Koe no Katachi (A Silent Voice) is a manga series written and illustrated by Yoshitoki Oima. The manga was first published as a one-shot in Bessatsu Shonen Magazine by Kodansha, and was later serialized in their Weekly Shonen Magazine from August 2013 to November 2014. The anime theatrical film adaptation of A Silent Voice, produced by Kyoto Animation, was released in September 2016.

The sensitive subject of A Silent Voice initially made it difficult for publication on any manga magazine. After months of legal dispute, the manga was finally approved for publication in the February issue of Bessatsu Shonen Magazine and won first place. Its serialization has also been reviewed and officially supported by the Japanese Federation of the Deaf.

In 2008, A Silent Voice received an award for “Best Rookie Manga”. In 2015, it was nominated for the 8th Manga Taisho and the 19th annual Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize. The manga went on to win the “New Creator Prize”. In 2016, A Silent Voice received nomination for the Best US Edition of International Material-Asia award in the 2016 Eisner Awards.

The story of A Silent Voice starts with a scene in the present, where a 12th grade high school student named Shoya Ishida comes looking for one of his old classmates. Her name is Shouko Nishimiya.

Ishida finally found Nishimiya and wanted to give her back an old notebook that Nishimiya used to use to communicate with her classmates. Remembering something unpleasant in the past, Nishimiya was shocked at the sight of Ishida and ran away from him.

The clock went back six years earlier. Ishida was hanging out with his friends Kazuki Shimada and Keisuke Hirose. They were attempting to jump off a bridge together as a test of courage – the 41st test, to be exact. It was a daily thing that the boys would do to pass time after school.

The three of them went to Ishida’s house, completely drenched and dripping wet. They cleaned up and spent the rest of the day playing video games in Ishida’s room. Ishida went into his sister’s room to get his manga and discovered a man named Genki sitting on her bed. Ishida told his friends that this guy was the 30th man that his sister has dated and she dated so many men just to fight off boredom.

The next day in class, one of Ishida’s friends named Miki Kawai told the gang that there would be a new transfer student coming to their class. They talked and guessed about how the new student would turn out to be. Ishida said that if the new student turned out to be a girl, it would be boring. “I really hate being bored” – he thought.

After class, the boys attempted to do their daily test of courage. Ishida and Hirose jumped immediately but Shimada decided not to join. He said that they should stop doing these tests of courage since they would be in middle school next year. However, just as Shimada was turning back to go to cram school, he found a nutria (a type of rodent from South America) and decided to skip school to join his friends. Before going back, they discovered that someone has took Ishida’s shoes while they were playing in the river.

Before going to school the next day, Shimada showed Ishida a picture of a boy appeared to be wearing Ishida’s stolen shoes. The three of them even built a plan to confront the thief and called it Operation: Shoe Rescue while giving the nickname “Deluxe” to their target. Ishida asked another one of his friends, a pretty girl named Naoka Ueno, to helped lure the thief out. After successfully tricked him to meet with them, Ishida and his friends punched him.

On the way back home, the gang was confronted by none other than Genki – the boyfriend of Ishida’s sister. It turned out that the thief they punched earlier at school was Genki’s little brother. Shimada, Hirose and Ueno ran away, leaving Ishida to face Genki alone. He beat Ishida up so badly that his whole face was covered in wound.

When Ishida’s mom told him to stop doing the dangerous tests of courage, Ishida just laughed and said that he would not stop. “I decisively triumphed over boredom today!” – Ishida thought.

The next day, when Ishida asked Shimada and Hirose where would they play after class. Shimada said that he couldn’t join because he had cram school and that he already skipped to many times. Hirose also said that they should stop doing the test of courage for good and ought to find better things to do.

Ishida dejectedly returned home and played video games alone, finally gave up his fight against boredom.

At long last, the new transfer student has arrived. Her name was Shouko Nishimiya......

......when the teacher asked Nishimiya to introduce herself, she pulled out a notebook. She slowly slipped through the pages while remaining silent. The last page of the notebook said “I’m deaf”.

Ishida was shocked and thought of Nishimiya as an alien. He said out loud “What a weirdo!”, but Nishimiya couldn’t hear him. The teacher then asked Nishimiya to take the seat in front of Ishida. She went down to her seat, bowing to each classmate as she went pass them. Ishida saw Nishimiya up close for the first time and he can hardly say a word.

How will the story unfold as Ishida and Nishimiya struggle to find a common ground? Will they be able to listen to each other’s “voice”?