Fall in Love, You False Angels Volumes 2 and 3 Review

At the beginning of the year, Kodansha debuted the first volume of Fall in Love, You False Angels in the Western market. This highly successful series, which won this year’s Kodansha Manga Award in the shojo category, continues to gain popularity as the months pass. But do the second and third volumes impress? Let’s take a look!

In the first volume, we met the protagonist Otogi Katsura and her love interest Toki Ninomae (nicknamed Ikkoku). Both characters appeared perfect at school, but had a darker side to their personalities that they kept hidden. And as we reunite with them for Volume 2, we find them both in quite a predicament. They’ve fallen hard for one another – but no one wants to make the first move and confess!

However, during a school orientation getaway, Otogi begins to realise that she can’t afford to wait around forever. She’s lucky enough to get to spend even more time with Toki, seeing many different sides of him that she didn’t expect. Still, at the same time, the girls in her group have started gossiping about the boys they have crushes on, which forces Otogi to consider what she’d do if someone else confessed to him.

Toki, meanwhile, is still trying to work out what to make of Otogi in general. The two of them are incredibly similar, and perhaps that’s why he’s so drawn to her. Still, just as he’s one of the most popular boys at school, Otogi is one of the most sought-after girls, and Toki knows it’s only a matter of time until someone asks her out.

Although in the first volume both of our leads wanted to force the other to confess their feelings, the pressure piled on them throughout Volume 2 leads to someone cracking. And this bombshell confession takes us into #3, where Toki and Otogi have to deal with the aftermath. What will it mean for the relationship they’d built up so far, and are their feelings even mutual…?

There has been a trend recently where shojo serialised in Kodansha’s Dessert magazine pair up the main couple relatively quickly, something I appreciate compared to drawn-out ‘will they won’t they’ scenarios. Fall in Love, You False Angels isn’t exactly following that same trend, but mangaka Coco Uzuki is headed off in a different direction that feels novel even if not necessarily original for the genre.

With no misunderstandings or escaping from reality, our leads are forced to deal with the matter in a way befitting of their ages. It’s not easy for either of them, given that they’ve been trying to hide their friendship at school; they have to be mindful of how others perceive them while sorting through how they feel. Otogi is fairly sure of herself, but Toki is more insecure than you’d expect and that ultimately ties into how they go about resolving the situation.

These two books together further demonstrate why the series has become such a big hit. The lead pair are relatable, but more than that, Uzuki’s skilled art brings their heartfelt story to life. The art leans into humorous expressions and attempts to keep the content light, but never by cheapening or taking away from the emotion of the storyline. It leaves you eager to see where the story of these two will go from here.

As mentioned, these two instalments of Fall in Love, You False Angels come to the West thanks to Kodansha and continue to be translated by Susamaji with lettering by Lys Blakeslee. Both releases read well (although I did notice one typo in Volume 3 that has slipped through) and contain colour pages at the beginning. #2 has two pages of translation notes at the end, but these aren’t present in #3.

The series is up to 5 volumes released in Japan so far. Whereas here in English, we have #4 scheduled for a release in early December, and thereafter, I suspect we will be on a relatively slow schedule as we’ll be almost caught up to Japan.

Overall, Fall in Love, You False Angels continues to prove itself worthy of the acclaim it has been steadily receiving. Coco Uzuki continues to move the story along at a steady but delicate pace, which proves rewarding for readers. It’s certainly a must-have for the shojo fans out there!

Our review copies from Kodansha were supplied by Diamond Book Distributors UK.