REVIEW - 'A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow' purely queer bait? (CONTAINS SPOILERS)

A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow begins with great Yuri promise. In book 1 we're introduced to 2 girls who seem to feel some form of attraction for each other that they cannot yet understand. The first words muttered between the two main protagonists are "Do you like salamanders?" as they both look intently into each others eyes, to which protagonist number 1, Konatsu Amano, immediately thinks "Is this pretty girl talking to me?" After this initial encounter, Konatsu heads off to class and thus begins her obsession with protagonist number 2, Koyuki Honami. Within the first chapter Konatsu catches herself constantly thinking about Koyuki and even asks herself "Why am I so hung up on her?" something that, I assume, most straight girls wouldn't even be doing in the first place, thus already indicating that Konatsu is potentially crushing on Koyuki. (I, the writer of this article, should clarify that I myself am a lesbian so don't actually know how the straights think).

Throughout Volume 1 the two characters continue to spend time together as Konatsu decides to join Koyuki's aquarium club. One of the initial moments within the aquarium, Konatsu heads over to Koyuki and tells her that she has come up with a name for the new salamander that recently joined the animals that reside there. She decides to name it after Koyuki herself as she believes that Koyuki is stuck in her shell just like the salamander. The scene continues and Koyuki begins to suck on a tube to clean out the water tank. Konatsu turns to the salamander tucked away in it's little house and says "C'mon out! I'm lonely, Koyuki" to which Koyuki herself gags and chokes on the tube because she thought Konatsu was talking to her. Konatsu asks what she's even doing and Koyuki explains. Konatsu tries giving it a go and Koyuki finds herself staring as Konatsu sucks on the tube and she becomes more and more focused on Konatsus' lips, and begins to get nervous. How that isn't gay, we will never know. To top the situation off, Koyuki starts talking about how they just technically had an indirect kiss and begins to get embarrassed and blushing. HOW IS THIS NOT GAY, is the question we should all be asking?

Remember to read manga from right to left!

Moreover, both the characters get excited about being able to see each other everyday after school as protagonist 1 has finally joined the aquarium club. The two characters experience several cute but awkward encounters which make them both blush and feel embarrassed over things that one could assume heterosexual women don't usually get embarrassed by. Encounters such as tripping up at the beach and needing a patch job on the knee. Koyuki walking into a lamp post because she's so distracted thinking about Konatsu she doesn't pay attention to where she's going. Koyuki getting jealous of Konatsu hanging out with a new friend called Kaede. There's even a scene where Konatsu hand feeds Koyuki tortoise pancakes, where Koyuki keeps asking for more and more leaving the reader feeling there is some form of sexual tension between the two... but then again, is it just queer bait? Volume 1 then ends with Koyuki thinking to herself "Oh no... Ever since I met Konatsu..." then impulsively embracing Konatsu.

Volume 2 continues where Volume 1 left off. With an embrace. Time seems to stop still and Konatsu goes to accept this hug with shaky hands slowly wrapping around Koyuki. Koyuki then realises what she's done and retreats, face fully flushed. Koyuki runs away and makes a huge deal about having hugged Konatsu, expressing fear if someone had caught them, and thinking to herself "Until I met Konatsu... I never knew this about myself." What could "this" be referring to other than romantic feelings for another female. Right? After which, Konatsu makes a big deal about wanting to help Koyuki as best she can as she feels she is over exerting herself. They take a fishing trip to a new island, where they share an intimate moment when Koyuki tries to help Konatsu with her fishing pole and they get extremely close to one another and stare at each others lips as their hands make subtle contact on the fishing rod. Koyuki panics and lets go, entirely freaking out at how close they had gotten. Just before the trip ends they decide to take a cute picture together to remember their time, and Koyuki comments that it looks like they are on a date - something I don't think straight women would think if they were out with a friend they didn't have any romantic or sexual feelings for.

