Customer Reviews

Peach Girl #1

5 star:		(41)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Momo Adachi is a teenage girl who is desperately trying to overcome what her outside appearance suggests and win the boy she's crazy for! To clarify, Momo ("peach" in Japanese) lives in an area where only pale girls are considered beautiful and innocent. Those with tan skin are stamped with the derogatory title of "beach bunny" and are viewed by society as easy party girls. Momo's problem is that she tans so easily and with light hair that everyone assumes is bleached, she fits the physical description perfectly! However, Momo is anything but the beach bunny her looks make her out to be. Shy and pretty, Momo tries desperately to lighten her skin with sunblocks and look like the girl she feels like inside. Only one boy seems to understand that Momo isn't what she seems--Toji. Toji is also Momo's love interest, and readers will grow to love him as much as she does! Of course, just when it seems like Momo might have Toji for her own, Sae--Momo's jealous "friend"--makes plans to make sure that doesn't happen!

This is a good MANGA series! Any female reader would be finding herself eagar to turn the pages!

Peach Girl is one of my favorite manga series! I first read it in SMILE magazine. It is a story about a high-school girl named Momo (Peach in japanese- hence, "Peach Girl"). Where Momo lives, only bad girls have tans, and Momo tans way too easily! This causes her to be insecure, because people think she is a bad person who only parties all the time, when she is really a girl who is very shy and nice. Her "friend" is Sae, who wants anything that Momo does, including the boy Momo likes! Poor Momo. Will she ever get to be with the boy she likes? Read Peach Girl to find out!

Peach Girl is an odd concept really, I mean we're following the love escapades of a girl whom is naturally blonde and tan in a world where everyone has dark hair and non-tan skin haha(Unless they fake'n'bake). Momo can't help it, she hates the way she looks. Now in the U.S. someone like Momo would be considered an absolute babe, but obviously in Asia, they have different standards of beauty.

So in this volume Momo has to deal with a backstabbing friend whom copies everything she does and tries to steals all the guys from Momo's life. Any guy that seems to take interest in Momo or/and that Momo likes. All Momo wants to do is look normal and get some friends who are'nt total (...) and because Momo is so insecure about the way she looks she doesn't realize all the guys that like her. its kind of fun to get some insight into the life of the "hot" girl. All girls are insecure about the way they look, especially the ones we consider hot.

Of course "Peach Girl" isn't deep, its a whole LOT OF FLUFFY SHOUJO!!! If you like fluffy shoujo then you'll love Peach Girl no doubt.!

God Bless & *enjoy* ~Amy

Momo Adachi is a young Japanese school-girl with a light problem: She's dark. In her area, those wuth dark skin (and in Momo's case, light hair) are frowned upon and refered to as "Beach Bunnies". It doesn't help Momo's situation any that her "friend", Sae, is trying to steal anything that Momo holds dear... Such as her crush-since-Junior-High, Toji. The only OTHER thing stopping Momo from going after Toji is that he only likes light-skinned girls... Or so it appears. Oh, and THEN poor Momo's got to deal with Kiley Okayasu, the school's biggest playboy who seems to have a "thing" for his "Sweet Peach", and doesn't have any problems showing it! What's a girl to do?!

Momo Adachi is a typical high school girl with all sorts of problems. For a start she likes a boy who doesn't know she exists, for another thing he once said he didn't like girls with dark skin... and the biggest problem is that Momo (which means peach in Japanese) tans at an abnormally fast rate. This does all sorts of negative things for her self esteem, particularly since her tan gives her a "beach bunny" image that has earned her a reputation as the school slut by her female peers despite the fact that she has never even been kissed.

Another factor undermining her ego is her best friend (excuse me..."friend") Sae Kashiwagi. Sae is a typical beauty, small and petite and with creamy white skin so fair Momo feels awkward with her. Even though Momo views their friendship as special and intimate she doesn't know that Sae really despises her, so much so that she is constantly going after the things that Momo wants. This ranges from clothes and handbags to the men that Momo admires. So of course when Sae learns that Momo likes a boy in their class Momo decides to tell her it's a boy named Kiley Okayasu, a flirtatious, loquacious, handsome young man... the real object of desire that Momo has wanted since middle school is a taciturn and sensitive man name Kazuya Tojikamori (Toji, for short).

When Sae learns of Momo's "feelings" for Kiley the first thing she immediately does is go after him. The problem is that once she does this Kiley starts to behave as is he actually cares for Momo, even going so far as to brag he kissed her in a beach incident that happened a few years prior. Suddenly though Toji is starting to take notice of Momo and her new "relationship" and Sae is still doing everything she can to stir the muck between the three.

The story is obviously bittersweet. Momo's friendships are not concrete and at any moment they are likely to blow up in her face. Sae is the perfect enemy, one who constantly has to validate her own ego by messing with the one person who makes her the most jealous and poses the biggest threat. Sae reminds me of every two faced snotty person I ever encountered in high school, and that makes this manga read truer than many I have perused recently. Kiley is adorable, of course. He is the typical attainable guy who will, in my mind, have issues later on that make him a deeper person (men of this sort always seem bright and bubbly on the surface, until one gets to know them). Toji is succinct almost to a point of brooding, but he surprises us all when after all of his defending Momo we discover that he has feelings for her... and Momo... Momo is an every woman. She is all of us, every single one of us who has ever second guessed ourselves or questioned decisions we have made because we weren't quite sure about our strengths and our worth... I am loving this first volume, and plan to read more... it just saddens me that (so far) no one seems to be into this series. This is a great storyline, one that will resound with many people.

