Author’s note — “My Neighbour, Kataba-san” has begun Part 2 (Working Adult × University Student arc)!
Good evening!
This is Amano Tenyuu!
To all my readers — thank you as always for your support in so many different forms!!
Last Tuesday, Part 1 of My Neighbour, Kataba-san came to an end, and yesterday Part 2 began 😆
I’ve never really talked anywhere about the background behind writing this story, so I thought I’d use this news post to put it all together and share it.
Everything from here on touches on the story so far, so if you haven’t caught up yet — sorry, but this will contain spoilers.
First of all, as of yesterday My Neighbour, Kataba-san has reached its 64th episode. Thank you so much for reading this far along with me, even with how long it’s gotten.
As for how I came to write this story: when I knew I absolutely wanted to write a “next-door-neighbour yuri,” I thought about how to differentiate it from the countless neighbour-yuri stories already out there, and what I landed on was two girls who’d gone to the same high school ending up as next-door neighbours.
On top of that, I thought it’d be more fun if, instead of both being university students, they were the same age but one was a working adult and the other a university student — that way I could also bring out the differences in their day-to-day lives.
So the story I actually wanted to write starts from here (my apologies to anyone despairing at how long it’s taken to get here 💦).
As a lead-up to the story I wanted to tell, I’d planned to breeze through their high school years — but there ended up being far more I wanted to pack in than I expected, and it turned into a heavier story than intended 😂
I’ve been writing it all this time hoping you’d enjoy it — I wonder how it’s come across. Every day I’ve written this I was anxious about it, but seeing everyone’s various reactions and warm comments kept my motivation up and got me this far.
Some of you mentioned it in the comments already, but yesterday’s episode was where the title finally paid off.
“Otonari no” (おとなりの) means “next-door,” and “Kataba” (片羽) — which literally means “one wing” — carries a few different meanings, but one of them is apparently “incomplete” or “missing something.”
What I wanted to write was the struggle of girls who aim to become flawless but can never quite manage it — that was the idea behind this whole story.
It’s precisely because you’re lacking something that you can make up for each other.
That’s the kind of relationship I find myself drawn to.
I’d be happy if you’ll enjoy watching how Fujishiro and Morishita weave their relationship together from here on! I think Part 2 is going to turn out to be a pretty sweet, tender story!!
I shouldn’t ramble on too much, though.
It’s just that I love this story enough to want to talk about it endlessly, so I’d be glad if this got even a little more of you interested in it ☺️
Going forward, updates will continue on Tuesdays and Saturdays, same as always!
Thanks for sticking with it!
The temperature’s suddenly dropped and it seems like the flu and so on are starting to go around…
Please everyone, take care of your health.
I’ll keep doing my best, full of energy too!
See you again soon!
Amano Tenyuu