Life Outside the Circle by H-P Lehkonen (4⭐️)

‘Life Outside the Circle’ is a black and white, BL WebToon romance set in Ikkeläjärvi, Finland. A trans man from Helsinki moves to the outer circles of Finland after inheriting his mother’s house and falls in love with his neighbour. 

This is a really sweet, very real romance story. One of the main characters, Juha, lives in the outer circle of Finland with his daughter. He ends up helping out Sami, his new neighbour and develops a huge crush on him. Sami finds out and teases Juha into making the first move and confessing. Its such an adorable romance and Juha is adorably awkward.

While its a very sweet romance, it also discusses a lot of real issues queer people experience daily. Juha’s community is very small and closed minded but Sami’s community is a lot more accepting and the author does a great job showing the differences. There are some homophobic scenes that happen and it’s done in a very real way. Its unfortunately something that we all have to deal with abd i think the author did a great job portraying it and the way the characters handled the situation was done really well. 

Representation - Bisexual (MC); Gay (MC); Trans (MC); Fat (SC); Post top surgery scars (MC); Hijabi (SC)

TWs/CWs - Blood; Bullying; Death of a loved one (past); Homophobia; Pregnancy; Racism