By Fumi Yoshinaga
Digital Manga Publishing, 200 pp.
Rating: Young Adult (16+)

As I’ve mentioned in reviews past, Fumi Yoshinaga is one of my favorite mangaka (or even comickers) of all time. Perhaps best known in the states for her lovely baking epic Antique Bakery, Fumi Yoshinaga has also graced the states with manga like Gerard & Jacques, Ichigenme, Solfege, Garden Dreams¸and The Moon and Sandals. Though most of her stateside releases are yaoi titles, her two best series in my opinion, Antique Bakery and Flower of Life, are not and have near-universal appeal. Indeed, both Antique Bakery and Flower of Life could be generally classified as slice-of-life stories, each following a close-knit community of characters through a few years of their lives. There is drama, to be sure, but these stories are neither shojo romances nor shonen action stories nor seinen thrillers: they are their own slow-paced tale of evolving human relationships. Though Antique Bakery was my first entry to Fumi Yoshinaga’s incredible body of work and still probably my favorite, Flower of Life is every bit as good, hilarious and moving as its spiritual predecessor.

For a brief synopsis of the story so far as it relates to volume four, I can do no better than the book’s own blurb: “As the school year winds down, Harutaro is in good spirits. His illness feels like a thing of the past, he and his best friend Shota are developing aspirations toward becoming professional manga artists, and best of all—his mom has come home for a visit! Just when things seem at their best, life often finds a way of balancing the scales. When a family secret causes Harutaro to question his future, who will he turn to in his lowest moment? Could it be… the one person you’d least expect?!”

The main shortfall that plagues slice-of-life manga is a lack of a satisfying conclusion. Flower of Life avoids that in spades. Much of the volume is dedicated to resolving the dramas and pre-occupations that affect the series’ side characters (Harutaro’s classmates), while the rest of it follows Haru and Mikuni’s rapidly evolving aspirations and careers as well as Majima and Saito’s ever-complicated romance. The ending is pretty unexpected and initially is almost aggravatingly open-ended, but when you step back and remember what the series has been so far I think it would do it injustice to end it otherwise.

This series, needless to say, is great. The characters are real, relatable, and fallible, the art soothing, and the stories funny and moving. What’s not to like? Keep an eye out for Yoshinaga’s award-winning Ooku coming out this August and pick up all four volumes of Flower of Life as soon as you can!

Volume four of Flower of Life is available now.