ワンダーフォーゲル [Wandervogel]

by Sakae Kusama, 草間さかえ

「僕は君の頭の中の物語だって、小説にすることができるよ?」放浪先の沖縄で野宿を続けていた沖津。台風で身を寄せたのは、小説家・伊武の家だ。本人曰く「他人の心の中が読める」という伊武は、過去のトラウマから閉所恐怖症の沖津に、初対面から興味を示してきて…!?
妄想狂か、嘘つきか。不思議な力を持つ男と過ごす、鮮烈な嵐の一夜──!!

Genres: Manga, Romance, Boys Love, Comics, LGBT, Graphic Novels, Yaoi

176 pages, Paperback

First published June 24, 2017

About the author

Associated names :
草間榮
草间さかえ
soft machine
soft_machine

Name (in native language) : 草間さかえ

Zodiac : Pisces

Blood type : B

Reviews

[K]

Kind of hard to follow, but really interesting.

I'm going to jump right in with a few spoilers (and then transition to bigger ones), because I have a feeling (based on the ratings on here) that a fair amount of readers will get frustrated or give up before unpacking what's going on. The first thing to know is that "Wandervogel" doesn't actually begin until the third chapter, and the Okitsu you meet in the "An Invisible Friend" chapters is not the one from the book summary.

Some of the reasons behind this confusion are honestly pretty muddled even by the end, and I'm not sure how much of the mystery will continue being developed in the second volume. But here's where we are at this point.

In "An Invisible Friend," there are two main characters: Hirasaka Koushirou ("Kou" or "Shirou") and "Okitsu," whose real name is Yuuto (family name still unknown). Although due to the art style they kind of look like they're in their 30s, they're currently college students working on some strange sort of pyramid scheme phone tree for a friend who's never shown but who'd accidentally joined a cult? (That never fully got explained, although there are a couple bonus pages at the end.)

Shirou joined this club - and applied to this university - solely to reunite with Yuuto, the "invisible friend" from his childhood whom all the adults around him had insisted was imaginary, until he'd nearly come to believe it himself.

In his first year of elementary school, Shirou had met a strange, very cute boy up on an isolated hill and had spent nearly every day playing with him. They'd become very close, with the lines blurring between childhood best friend and first love. After a while, Yuuto said he couldn't see Shirou anymore, since his father was very ill and he had to stay with him. Shirou insisted - bringing him medicine and books and juice boxes - and their friendship continued until one day when Yuuto didn't show up. When Shirou went on a frantic search, he finally stumbled across Yuuto's house, where an old man was in the process of kidnapping his screaming sobbing best friend.

Shirou bit the old man on the wrist, was knocked down, and had to watch as the car zoomed away. When he reported it to his parents, then to the police, there was no record of any missing child, and Shirou was too young to be able to find the house again. So his parents put him in therapy to make him get over his trauma from losing an imaginary friend...except the doctor they sent him to was the same old man he'd bitten.

I don't really know what happened at this point. Did the old man not recognize him and his story, or did Shirou lie about what had happened, because he was afraid of him? Regardless, he wasn't able to confirm Yuuto's existence or see his friend again.

In his third year of elementary school, he went with a group of friends to a haunted house, which ended up being Yuuto's house..."haunted" now because a dead body had been discovered there, presumably Yuuto's father. Shirou was traumatized enough by this point to stop going to school entirely.

As he got older, though, he became more determined to prove Yuuto's existence, so he went from clinic to clinic, joining therapy sessions and telling his invisible friend story in hopes of finding that kidnapping doctor again, or anyone who might know about Yuuto. Finally he does - he meets a claustrophobic guy, two years older, named Okitsu Ryou, who says he can put Shirou in touch with Yuuto.

Yuuto is going to college under Okitsu's name, since he'd basically been off the grid since his first grade abduction. The real Okitsu had also been a pretty big loner, with none of his classmates particularly remembering him, so it's not hard to take over his identity.

Yuuto and Okitsu Ryou had both been taken care of by the same doctor - Yuuto's "grandfather," who I don't think was actually related to him? Yuuto's father had been the doctor's patient; when Yuuto's mother died, his father pretty much had a mental break and ran off with him, dragging him places for the next 6 months or so? until the doctor tracked him down and found him.

Here's where it gets a little weird. You gradually figure out that when Yuuto's father was "ill" and "bedridden," he was already dead. That explains why the doctor would whisk the child away, but not why he would leave his patient's dead body in a house to be discovered several years later. Except I think he actually was kidnapping Yuuto? I don't think they were a blood relation - the doctor probably felt some guilt over what had happened with his patient, and decided to take Yuuto in and use hypnosis to erase his memories of the last few traumatic months.