Later in the volume Kaede and Konatsu decide to go get ice cream together and Koyuki gets jealous. Whilst Kaede and Konatsu are out spending time together Koyuki obsesses over the fact that Konatsu isn't replying to her texts and can't help but want to invite Konatsu to go to a summer festival with her, but assumes that Kaede already invited Konatsu to go with her instead which also aggravates Koyuki's jealousy. However, Konatsu can't stop thinking about Koyuki either and wants to tell her how she feels but is scared. She brings this up to Kaede, and Kaede's mission in the series from then on becomes getting Konatsu and Koyuki together. If this series wasn't about two girls having romantic feelings for each other why would this even become such an important part of the story's plot? Kaede takes Konatsu to Koyuki's house where she pushes Konatsu to talk to Koyuki, who at this point the readers assume are crushing on each other and Konatsu asks Koyuki to go to the summer festival with her. The volume ends with the two at the summer festival where they share yet another intimate moment.

Volume 3 and 4 begin to unravel Konatsu's daddy issues as her father shows up temporarily before he promptly disappears again. Whilst this is occurring the two main characters continue to have awkward and intimate encounters as they try to navigate and understand their feelings for each other. At one point in Volume 4, Koyuki even admits to herself that "I wish we could openly tell each other how we feel" whilst jotting down in her notebook that she wants to stay together forever with Konatsu. Volume 5 is basically Kaede trying to understand Koyuki's side of the story, coming up with plots to get Konatsu and Koyuki together. At this point in the series readers are completely sure that the two main characters are crushing on each other. Not only because of conversations being had, and thoughts being expressed, but also the fact that looking intently into each others eyes is something that occurs with some frequency within the manga books, as well as blushing, nervous shyness, and outright gay panic.

In Volumes 6 and 7 there seems to be a lot of miscommunication and drama between the two main characters, consequentially leaving them to ignore each other and spend time apart from one another. But at one point in the middle of Volume 7 they finally find a moment to talk and realise that they both feel the same way about each other. But here's the twist, it seems to be all about loneliness, and apparently nothing to do with romantic feelings at all. Konatsu explains that she hates being alone and Koyuki fills that void for her and she fears that as Koyuki is growing and changing she will move further and further away from her and that loneliness will return. To which Koyuki explains that she feels the exact same way. To which they then hug it out. Which I and many people on Reddit believe this seems to be somewhat of a cop out by the author. Saying that, as they hug one of the girls thinks to themselves "But I think, there has to be more than that." Which in a way reels the gays back in hoping that it will turn out to be a romantic crush as we all initially perceived.

However, some Reddit users have explained that the author mentioned themselves that they never considered the protagonists to be gay, but purely platonic. Nevertheless I have personally found it incredibly hard to find any official statement from the author themselves of this. After scrolling through the author's Twitter I was also unable to find this statement, unfortunately the majority of their tweets are in Japanese so it may have been amongst one of those. I unfortunately cannot read Japanese so am unable to affirm or deny. I'm just hoping that in Volume 9 all is revealed and that the author holds true on what we readers already believe to be very clear; there is no way Konatsu and Koyuki are straight!

I think it is also important to mention that the closeness between Japanese women and other women around the world is culturally different. In Japan it is common for women to be rather close and touchy, in other countries this would be seen as potentially gay. Saying this however, all the actions, occurrences, thoughts, feelings and reactions between the two main characters have left readers on Reddit confused as to why the author stated that the series isn't meant to be Yuri. Even more confusing is that the series is listed under the LGBT+ category on Amazon, other book selling companies, and on Yuri manga rating lists despite the author's statement. Not to mention that the interactions between both characters, seem to most that read it, to be very sapphic-like courting behaviours.

From Volume 1 to 8 there are many happenings that cannot be seen to be things that occur amongst two heterosexual female friends. Heterosexual women would never get nervous watching another woman sucking water out of a tube, or be constantly, obsessively thinking about their female friend. A straight woman wouldn't be constantly thinking about how they want to touch said friend or tell them how they feel. They wouldn't freak out after getting slightly too close one to another in proximity. Nor would they want to know what their friend is thinking or feeling at all times of the day, mostly about whether or not that said friend is thinking about them in return. Thus one can only speculate that the author must have known exactly what they were doing with playing out the story in the way that they have. Thus, the possibilities are as follow; either the author didn't want any backlash or judgement from the publishers or family members. Or, it's purposefully queer bait for strategic marketing and high purchase ratings. Or, the ninth and final book will leave us queers surprisingly happy. (Or not surprising because it's entirely obvious that they are gay).