# The Guy She Was Interested in Wasn't a Guy at All

The Guy She Was Interested in Wasn't a Guy at All (Japanese: 気になってる人が男じゃなかった, Hepburn: Ki ni Natteru Hito ga Otoko Janakatta), shortened as KiniOto and more popularly known as The Green Yuri, is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Sumiko Arai. Originating as a short story posted on Arai's Twitter account from July to September 2021, the series started its current weekly run on the platform in April 2022, before being serialized on Pixiv Comic in April 2023. Kadokawa Shoten published the series in print in the same month, with its chapters collected in three tankōbon volumes as of February 2025. An anime adaptation has been announced.
The series has been a critical and commercial success, with critics praising the story, artwork, and characters. It won the 2023 Next Manga Award in the web manga category.

## Plot

Aya Oosawa has developed a crush on the clerk of the record store she frequents. Unbeknownst to her, the store clerk is her classmate Mitsuki Koga. The manga follows the budding relationship between Aya and Mitsuki and their shared love for music as they experience daily high school life.

## Characters
### Aya Oosawa (大沢 綾, Ōsawa Aya)

    Voiced by: Akari Kitō (drama CD)
    A gyaru high school girl who has an interest in rock music; however, she is unable to share her interests to her closest friends due to her friends preferring contemporary music and out of fear of being alienated. Harboring no romantic interest towards men, she first gets acquainted with Mitsuki by stumbling upon the record store by chance and develops a crush on Mitsuki's workplace persona as she continues to frequent the shop and they connect through rock music, not knowing that it is her classmate.

### Mitsuki Koga (古賀 美月, Koga Mitsuki)

    Voiced by: Mariya Ise (drama CD)
    A nerdy high school girl and classmate of Aya who also has an interest in rock music and works part-time at the record store with her uncle. To maintain anonymity during work, she wears unisex clothing, a face mask, and contacts in place of her glasses and school uniform, causing her to be mistaken for a boy and be dubbed by Aya and her friends as Onii-san (おにーさん). After Aya falls for her workplace persona, Mitsuki takes measures for Aya to not connect it with her school persona. She also learns how to play the guitar.

### Joe (ジョー, Jō)

    Voiced by: Kenjiro Tsuda (drama CD)
    Mitsuki's uncle who manages the record store and serves as her parental figure and guardian, often showing concern for his niece's introverted nature. It is later revealed he was in a previous relationship with Kanna when Mitsuki was young, but they had to end the relationship as he was prioritizing taking care of Mitsuki when Kanna proposed moving to Los Angeles with him.

### Megumu Narita (成田 恵, Narita Megumu)

    Voiced by: Tasuku Hatanaka (drama CD)
    A friend and classmate of Aya and Mitsuki who is the first to connect Mitsuki's workplace and school personas after noticing similarities between the two. He makes efforts to make both Aya and Mitsuki interact, get close to each other, and avoid miscommunication.

### Chizuru (ちづる)

    Voiced by: Erina Koga (drama CD)
    A friend and classmate of Aya's. She tends to offer Aya advice on how she can approach her crush on Onii-san, unaware that Onii-san is fellow classmate Mitsuki.

### Mao (まお)

    Voiced by: Nene Hieda (drama CD)
    Another friend and classmate of Aya's.

### Kanna (カンナ)

    Joe's ex-girlfriend and a friend of Mitsuki's who moved to Los Angeles. She returns to Japan and spends time with Joe and Mitsuki, though she still feels pain from her previous breakup with Joe. She also connects with Aya on their respective struggles towards romance.

### Hime (ひめ)

    A high school girl who is Aya and Mitsuki's junior and is the daughter of a record producer. She holds Mitsuki's songwriting with high regard.

## Production

In an interview with Shuko Yokoi, Sumiko Arai shared that the concept of The Guy She Was Interested in Wasn't a Guy at All originated from her being drawn to stories about individuals from differing backgrounds connecting and wanting to tell a story about girls, so she drew short stories featuring no dialogue which were posted to Twitter, as Arai believed it could thus resonate with international readers. One of these short stories, uploaded between July and September 2021, served as the inspiration to the series.
Since Twitter only allows four images per Tweet, chapters of the series are limited to four pages. As a result, Aya and Mitsuki's interactions have to be depicted concisely. The series' editor commented that the character's faces are illustrated to be detailed enough to understand the story without the dialogue, which makes the series more accessible to Twitter users not from Japan. The yellow-green color which complements the black-and-white illustrations was stated by Arai to be a late addition before the first chapter was uploaded.

## Media
### Manga

Written and illustrated by Sumiko Arai, the series originated on the author's Twitter account on April 10, 2022. It later began serialization on Pixiv Comic on April 29, 2023. Kadokawa Shoten began publishing the series in print in the same month, with its chapters collected in three tankōbon volumes as of February 2025.
Arai announced on April 3, 2024, that the series is receiving an official English release alongside other international releases, with Yen Press later announcing on April 26 they licensed the series for English publication.

#### Volumes

| No. | Original release date | Original ISBN | English release date | English ISBN |
| 1 | April 19, 2023 | 978-4-04-681732-7 | October 22, 2024 | 978-1-97-539968-9 |
| "Rhythm A""Chapter 1: Teen Spirit""Chapter 2: Creep" "Chapter 3: Don't Stop""Rhythm B" |||||
| 2 | February 27, 2024 | 978-4-04-683173-6 | February 18, 2025 | 979-8-85-541259-8 |
| "Chapter 4: Caring""Chapter 5: Rock 'N' Roll" "Chapter 6: Song 1" |||||
| 3 | February 20, 2025 | 978-4-04-684257-2 | — | — |
| "Chapter 7: Wish You Were""Chapter 8: 24H Radio" "Chapter 9: Should I Stay, or..." |||||

### Anime

An anime adaptation was announced by Arai on her X account and Kadokawa Shoten on February 20, 2025 to coincide the release of the third volume.

### Other

Apple Music and Spotify released an official playlist containing songs that Mitsuki and Aya listen throughout the series to coincide with the release of the first volume, featuring artists such as Nirvana, Turnstile, and Royal Blood, among others.
A pop-up store selling merchandise from the series was open in Ikebukuro from September 15–24 and in Nagoya from September 30 to October 9, 2023.
A drama CD adaptation was released on April 24, 2024.

## Reception

The first volume sold 150,000 copies within a week of its release. By September 2023, the series had 200,000 copies in circulation.
The series won the 2023 Next Manga Award in the web manga category. The series ranked second on the 2023 "Book of the Year" list by Da Vinci magazine. The series ranked second on Takarajimasha's Kono Manga ga Sugoi! list of best manga of 2024 for female readers.
A columnist for Animate Times praised the artwork, particularly its use of color, and the story's progression. Momo Tachibana of Real Sound praised the main characters and their interactions, describing them as understandable. Erica Friedman felt the story was "not the first of it's [sic] kind" but that it handled its subject better than similar series. Friedman also praised the artwork and its use of black, white, and green.