feeling something for Kanzaki at this moment? (By the way, Kanzaki was busy looking for #1, which is the reason why he bumped into "Ichigo".)

That's pretty much a good summary of chapter 1. XD I should mention that this manga can easily be split into 2 arcs. (I can't go into any more detail without spoiling the story. >.<)

This shoujo manga has all the essentials:
- 1 main love interest (2 competing love interests)
- 1 female rival
- 1 best friend
- Lots of bullies and then bullies turned into nicer classmates
- Tons of struggle
- Kissing parts located at strategic points
- Happy ending

This manga made me blush a lot, squee a lot, say "omg" a lot, made me go "AHH!!" a lot and yeah... Good stuff. A lot of frustrating moments, a lot of "why did you do that!" moments, and for a good chunk of the manga, you think that Ichiko is together Kanzaki, but they were actually in limbo until they explicitly say it. @.@ Also, this manga was nail-biting to the end. A must read and definitely made me remember why I was such a hopeless romantic in high school. :3