Title: Snow Angel Vol. 1
Author: Haruka Chizu
Publisher: Viz Media
Language: English
Format: Digital
Pages: 176
Genre: Slice-of-Life, Drama, Romance
Publication Date: May 13, 2025
The Story
Muku had a happy childhood growing up with her friends Yuto and his brother Saku. Along with Muku’s sister, Inori, they would end up in a bunch of snowball fights as kids; however, one day, Yuto and Saku moved away, and then shortly after, Muku and Inori’s father passed away. Muku, Inori, and their mother ended up moving in with family, more specifically Muku’s grandparents. There, they have to take care of their grandfather, who has dementia. While Muku was happy to do so at first, she soon realized that she was suffocating due to the way her family treated her.
What made matters worse was that she just recently lost her job when her company decided to shutter its doors for good. When she unveiled the news, her grandmother gave her a stern lecture and used kindness and a bit of passive aggression to talk down to her, telling her that she, basically, won’t ever amount to anything… but yet… she still loves her no matter if she ends up as a failure.
One day, there is a knock on the door. A grown-up Yuto and Saku appear because they happened to be in the area and wanted to stop by and say hello. The problem is, earlier in the volume, there was a grumpy-looking boy who lost his WiFi signal on the train after it had to make an emergency stop. Without realizing this, the boy was Yuto, and Muku helped him out. He recognized her instantly, and suddenly, childhood friends we reunited.
Suddenly, all of her childhood memories came flooding back to her and she makes an impulsive decision and leaves home, having Yuto and Saku take her with them, but can she truly run away from an overbearing family that wants nothing more than to suppress her freedom and happiness?
Characters
There’s a lot to unpack in this first volume because, typically, a first volume spends most of its time introducing us to its characters and builds upon the world we are going to take our journey in; however, there was a LOT of character development here that I didn’t expect to find right out of the gate.
First off, we have Muku. She’s 21 and dreams of being on her own. She fondly remembers the days when she used to laugh and play in the snow alongside her childhood friends, but now, she’s depressed and just doing whatever she can to make her family happy, all while realizing that it is creating a prison for her. She loves to read a lot and escape into different worlds, as it’s the only way to cope with reality. The mere fact that she impulsively decided to run away from home the moment she realized those two visitors were Yuto and Saku tells you just how fed up she was with everything. Even when she tried to offer a practical solution of putting her grandfather into a nursing home, she was immediately talked down to, called selfish and uncaring, and made to feel as if she was betraying him after he had taken care of her for so long.
Despite being 21, she still acts as if she’s a teenager with some of the little tantrums that she throws. While it could be seen as comedy, I think it goes much deeper than that. In the flashbacks, she was always outgoing and energetic. After being turned into a makeshift caregiver and being made to feel completely useless, it’s as if those little outbursts are her remembering the simpler times… times when she was purely happy. When you think about it like that, those comedic moments come off as a bit sad.
Next, we have Yuto. Yuto was always shy when he was a kid. In a flashback, Muku tried her best to reach out to him when he transferred to their school, but he wouldn’t say anything until one day, he broke down and started talking to her. They quickly became friends, but even in the current day, not much has changed. Sure, Yuto might be older and more mature now; however, he still has that shyness about him. Plus, he was completely shocked when he reunited with Muku because he thought that she was a boy when they were growing up!
Despite that, there is a bit of mystery about him. As we saw in the beginning on the train, he was furiously typing away at something, muttering about a deadline. Later, after Yuto takes Muku in, he’s up until past midnight working on his laptop, and when she inquires about what he’s working on, he says that he likes to keep his work private. There were some clues strewn about which might suggest what his occupation is, and given one of Muku’s biggest interests, you could put two and two together and figure it out. It’s not much of a mystery, but if I am right in hypothesizing what Yuto does for a living, the reveal is going to be spectacular.
There isn’t much to say about Saku except that he tries to be the voice of reason by being stern, but he means well. He spends a lot of time yelling at Muku… not in a harsh way… but rather in a way to get her to respect the rules… or to not lie in the road after tackling Yuto so that he doesn’t run them over with the car… stuff like that. Despite his brash demeanor, Saku does stick up for her when it comes to Muku’s family, which shows that he truly cares about her!
Then there is Muku’s family…. More specifically, her mother and grandmother. The two of them act the same way towards Muku in the fact that they use passive aggressiveness and pleasantries to talk down and make her feel insignificant. They truly are the worst who don’t respect her time or freedom, thinking that family matters more than one’s own happiness. While family does matter above a lot of things, completely ignoring practical solutions that could make it easier for everyone and to continue to impose undue hardship while using emotions as an excuse is just plain wrong… and that’s the two of them in a nutshell.
Finally, we have Inori, Muku’s sister, who is in the same boat as her, but she doesn’t have the inner strength to stand up to them. She has dreams and aspirations of going to college, which is exactly what her mom and grandmother want; however, they want her to become a teacher like her grandfather and her late father before her. Muku wants to support her financially because she knows it’s Inori’s dream and it would be her ticket out of there; however, Inori just takes the proverbial punch to the face rather than fight back when Muku’s leaving home means that her mom and grandma decided she shouldn’t go to college after all and should stay home and help take care of her grandfather.
In short, this is just one messed-up family.
Final Thoughts
The series if off to a decent start. I came into this expecting something along the lines of Boy’s Abyss; however, it’s not as dark, but the same time of suffocating feelings are still there. It still has a similar premise of a main character looking to escape a less-than-desirable life for something better, but feels as if there is no escape. The story is told in a more lighthearted way, but it still has those dark, dramatic undertones to it.
I do think the story felt a bit rushed in the first volume, though. Going from “my home life sucks” to “yay, I escaped” within the first couple of chapters, I felt, didn’t allow enough time for the drama to settle in. I’m a fan of slow burns, and this burned the premise rather quickly. I would have preferred to give us that glimpse of Yuto on the train and then spend the rest of the volume exploring Muku’s life. I would have drawn out the drama for at least another two volumes to truly build up that sense that there is no escape, and then introduce Yuto and Saku’s visit as the cliffhanger to end the third volume.
But… that’s just me. It still doesn’t help that it made this first volume’s pacing feel a bit unnatural. Plus, just throwing yourself at your childhood friends just minutes after seeing them for the first time in ten years, and then having them willingly help you run away without questioning you, your motives, your plans, or offering any sort of pushback was just odd. Plus, as controlling as her family was, they said nothing and didn’t even try to interfere or stop it from happening. None of it felt natural, and, sad to say, I felt it was poorly executed.
But… that was the only real issue I had with the story. Everything else was fine, as we did get a fair amount of character development, we established the backstory of our main characters, what led to the present day, and it sets up a little swerve at the end that makes you wonder what’s going to happen with Muku. Plus, it gives her something to think about that will help her set a goal which will, most likely, be the endpoint for this series (not to mention the obvious budding romance between her and Yuto… I mean, come on, they’re on the front cover, so it must happen!!)
Again, it was still a decent start and it did enough to capture my interest to want to keep reading. The flashbacks were cute and charming so if you’re looking for an unconventional romance story with quite a few cute moments, this will do the job. As for the drama department, could have used a lot more, but it was fine for what we were given.
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This item was provided for review by VIZ Media.
