is a Japanese

Japanese language

is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

 manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

 series written and illustrated by Io Sakisaka. It began serialization in 2007 in the shōjo

Shojo

The term refers to manga marketed to a female audience roughly between the ages of 10-18. The name romanizes the Japanese 少女 , literally: "little female". Shōjo manga covers many subjects in a variety of narrative and graphic styles, from historical drama to science fiction — often with a strong...

 manga magazine Bessatsu Margaret

Bessatsu Margaret

, or for short, is a shōjo manga magazine published monthly in Japan by Shueisha. It is targeted at girls aged roughly 12-17. It is a spinoff of the magazine Margaret.-Current:*360° Material - Touko Minami*Acanthus - Izumi Yamaguchi...

and ended in 2010. The chapters are collected and bound in tankōbon

Tankobon

, with a literal meaning close to "independently appearing book", is the Japanese term for a book that is complete in itself and is not part of a series , though the manga industry uses it for volumes which may be in a series...

 format by Shueisha

Shueisha

is a major publisher in Japan. The company was founded in 1925 as the entertainment-related publishing division of Japanese publisher Shogakukan. The following year, Shueisha became a separate, independent company. Magazines published by Shueisha include Weekly Shōnen Jump, Weekly Young Jump,...

 under the Margaret Comics label.

Plot

15-year-old Ninako Kinoshita has never been in love until an encounter on the train with her school's most popular boy, the quiet Ren Ichinose. As she grows closer to Ren, she falls in love with him, but must learn to cope with the unfortunate fact that Ren already has a longtime girlfriend.

Main characters

Ninako is the main female protagonist

Protagonist

A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...

 around whom the story revolves. She is a very kind and gentle girl who falls in love with Ren Ichinose. When she finds out that Ren already has a girlfriend, she resigns herself to being just a friend and to quietly hold onto to her feelings. She is good at most of her subjects with the exclusion of mathematics, which she mentions a number of times is her weakest subject. Ninako is very caring and modest, willing to return any favor even if it is something small. Later on, when Andou tries to convince her to go out with him, she rejects him, saying that being in a relationship with someone she does not love is not right. She wants to remain in her feelings of liking Ren, even if they are not reciprocated, because that is whom she is in love with.

The male school idol who is basically good at everything and plays the role of main male protagonist. He likes to keep himself isolated from most students and is admired by all of the female populous as a result. He has a close group of friends which are male however the story gives the impression most other male students are jealous of his position. He also has a strong passion for mathematics. Although he has a girlfriend, Mayuka, who is older than he is, Ren tends to lose his guard around Ninako. He only later on realizes his feelings for Ninako, but tries to forget about her by distancing himself for Mayuka's sake. In the end, Mayuka breaks up with him because she realized his feelings toward Ninako and that she treats work more important than love. Ren's feelings toward Ninako grows stronger unabling him to hide it no longer.

Daiki is introduced as a childhood friend of Ninako's and has strong feelings towards her at the beginning of the story. He grew attached to Ninako after his parents divorced two or three years prior to the start of the manga to which he had to make the choice of living with his mother and older sister or his father. Since choosing to live with his father his relationship

Interpersonal relationship

An interpersonal relationship is an association between two or more people that may range from fleeting to enduring. This association may be based on limerence, love, solidarity, regular business interactions, or some other type of social commitment. Interpersonal relationships are formed in the...

 with his older sister lost its flavour. He eventually falls in love with and starts dating Sayuri, Ninako's friend.

Ando is Ren's middle school friend and also has an idol-like status. He often finds himself competing with Ren like a rival at times. Ando takes advantage of his position and is a big time player among the female students; however, he forms no relationships with them and believes himself not fit for a relationship. His opinion changes after meeting Ninako, who has a strong effect upon him. He eventually falls madly in love with her, saying that he loves her honesty, and often tries to win her favor. He is also very much aware of her feelings for Ren and often tries to help her through Ren's relationship with Mayuka or discourage her from pursuing Ren.

