Aimi may be popular, but the fact that he's trashy is known by everyone—even himself! He'll go out with anyone as long as he's not tied down to just one person. But now, he's dating Kaede, a very convenient underclassman who doesn't ask for anything and doesn't say anything unnecessary. But isn't it strange that Kaede's attitude doesn't change even when he sees Aimi kissing a sex friend? Thrown off by this, Aimi starts to become possessive of Kaede. However, his feelings don't seem to be reaching Kaede at all… 

I Don't Know How to Love has art and story by Yu Machio. English translation is done by Jan Cash and lettering by Amethyst Xuan. Published by Yen Press (September 23, 2025). Rated OT.

Rebecca Silverman
Rating:

You know those books that you like better as they go on? This is one of them, but I could easily see it not being that way for all readers. The main draw of this story is the same as in many romance novels: one of the romantic leads has never been in love and assumes that sex is all there is to a relationship. Naturally, dating the other romantic lead proves him wrong, and as the story unfolds, seeing Aimi realize that he wants more from his relationship with Kaede than the norm becomes the draw. But it does take him a while to get there, and during his journey, he is unfaithful to his boyfriend, which can be a dealbreaker for some romance fans.

Although it's not like he didn't warn Kaede, and by extension, us. Aimi is willing to date absolutely anyone (although before Kaede, it's always been women), provided they stick with his ultimatum: they can't say anything if he kisses or sleeps with someone else while they're dating. It's honestly a very shitty take, but Aimi is so hot that no one really bothers to question it – and certainly not those who only want a sexual liaison with him. But Kaede is puppyishly eager to take Aimi up on his conditions because he figures it's the only way he'll ever get to date his senpai. After all, Kaede may be bi, but he's never heard the same said about Aimi.

As you can probably guess, being around the sweet and earnest (although not naïve or inexperienced) Kaede opens Aimi's eyes, which is precisely what many of us will be reading this story for. What's nice is that it's the fact that Kaede isn't pushing for any sort of physical relationship that helps to open Aimi's eyes. While he clearly enjoys sex, being seen as a romantic, rather than a sexual, partner is fascinating to him, and he really doesn't know what to do with Kaede's sincerity. By the time he realizes that he wants Kaede to want more from him, he's in completely over his head, much to the amusement of his friends.

In one sense, this is a romance between a puppy and someone with the emotional intelligence of a brick. Both of them learn to grow over the course of the volume, with Kaede coming to trust in his relationship with Aimi and Aimi realizing that he has a heart as well as a penis. There's one mildly explicit sex scene that really does feel like the culmination of their relationship, and it's really a very nice single-volume story. I'd read more about these two if they were available.

Caitlin Moore
Rating:

I get that working in the short form is challenging, especially when it comes to relationship-driven genres like romance, but I'm starting to feel like the pacing for a lot of the single-volume BL manga I've read is way off. The latest in this trend is I Don't Know How to Love, a sweet, slightly spicy college romance between Aimi, who will date anyone as long as they accept an open relationship, and Kaede, a younger student who asks him out but expects nothing of him.

I never outright disliked reading it, but nothing in the volume ever felt quite right. It started when Aimi realized that he's less annoyed by Kaede than the girls he's dated previously because Kaede asks him for nothing. He's not jealous when he sees Aimi with other girls and barely even asks him out on dates. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Aimi starts feeling jealous when he sees Kaede chatting with a couple of female classmates, which the audience is meant to take as a sign that Aimi is actually serious about Kaede. I know jealousy tends to be depicted as a sign of love in Japanese media, but that's the only sign of the shift in Aimi's feelings up until he declares he wants to stay with Kaede forever. Um, what? This doesn't feel like a conception of dating and falling in love by anyone who has ever actually experienced it.

The explicit sex scene at the climax comes so suddenly that it feels premature, but I have to admit that Yu Machio's art almost makes it work. Their style is spare, even sketchy; they have a marked tendency to avoid drawing backgrounds, and the characters rarely even interact with objects around them. The small cast is clad in basic T-shirts and jeans. However, this is the kind of simplicity that justifies using the hackneyed old line, “Less is more.” Machio has a gift for creating varied facial expressions with rather minimal linework, especially Aimi's grumpy expressions. So when the clothes come off and the dicks go in, their mastery of the human form becomes clear. The glances they exchange, the way their bodies interact… I almost forgot that the lead-up was sudden and unsatisfying. Almost.

I Don't Know How to Love isn't terrible if you're looking for a quick BL romance fix. The story is no great shakes, but it's not upsettingly bad, and the art is good. It just leaves me wondering, is the title meant to describe the Aimi, or is it a declarative statement by the artist?

Bolts
Rating:

It's hard to read intentions, especially when they act in unorthodox ways. Most people don't go along with crazy or unreasonable demands unless they are secretly hoping for something, or another feeling just overpowers the typical concerns. Reading this story was interesting because it's built on a premise that fundamentally doesn't apply to me as someone who is polyamorous. If I have a partner who wants to see or continue to see other people, I would be ok with that as long as there is clear communication. In fact, there is a part of me that was wondering if this was going to be a polyamorous story at some point, until about halfway through the book, where things get a little bit more typical. When one of our main characters agrees to only go out with the other if he's allowed to see other people, you hope the story isn't going to go in the more obvious direction that ends up going in.

That isn't to say the story that we get is bad. I actually quite like the interpersonal introspection from our lead as he navigates an unconventional relationship dynamic that he himself caused. It's nice when a story has a main character who is a little bit of a dick and the story gets on his case about slowly realizing that he needs to deal with the consequences of his own actions. Those consequences are accepting the fact that he found somebody who likes him so much that he is willing to respect very unreasonable boundaries. However, that acceptance inadvertently causes him to grow in a way that ironically leads to a more natural relationship by the end. It's a very solid, self-contained story about recognizing your own unfamiliar emotions and maturing beyond a child's understanding of what love is like. As far as boys' love stories go, it is incredibly solid, and I think most people would be able to understand the conversations.