This series is a BL manga that was created by Mone Sorai. I don't know much else about what had to be done to create the story. I would imagine that she traveled a lot in order to draw all those different places around the world. The story also seemed like it ended after volume three however, there is news that another volume was released in Japan.
A gay couple decides to travel around the world with the plan to be wed, if they're still together at the end of their journey.
Let's do a little bit of comparing. I couldn't help but to compare Lonely Planet to another series called "What did you eat Yesterday" only thing is that the latter series doesn't have travel included. The couple goes to each place where they try the local food, meet new people, and take pictures of the sights. When they try the food in each new place, they go through this whole spill of the ingredients. Sometimes it's a little annoying, sometimes it's interesting to learn about food that you don't know about. Information about certain places are a bit too much at times as well. Do keep in mind that "travel guide" is a key word here. Lonely Planet's main conflict at the core of the story is a lack of confidence in who the couple wants to be. A lot of the times during the trip, one half of the couple is very uncertain about being an out gay man. While the other guy is willing to be open because he loves this man so much. There's a difference in personality that bounces off of each other as the two meet new people and have little misunderstandings. What kept me reading was wanting to witness the change in attitude of the shy character as they meet more people in other countries who were similar to them. Each chance encounter gave the couple new reasons to love being who they are. I enjoyed this couple's journey of self discovery a lot. I'm not sure if it's over or not.
The art for each place has such fine details. The creator took care to make sure that each place she drew actually did the real country justice. I wasn't always a fan of the character models. They very much looked like beginner sketches in some panels. The noses kind of bothered me a bit too. Still, the character's looked amazing when being captured in emotional moments. No mater if these panels were happy or sad.. The couple always looked good in the countries that they visited.
Our not so lonely Planet Travel Guide is an easy enough read. There's three volumes that can be devoured quickly if you have the time. Be aware that you will experience big information dumps in some parts of the story.
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