Mayuka is Daiki's older sister. Her existence is also kept low profile until a certain point where it is found that she is actually the girlfriend of the unobtainable Ren Ichinose. She has a job which is in the modelling

Model (person)

A model , sometimes called a mannequin, is a person who is employed to display, advertise and promote commercial products or to serve as a subject of works of art....

 business which she pursued for what she thought was Ren's sake and she is currently studying for entrance exams to university. As the series progresses, she becomes wary of Ninako's relationship with Ren but remains friendly toward her. She eventually realizes how much her relationship with Ren is strained: she is almost always busy and has to cancel their dates. In chapter 19, she breaks up with Ren because she now knows that Ren is in love with someone else and she doesn't want Ren to continually repress his feelings just for her. She acknowledges that nothing will ever stay the same, as she herself has changed, and that before she didn't want Ren to change and leave her.

Sayuri, nicknamed by her friends, is the mature friend of Ninako's who falls in love with Daiki, whom she eventually dates. However, their relationship is not without bumps when Sayuri becomes afraid of confrontation with Daiki when she believes he is cheating on her. Her worries about honesty in relationships comes from her boyfriend in middle school being snatched away from her.

Tsukasa is a friend of Ninako's who tends to be a blabbermouth. Despite this, she remains loyal to Ninako and often encourages her in love. She has wavy hair often tied into a ponytail.

Noriko, known as to her peers, is a friend of Ninako. She has long, straight hair.

Tamaki is a friend of Ninako. She has short, wavy hair.

Manabu, more commonly known as to his peers, is one of Ren's carefree friends. His cousin owns a café, where he works. He notices Ren's feelings for Ninako early on and desperately tries to pair them up.

Yūtarō, nicknamed "Yū" and "Tera" by his peers, is one of Ren's friends at school and is both sagely and mature. Unlike Ga-chan, he tends to be more realistic and is often holding back Ga-chan's matchmaking attempts so as not to trouble Ren. In middle school, he attended the same cram school as Sayuri Uehara, and they began dating. However, they broke up abruptly when Sayuri believed Yū was cheating on her. Yū regrets hurting Sayuri and realizes their relationship failed because of lack of communication, but knows they cannot return to the way they were. Instead, he encourages her to make peace with Daiki when troubles appear in their relationship, and moves on from her once she has done so.

Mao is a student junior to Ninako and the others. In middle school, she dated Takumi, but only used him to get close to his best friend, whom she had a crush on. Ninako eventually discovers that she is the cause of strain between Takumi and Ren when Mao enrolls in their high school. Despite that she initially chased after Ren, she tells Takumi that she fell in love with him while they were dating and is willing to compete against his affections for Ninako in order to be with him again.

Drama CDs

Strobe Edge originally had a vomic (voiceover comic) produced by Shueisha

Shueisha

is a major publisher in Japan. The company was founded in 1925 as the entertainment-related publishing division of Japanese publisher Shogakukan. The following year, Shueisha became a separate, independent company. Magazines published by Shueisha include Weekly Shōnen Jump, Weekly Young Jump,...

, where voice actors provided voices to manga panels. Once plans for drama CDs were made, Shueisha closed down the vomic website. Two drama CDs were released, the first on August 25, 2010 and the second on September 22, 2010. The drama CDs used an entirely new voice cast with the exception of Yui Shōji, who was the only one to reprise her role as Mayuka Korenaga.

Reception

Strobe Edge received moderate success in Japan. The fourth volume charted at #29 on Oricon

Oricon

, established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan. It started as , which was founded by Sōkō Koike in November 1967 and became known for its music charts. Oricon Inc...

during the first week of sales, selling a total of 34,158 copies. The fifth volume ranked at #19 and sold 46,299 copies on its first week of sales. The release of the sixth volume peaked at #24 and sold 51,402 copies. The seventh volume charted at #9 and sold 82,575 copies on its first week and 109,758 in total. The eighth volume charted at #7 and sold 76,372 copies on its first week and 137,087 in total. The ninth volume charted at #4 and sold 152,907 copies on its first week and 211,188 in total. The final volume charted at #3 and sold 132,738 copies on its first week of sales. It became the 43rd best-selling volume of the first half of 2011, selling a total of 356,021 copies.

In a poll done by Escala Cafe in April 2011, out of 316 votes from women from the ages of 22 and 29, 2.5% were interested in a live-action adaptation of Strobe Edge.