Yori Asanagi and Himari Kino
Whisper Me a Love Song (known as Sasayaku You ni Koi o Utau in Japanese. Also sometimes translated as Whispering You a Love Song) is a 2019 Yuri romance manga by Eku Takeshima. It began serialization in Comic Yuri Hime in April of 2019 and is licensed in English by Kodansha Comics. An anime television series adaptation by Cloud Hearts premiered April 13, 2024.
Whisper Me a Love Song is the story of first year student Himari Kino falling for third year student Yori Asanagi after hearing her play with her band, The SS Girls, during the schools opening ceremony. When Himari tells Yori that she has "fallen in love with her" when the two meet up by chance, Yori thinks that Himari is confessing to her, though later Himari clarifies that she meant she fell in love with Yori's music, Yori is embarrassed at first, but then decides to get Himari to fall in love with her for real.
Tropes present in the work are:
- Affectionate Nickname: Shiho shortens her friends' names into two syllables, no honorific. Himari turns into Hima, Hajime turns into Haji, Kaori turns into Kao, Aki stays as Aki, etc. Yori still gets "Asanagi-san", indicating the distance she still puts between them.
- All-Loving Hero: Himari is an extremely kind and loving person who wants nothing but the best for the people around her. Which can lead into Chronic Hero Syndrome as she seems physically incapable of not going above and beyond to fix things if she sees a problem.
- Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Yori is a beautiful dark-haired girl with a composed demeanor and is perceived as stoic by others. Downplayed however, as she's a Nice Girl and not as aloof as she looks, being instead quite the anxious and emotional overthinker.
- Bickering Couple, Peaceful Couple: Shiho and Aki are the Bickering Couple, with the two taking a long time together, there being no shortage of drama between them and Shiho being a tsundere. Meanwhile, Himari and Yori are the Peaceful Couple, as they are both generally nice and work out their problems relatively easily.
- Cast Full of Gay: You know heterosexuality is a foreign concept to the cast when even the Posthumous Character is revealed to have been in a lesbian relationship.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Shiho is mentioned several times as the previous vocalist of the SS Girls before getting properly introduced in the series.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Downplayed with Yori. She gets rather uncomfortable when Himari gets too close to others, but mostly keeps those feelings to herself.
- Didn't Think This Through: Shiho had Himari become Laureley's manager largely to spite Yori. It's only after the deal has been accepted that Himari's complete lack of knowledge about what a manager does is brought up. Much to their luck, she is a fast learner and has plenty of initiative.
- Fatal Flaw: Shiho tends to run away when any sort of challenge or adversity appears, which often ends up causing her a lot of angst. When her best friend ended up being better at the violin than she was she stopped playing, when she realized Aki was in love with Yori she quit the band. She would come to regret both decisions. The fact that she ends up challenging the SS Girls to a rock off actually points to how much she has changed since joining Laureley.
- Festival Episode: Chapter 31 has Himari and Yori go to a festival together.
- Full-Name Basis: Mari Tsutsui refers to others by their full names.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Most chapter titles are a list of things that happen or are otherwise included in the chapter. For example, the first chapter is titled, "The roof, a guitar & Senpai."
- I Just Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Despite the fact that Aki had been in love with Yori for a long time she is nothing but supportive of Yori and Himari.
- Last-Name Basis: Yori tends to refer to people by their surnames, even her best friend Aki. She continues to address Himari as "Kino-san" most of the time after they start dating, despite Himari calling her "Yori-senpai," and while she agrees to Himari's request to use her first name more, she often falls back on using Himari's surname.
- Love at First Sight: Played With, while it seems Himari has fallen for Yori in an instant, it was actually her music, falling in love with Yori herself took a bit longer. Though it is more or less played straight with Yori who does fall almost instantly in love with Himari.
- Nice Girl: The main couple Himari and Yori are genuinely kind and pleasant individuals - and Himari even takes it to All-Loving Hero levels.
- Oblivious to Love: There is actually an oblivious triangle, Yori is oblivious to Aki, who herself is oblivious to Shiho.
- One Degree of Separation: Himari is connected to virtually everyone in the cast who is alive, due in large part to being Laureley's manager while also becoming Yori's girlfriend. Yori is amazed that Himari knows Yori's best friend Aki, who happens to be the older sister of Himari's best friend Miki.
- Third-Person Person:
- Kaori Tachibana playfully refers to herself as "Tachibana-san."
- Aki once playfully refers to herself as "Mizuguchi-sama."
- Tritagonist: While the story mostly just follows Yori and Himari, after Shiho Izumi is introduced she quickly becomes a huge focus character in her own right.
- Wham Episode: Chapter 10 reveals that Aki is in love with Yori, putting pressure on Himari to figure out how she feels about Yori.
- Wham Line: In Chapter 10, after Aki asks Himari how she feels about Yori, only for Himari to reply that she's unsure, Aki gives a startling response.Aki: Himari-chan, just so you know, I'm in love with Yori. Not as a friend. I mean in the romantic way. Hey, I may not know what it is you want in the end, Himari-chan, but do you mind if I take Yori for myself?
