Rec'd via Paperbackswap.com.

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Book Description:
"Love Jessica"...That's what Leah finds on the back of a love letter to her sister. But who is Jessica? When more letters continue to arrive, along with flowers and other gifts, Leah goes undercover to find out her sister's secret. But what she doesn't expect is to discover a love of her own--and in a very surprising place! Winner of the Manga Academy’s Create Your Own Manga competition, Rivkah has crafted a beautiful and haunting comedy-drama that reminds us that there is no such thing as a simple love.

Grrr.
I typed a JE up but accidentally closed the window without saving it. I'm not sure I have the energy to write it all up again, but here goes:

So the story's predictable. Leah finds a love letter in her older sister Sarai's possessions...and it's from a girl. Leah doesn't have the courage to ask her sister directly about her sexuality, and their conservative senator mother would never accept her *perfect* older daughter as a lesbian, but it seems like Sarai almost wants her sister to ask, just so that she can stop pretending she's "normal."

The art's OK. Not too exciting. What really drove me nuts was the dialogue; not what the characters said, but the way it was laid out within the panels. Usually in comic books, if text is in a word bubble it is spoken aloud, and if it's in a box or "floating" in a panel, with no encircling shape, it's a thought or external narrator. In Steady Beat whole conversations take place just floating in the air, and it's not at all clear who said what, or if something is spoken or only an internal monologue.

Tokypop put over 40 pages of filler in at the end, which was totally lame, but I guess the author didn't have enough content to fill the book out?

Series has potential. I'll check out the next volume.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

sent to Sandy Yong of Jersey City, NJ to fulfill a request on Paperbackswap.com!