And once more I find myself foraying into the world of Only the Ring Finger Knows, a tale of two boys in the worst-kept "secret" relationship ever, who take everything too damn seriously, especially those rings. I have to tell you, every time they talk about those rings, kiss the rings, whatever, I feel like I'm back in fourth grade after exchanging one of those split-heart "best friend" necklaces with someone. Except these guys are older than fourth grade...at least physically.

Like the previous novels, The Ring Finger Falls Silent (how noisy was that ring finger to begin with, by the way?) consists of two stories. In the first, seme Kazuki Yuichi gets stupid jealous because uke Fujii Wataru keeps hanging out with another seme, Asaka Masanobu. Wataru's like, WTFever, Asaka's not gonna do anything. Riiiight. Wataru, this is the yaoiverse, and the seme is always right.

In story number two, Wataru-- a senior in high school --gets drafted into helping put on his school's annual fair, the theme of which is apparently "let's guilt popular students and teachers into donating stuff for us to auction off!" If I believed all the manga and whatnot I read from Japan, I'd have to assume that every school just elects celebrities. Then again, I went to a small high school where everyone knew everyone...

Anyway, Wataru gets forced into getting Yuichi to donate something, and Yuichi's older brother manipulates Yuichi into agreeing, and because apparently the fangirls are so rabid that they might attack Yuichi or something, it's decided that he needs to bring a girl with him...so he brings Wataru's sister, etc, drama drama drama.

Okay, I'll say right now that of the three novels I've read in this series (see reviews for novels one and two), this is my, er, favorite. Least un-favorite? Something like that.

Most of the problems between Wataru and Yuichi are still from a lack of communication, and Yuichi is still a prick as far as I'm concerned, but that aspect of things is lightened as manipulative forces from outside the couple-- namely Asaka and Yuichi's brother, Shohei, plus a fangirl --cause the real trouble.

It's just exacerbated by poor communication and Yuichi's prick-ness.

There were fewer typos and small errors than in previous volumes, but I have a number of other issues. First, there are a few places where a change in scene happens without even an added line break, which confused me a couple of times.

There are also a number of places where you have to think for a second to figure out who's saying what line. For example, in one scene, Wataru is hanging out with Masanobu.

...Masanobu had seemed a little puzzled, but he soon nodded and agreed.

"...But to be honest, I'm surprised."

Gazing at the glass of red wine he'd ordered, Masanobu spoke a few words at a time.

"For you to be the one to invite me here..."

"Oh, is that surprising?"

Because of that line about Masanobu speaking a few words at a time, you'd expect him to be the one saying "For you to be the one," but in reality that's Wataru speaking-- Masanobu invited him out. When I thought about it of course I figured it out, but it pulled me out of the story to do it.

And there are times when a particular line someone said earlier will be re-quoted...but it's presented as a regular quote, with just quotation marks. It's more typical for a person remembering what someone else said like that for it to be in italics-- like a bit of inner monologue, because that's what it is; the character remembering that quote in their mind.

So. If you can't just get enough of Yuichi and Wataru, you have my sympathies, and you'll of course go out and buy this book. But as always, if you're looking for more than simplistic slice-of-life romance and melodrama, you'll probably get bored with this.

Author: Kannagi Satoru
Illustrator: Odagiri Hotaru
Censorship: N/A
Warnings: Same-ol' same-ol', I'm afraid.