Yuuto had formed enough of a bond with Ryou by this point, though, for Ryou to step in as a big brother figure and promise to write down everything Yuuto had told him so he could help him restore his memories later. Yuuto had never wanted to forget Shirou.

So now, in the present, Shirou has finally found Yuuto, with Ryou's help, and Shirou remembers enough, or has been told enough by Ryou, to start restoring that bond they'd had as kids. This was a pretty cute love story, honestly, and would've made plenty of sense as the primary storyline, because there's still an absolute ton for them to unpack and deal with.

Including this incredibly weird offhand confession by Shirou (to their mutual friend) that he and Yuuto hadn't actually kissed as like, 6 year olds...they'd instead done something sexual? Again, I have no idea if this is going to get explained at all in the next volume, or if it relates to whatever horrific memories of Yuuto's father that the doctor was trying to erase. But that is a wildly disturbing and dark piece of information that just got skimmed past as we jumped to the main story, about Ryou.

So then we get to Wandervogel, and to Okitsu Ryou's love story. He's had claustrophobia since he'd been trapped in an elevator as a kid, but it'd been pretty manageable until he turned 17 and suddenly couldn't sleep even on verandas or anything that felt remotely enclosed. For the past 3ish years, I think, he's been largely sleeping outdoors, in a tent. (Which I guess doesn't count as claustrophobic? But if he'd been sleeping on the ground in the open air he would've been frostbitten and dead by now.)

I'm not sure Kusama really knows that much about mental illnesses, because some of this felt sloppy. But parts rang true - maybe they had a friend or a family member with some of these issues, rather than experiencing it themselves.

Anyway, since it is way too cold and snowy to keep sleeping outside, and since his adopted little brother has friends now and seems to be doing okay - and is reapplying to university under his own name - Ryou decides to move to a warmer climate, in a southern seaside part of Japan where the winters won't be so uninhabitable.

A few months later, he's settled in at a restaurant job and is vaguely familiar with an older novelist named Mr. Ibu (I imagine the actual Japanese was Ibu-Sensei, since he's an author the restaurant owner respects very much). Since a typhoon's on its way, Ryou heads to the most sheltered bit of coast he can find (were there no parks inland?) and stumbles across Ibu's house, where he's being choked by an older man Ryou assumes is his rejected lover.

Ryou saves him, then thanks to his boss's interference, winds up staying at Ibu's house to ride out the storm. Conveniently, the house was originally built for someone else who'd had some sort of claustrophobia, so all the rooms are very big and open and the bedroom has a glass roof.

Again...I'm not sure how Ryou would feel so comfortable sleeping indoors if even an outdoor veranda was too difficult for him, but whatever. Story logic.

He and Ibu form a pretty unexpected and rather fast connection; Ibu has this odd ability to read minds, or to at least seem like he is because he's so attuned to other people's emotions. They wind up in a sexual relationship, much to Ryou's surprise, and they spend a lot of time talking and getting to know each other better.

Ryou tells Ibu his entire life story, along with the Yuuto & Shirou story, and Ibu tells Ryou about how his career as a ghostwriter - a pretty normal thing, but Ibu truly believes he's actually reading the authors' minds and transcribing their stories.

I won't go into specific spoilers here because this part of the storyline was complex but made more sense to me, and I ultimately liked how it was playing out. It's pretty interesting and shows how strange and unique people are.

Stars detracted mostly because the story was told in an unnecessarily messy way that took a lot of work to unwind, and because that Yuuto & Shirou reveal was so incredibly weird and unsettling and not addressed at all. But I'm very intrigued by this story - I like its unique setting and feel, and I want to see what happens to them next.

[Emily]

While I liked the setup for this story, I had no idea what was going on.

[Sophie]

I'll admit, apart from shota Kusama Sakae could probably draw anything and I would love it.

The cover of this alone is worth the price of admission, and the manga itself was great as well. It's two connected stories, one about a university student who had a friend as a kid who disappeared and nobody remembered. He and that childhood friend are of course reunited, but the story is a lot darker than you'd think from that description. The second story is the これから story of the friend of the childhood friend, and it too took a different direction than I expected but I loved it. I cannot say what makes me adore Kusama Sakae's manga as much as I do but I do.

[Cas ✨]

This was confusing as hell 😅 we jump in at a random point in the story, the revisiting memories makes it even more unclear, and there are a lot of vague things I think you’re supposed to be able to connect or make assumptions off that just weren’t connecting for me… and even when they did plainly say things, I still felt lost.

[Kristina Butke]

This review refers to the 2026 release from TOKYOPOP's LoveLove imprint, which comes out *today.* I got an ARC from Media Lab Public Relations in exchange for a free review.

This manga went a bit over my head, and readers need to realize that the first two episodes of the manga in the book are not the main story, but more like a loosely connected prologue that doesn’t figure into the main story all that much.