I've read all 8 books in the peach girl series and 1&2 of peach girl: Change of heart. I really want #3 but I shall wait like a good girl.....AHHH must have it! must have it! Anyway....this is a great series because its funny, sexy, cute, and addicting. Sure you might say being addicting is a bad thing but what would you do if you didn't crave the next book in the series? Its worth every cent of your money and every moent of your time, or at least it was to me. Every book is exciting and the endings will leave you longing for more! Its simply one of the cleverest mangas around! Great job Miwa Euda!!! Clap!! Clap!! Clap!!

... that must mean this manga is good. (...) When I first looked at the picture of this girl on the cover of this new manga in my hands, It came to me as somewhat strange that this girl never learned to zip her fly, but don't let this fool you. All the colored artwork of this girl display her in strange clothes and positions like this, but she isn't like that at all. Momo (meaning Peach in Japaneese) Adochi (I belive her last name is, or somewhere along those lines) is really a very nice (until she gets ticked off) person who has unfortunatly big problems when it comes to her friendship with a wicked cat-woman named Sae. Though its not a vital part of the story line, it should be pointed out that Momo is one of those that tans easy. Sadly, her classmates view her tan skin as her being a "beach bunny." But really Momo was active on the swim team. Now back to Sae. Momo came to her high school a few weeks late because she had the measles. When she started her first day, Sae immediatly latched on to her. At the time Momo was just happy to have a friend because everyone else had already been sucked into their own groups, a sorting that Momo missed because of her absence. When Sae became her "friend" Momo didn't realize or wonder about why Sae wasn't sucked into a group herself. The truth is apparent later when she sees that Sae is nothing but wicked. It is said that the grass is always greener on the other side, but Momo's version of it is that "if I were to pick one blade of that grass, Sae wouldn't rest until she had it." This becomes truly apparent later on when we see Sae's true side. Sae finds out that Momo has been in love with a boy named Toji since she was in junior high, a secret that Momo has wisely kept from her. In a cruel display of meaness after finding out, Sae goes after this boy herself in front of Momo's eyes no less, all the while looking like the sweet one while Momo is left looking like SHE is stealing Toji from SAE. To add a great deal of humor to the otherwise disturbing plot, a popular and hot guy is added named Kiley. Kiley appears at first to be just a pervert, and he accidently keeps causing more trouble for Momo left and right, making the situation between her and Toji worsen. Momo (I don't blame her) has a lot of built up anger inside her from just the small amount of time that she has had to put up with Sae and her relentless copying, among other things. Kiley (he brings it upon himself) becomes the scapegoat for her anger. If Kiley were not in this manga, it would just be a drama, almost unbearable because of Sae. Kiley makes this manga's world turn. The artwork, or animation in this manga is beautiful. In other manga/anime that I've read/seen, the characters are nothing but geometric forms. Miwa Ueda's art hand has gotten carried away when it comes to the beauty of the animation in this manga. So all in all Alas I cannot give you readers more information on the plot except for the bare minimum. My review here is nothing (if that) compared to what you will read when you read this manga. If you have the not-too-unreasonable twenty bucks to spare, which is easy enough if you babysit, have a job, walk dogs, whatever, I highly highly recommend that you buy Peach Girl numbers one and two. If you just buy volume one WARNING: Cliffhanger alert! In number two there is a steep cliffhang drop as well, (...) If you enjoy manga, or any young adult literature at that, you WILL love Peach Girl by Miwa Ueda. (...)

This may be a shoujo manga but it's not for the little girls! Momo is a lush beauty with a complex about her dark tan skin. Her looks get her into trouble because people seem to always assume things about her based on her looks. She's got a crush on a friend since Jr. High, Toji, who she tries to keep secret from her "best friend", Sae. Sae can't stand that guys are more interested in Momo than her. Momo has Kiley, a popular and good-looking senior, chasing after her and complicating her efforts to be with Toji!

After reading just this first volume,...I'm definitely drooling in anticipation at the next volume!

I used to read Sweet Valley High in junior high school and I picked this up because the drawings caught my eye. It seems like an illustrated Sweet Valley high sometimes, but that's okay. When I look back, those books were actually decent for kids to read because although they did take a kind of dramatic soap opera type form, the characters did usually do the right thing and they respected themselves and their bodies. Elizabeth and Jessica never ran around sleeping with everyone in sight, or with anyone, actually. So they were decent bubble gum type role models. This book seems to take a similar attitude towards such things, although it looks at [physical attraction]in a sometimes different way, it's hard to say exactly how. It's a cultural thing, I think.
Anyways, It's really amusing. I love it when the comics take really ridiculously comic form, like when Sae is throwing herself at Toji (she goes to such lengths as to trip him in the hallway with a wire and stuff). Sometimes Sae turns into a paper doll and sometimes Sae develops road runner legs when she's running after Toji or someone else and I find that hilarious. When the characters are drawn realistically, they are drawn well. Momo has huge eyes and vulnerable facial expressions that are just adorable, and as much care is taken with the guys. I thought Goro was especially well drawn, even though he is [not popular].

This wonderfully drawn manga, full of comedy, action, and drama, is a must for any graphic novel lover (over 13), and for those who find themselves at the wrong end of envious assumptions. Momo (that's Japanese for "peach") is a bright, innocent girl who is always hit on by sleezy men because she looks like a beach bunny with her tan skin and light blond hair. Momo's "best friend" Sae uses these assumptions to her own advantage by encouraging the rumors about Momo in order to place Momo out of the High School dating circuit...and have Momo's crush all to herself. The first volume leaves you with a cliffhanger that will leave you breathless for volume 2! This is a touching novel that, like Momo, appears shallow and bubble gum on the outside, but is filled with touching and true sentiments.