EROMANGA
HALL OF FAME

Eight years after a first book, the artist redrew more than half the pages before letting a second one go to print. Dakara Kami-sama, Boku ni Shika Mienai Chiisana Koibito wo Kudasai stands in the hall as that second book, delivered with all the labour it took.

Published by GOT, it is an adult short-story collection of the kind catalogued as loli, holding four short stories and one told in three parts. A god who lives in a school locker, a reserved train carriage in a near future where men have lost their standing, a photo session for an underground idol: the premises are outlandish. Its subject is an age gap, and most stories end brightly, as comedy.

Readers agree on the sheer density of the drawing, which lends even everyday clothes the texture of real life, and on the humour: absurd setups driven by quick back-and-forth and closed with a wry punchline. Once the laughter fades, what lingers is the odd warmth of having heard a small, good story.

Gomennasai's first book, Omase de Gomen!, appeared in 2008. Having returned to magazines in 2013, the artist stepped away for about a year and came back again in 2016, then reworked the art on 151 of this book's 230 pages so that the older stories would match their present hand.

The print edition came out at the end of June 2016 and placed sixth for the year among adult comics at Toranoana's Akihabara Store A. In the 2016 round of the Ero-Manga Grand Prize, a small readers' poll whose leaders drew just six votes apiece, it shared fifth place with two other books. It stands 164th among the hall's commercial works.