The first story, told as “An Invisible Friend,” focuses on a young man named Shirou (aka Koushirou) who witnessed his childhood friend Yuuto being kidnapped during his first year of grade school. Yuuto disappeared without a trace. Over the years, people are convinced Yuuto is an imaginary friend, and Shirou is even taken to psychiatrists and therapists to “work through it.” However, the years pass, and Shirou still insists in his heart that Yuuto was a real friend who really disappeared.

As he tells this story to his two college friends, one of them, Okitsu, starts to feel uncomfortable and leaves the conversation. Shirou goes to Okitsu’s house to wait for him and….

SPOILER…

says, “Welcome home, Yuuto!” It turns out Okitsu is the name of another man, a childhood friend of Yuuto’s, that Yuuto decided to borrow for various reasons. One of the key details that comes up about the real Okitsu is that he has severe claustrophobia that led him to barely attend school growing up.

Anyway, the “Invisible Friend” story wraps up with Yuuto and Shirou happily reuniting with a kiss and learning m ore about the mysteries of the past, and we learn that Okitsu moved to Okinawa for wide open spaces…

and that’s where the main story “Wandervogel” kicks in.

Okitsu lives and works in Okinawa for a man with an izakaya-type place, and he makes food deliveries for him. But due to his severe claustrophobia, he sleeps outside.

There’s a major typhoon ready to hit the islands and Okitsu is told to make all the deliveries before it hits, and he ends up making a delivery to a man known as Mr. Ibu, one of the izakaya’s top customers. Ibe is a novelist and lives in a huge home, as Okitsu finds out.

Mr. Ibu has a knack for echoing what Okitsu says in his head, but plays it off. He realizes Okitsu needs shelter from the typhoon and claims his boss told him to let him stay.

Okitsu feels comfort with Ibu and his large home, and doesn’t feel claustrophobic, even when it’s time for him to bathe. The whole house has a lot of windows and is designed to look open and free.

But there’s something hanging over Okitsu’s head…the night or two before, he witnessed a strange old man choking Ibu at his house, and then running off. He thinks it’s a lover’s quarrel, but it’s actually a writerly one.

It turns out, Ibu writes books for people with stories, but cannot write them. I missed the part in the book where this is attributed to mind-reading on his part, but I have to admit I was super tired while reading this manga and nodded off a couple times, so I could have overlooked it in my drowsiness. However, it makes sense, because Okitsu believes it might be a bit of a delusion on Ibu’s part, despite trusting what he says.

Anyway, there’s this whole conflict between writers, secrets about the novels, and an explosive realization from the previous story, “An Invisible Friend,” that gets casually mentioned that made me do a double-take. Again, I might’ve missed this because I was sleepy.

I won’t elaborate on the story further, only that it has a good, happy ending, and there will be a forthcoming volume two.

So, admittedly parts of this manga went over my head, and I had a hard time linking the first story with the Wandervogel story because the first one seemed so…emotionally fraught in comparison. Not that there aren’t emotions to be had in the Wandervogel part, it’s just that one story comes across far more serious than the other. I wanted these stories to flow together a little bit better and have a clearer relationship with each other. They felt like two very separate works.

Despite my missing out on stuff (I blame my uncontrollable napping, not the author), I did enjoy myself as I read this manga for the most part. It’s got unique ideas going for it, some interesting art styles, and mysterious, traumatic events. If you like something on the quirkier side of your BL tastes, pick this one up.

[Ryofire]

I read this because the plot sounded interesting, and I really like Sakae-sensei's other boys love manga, "The Troublesome Guest of Sotomura Detective Agency". Unfortunately, "Wandervogel" seems to magnify all the issues I had with TGSDA, without any of the things I liked about TGSDA. It's functional as a mystery, I guess, and the dynamics for the two couples are enjoyable enough. The art is still okay if not as interesting as TGDSA (which is to say, rougher than even most "just fine" manga).

The plot summary for this is also misleading. I'm not sure if this was serialized differently or what, but the plot summary only refers to what's basically the second half of the story. The opening concerns a different couple, whose story ties into the couple described in the plot summary. And given the actual plot is weirdly overly complex, there's relatively little time given for the story described in the summary to properly breathe.

I imagine another reread would help, but I was constantly rereading pages to try to understand what was going on, and that didn't help much. A central theme of the plot is assuming false identities and what is real and what isn't, and what different personas we take on around different people, as well as memory problems (I guess). So while I guess this works for the plot, it makes for a confusing, pretty unenjoyable narrative. And the confusing nature of the narrative makes it hard to connect with any of the cast. Sakae-sensei does good character writing, so there are moments that shine through, and even a number of nice panels, but the overall story is a mess. I would imagine this is why it got a volume 2, but given my experience of short boys love manga that have second volumes, that might not answer any questions and just lead to more nonsense, so I'm hesitant to bother. Volume 2 does promise to deal more with Ryou's claustrophobia at least, so there's that. But maybe if volume 1 wasn't nonsense we'd have gotten that in volume 1.

