* AdaptationDisplacement: As is the norm with light novels, the manga is more well-known.
* FanPreferredCouple: Nagisa and Umino are taken as canon (in a HideYourLesbians manner) by many fans.
* ItWasHisSled: Umino [[spoiler:dies.]] It's a ForegoneConclusion in the books but the manga has a more ambiguous intro.
* LesYay:
** Umino isn't too interested in the boy that likes her. Instead, she wants to spend all her time with Nagisa.
** Umino states that she's a mermaid who needs to find a friend or else she'll turn to sea foam. This emulates ''Literature/TheLittleMermaid'', minus the romance.
** In splash pages and official art Nagisa and Mokuzu are always holding hands and being intimate.
* TearJerker:
** The manga is notorious for being a mood ruiner. It seems like a normal story about a weird NewTransferStudent befriending a girl and becoming her ManicPixieDreamGirl but it [[CerebusSyndrome goes downhill]] quickly once [[spoiler:we find out Umino wasn't lying about her dad killing her dog]].
** [[spoiler: Umino's murder]] in the end. The TruthInTelevision about how [[spoiler: she could have been rescued if she hadn't refused the help]] adds to it without question.
* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForLittleGirls: The series is about a somber middle school girl who is befriended by the eccentric NewTransferStudent who thinks she's a mermaid. There's a lot of hand-holding between the two and the light novel has moe, brightly colored artwork. But with a title like A Lollipop Or A Bullet you shouldn't expect cute fluff from the manga. It's anything but. Umino is severely abused by her father and in a truly TearJerker of a BittersweetEnding she ends up brutally murdered by him.