With the Light… 5

Keiko Tobe – Yen Press – 2009 – 14 volumes
“With the Light” is published in omnibus form. Volume 5 covers volumes 9-10.

I am extremely emotionally involved with the characters in this series.  There’s nothing that seems fictitious about the lives of Hikaru and his family, and the extremely realistic (and optimistic) way the series portrays the problems facing Hikaru and how he, his mother, and those around him is great.  I especially enjoyed the look at children with other forms of learning disabilities this volume, and the problems facing educators who are given a general “Special Education” classroom full of children with different needs.  Basically, this manga is far, far different than any other that I read, and I’ve been with it since the beginning, so I feel like I have an obligation to keep following along.  Especially since I will inevitably learn much by the time I finish every fat volume.

I also like that the series runs in “real” time.  Hikaru, his sister, and all his friends age, and the story progresses through each year of his schooling (in this volume’s case, his final year of elementary school).  It does a good job of having characters come and go as they would in real life, and I love all the connections his mother and others make throughout the series.

Now, I always complain about repetition in this series.  I realize the irony in this, since I’m sure it comes up in every review and anyone reading through these is going to be reading that over and over again.  I feel that accurately recreates the experience of reading this series.  It’s probably better in small chunks, but I always finish one of the omnibuses in one sitting, so I’m left with a bad taste of repetition in my mouth.  There’s also the fact that, in this volume, Hikaru gets yet another new teacher, something that just happened a year ago in the story.  We have to go through all the same adjustments yet again, and that was hard to sit through since, literally, Gunji-sensei had just been educated.  Happily, after a chapter or two, all these problems inexplicably disappear and most of the school year is glossed over, with happy results at the end.  Hm.

Instead of Hikaru’s life, we look at other children.  Aside from Miyu (the younger autistic girl who has been Hikaru’s classmate for years), there are two new students in the special education class this year.  One boy has ADHD, and another has dyslexia.  The new teacher insists on teaching all these children at the same pace, so the boy with dyslexia is at a disadvantage in a class with Hikaru and Miyu, who are further behind in studies, and the boy with ADHD, who the teacher insists on disciplining rather than working to find a solution to his problems.  The discipline winds up being a problem, since it upsets the ADHD boy, which in turn upsets Hikaru, who is sensitive to noise, which then upsets the other two students as well.  How this is solved isn’t really examined in-depth aside from giving Hikaru his own space to calm down in, but the boy with dyslexia does get a chapter or two to himself as his mother tries to figure out why her son has a hard time reading and find a solution that will help him best.  We also find out a little about the boy with ADHD, but more that his family situation is such that his mother has a hard time earning enough money to keep them with food and shelter and isn’t able to extensively look for help.

We also see a chapter about a girl we’ve met before who is having problems with her abusive, alcoholic father and her strict mother, who is upset she can’t get into a good junior high.

And there’s also lots and lots of time spent with Hikaru’s mother, who does extensive research to find the best junior high for Hikaru and has to appeal to the school board extensively in order to not have him placed at the poorly-run and overpopulated special education facility.

While it is incredibly interesting and informative, and I do have an emotional investment in the characters at this point, it can be tedious to read because of the repetition and just… well, having to go through all the possible solutions with the characters whenever there’s a problem.  I actually thought the junior high problem was an interesting one, and the story glossed over all the appeals to the school board that were needed, but a bad taste has lingered from other volumes.  There probably aren’t a whole lot of manga readers that are going to pick this up and read it regularly, but I think it’s an incredible resource on autism, especially as a learning aid for adults, teens, and maybe even a younger audience, too.  I’m extremely happy this is being published, and I do hope it’s finding the right niche for itself, because it deserves to be used as a learning aid.

Sadly, Keiko Tobe passed away in late January.  The series remains unfinished, which means we won’t ever get to see Hikaru become a happy member of society.  That’s the other hard thing about reading it, that I know there isn’t a resolution at the end.  But I suppose that’s appropriate, since there’s never really any resolution to real life, either.