I can't honestly recommend this manga, but I will say: if you like any aspect of this at all, or just like realistic fiction boys love, particularly detective fiction, you should give TGSDA a shot. It's actually good and enjoyable. I'm really not sure what happened with "Wandervogel".

[Rachael]

I’m biased. I’ve read all of Sakae Kusama’s works that are available in English and I liked all of them.
I like that one or both of her guys are older. She tends to pair a thirty to forty something guy with a university student (Everyone is adults and her students tend to be older.)

Story-wise it gets interesting because her stories follow a winding path. The detective agency one was the most straightforward and it was the first one I read. It was a good introduction. The rest of her stories get there but you might have to read a few pages more than once or re-read a section. For me, it’s not a lack of talent but her being in touch with these weird, prickly men who are actively working on being better friends and boyfriends so their communication reflects that - gaps, inferences, looks. Or are wondering how they got in this situation themselves.

“Wandervogel” volume one seems like a good example of what I’m talking about. It involves two separate groups of guys telling one story from three perspectives, then we follow one of those guys as he gets to know a customer at the restaurant he works at during a typhoon (I don’t want to give too much away because it is good and interesting).

Kusama’s characters go with the flow and are rewarded at the end. It’s the same with reading her works, just go with the flow and you might enjoy it all by the end. I did.

[Katdunn37]

Good plot driven mystery with a touch of gay romance. But not enough sex/heat for me!

There was a pre-story too in a completely different setting and with different characters from the “main story” & I was quite confused for the first half, but then I sort of got it/ Also, each character had multiple names (fake identity, nickname, surname vs given name, etc) making it difficult to understand— had to go back and try to figure out who each character was by the illustrations - which was also difficult because Its hard to tell the characters apart when the comic is in black and white.
I will probably read the next volume of the series, but only because they are available free from the library. Maybe the story will come together and make more sense as I get further along.

[Kate]

If you look really hard, I think there’s a good story somewhere within this volume but I don’t think it was well executed AT ALL. While it’s fine to leave some things implied, there were so many gaps that I frequently had no idea what was going on. The first section of this volume, “An Invisible Friend,” was particularly bad about this. I had so many questions and then rather than answering any of them or tying up the loose threads, this plotline is de-centered and we’re suddenly in a new story from a completely different character’s perspective (that also suffers from the “too much left unwritten” problem).

Given all of this, I don’t think I’ll be picking up volume 2.

[Lissy]

The story is written in two parts, with the first part being about finding a lost first love, while introducing the main character of the second part. The second part is about finding comfort and a place to call home. The story unfolds as a sort of mystery, and I liked how the "magi power" ended up being something very grounded and human. I love stories of a wanderer finding their place and their person!

[Carla]

The pacing of this story is not good. I’m not sure if it’s just me or if it’s really hard to follow. The character designs all look too similar so it’s hard to tell who is who, and I can’t tell what’s happening in the now vs what’s a flashback (other than when they’re kids). I think the characters magically discovered an unexpected past connection but I’m not sure why.

[Swathi]

Not my cup of tea. I read the forst part 3 or 4 times and I just could not get into it. I was a little sad becuase the art work was very much like another artist that I love but the story was confusing.

[ℂ ✧]

He vist que el llicencien aviat en castellà, però jo he intentat llegir-lo i no he entès res 😅 així que ciao!

[Rebecca]

This is an odd one, and I'm still parsing my thoughts. I didn't dislike it...

[Athira]

I'm so confused

[Yuuto]

This was such a confusing, practically nonsensical story, honestly I was wondering if it was AI translated because nothing made any sense.

[Vanessa]

restarted this like 3 times and couldn't figure out wtf was going on. super messy. a rare graphic novel dnf from me

[Ev :3]

One of the worst mangas I've ever read, I can't believe I spent money on this

[LelandraTheLazyReader]

I did get a little confused

[Morthos]

2.75

This volume should've mostly focused on and and expanded the Invisible Friend story. They were far more interesting as both characters and a couple, as well as having a more interesting backstory that I cared about.

I didn't care about Ryou and Ibu which sucked because the plot they were in was interesting enough but those two characters were boring to read from. It didn't really help that the way this whole book was written was very confusing to read, there were times when I wasn't really sure if we were in the past or not, typos and odd sentence structure here and there with the translation...

I lost any interest in reading volume 2 especially if it's just going to be more Ryou and Ibu. I would've loved to have just read a fleshed-out version of the 1st story. Their chapters felt very rushed and confusing at times, but I cared about those two by the end of chapter 2.