only if you wanna get banned
it's a good series that's ACTUALLY more aimed at guys than girls, you'd probably like it

Welcome to the forums,

Love Hina is a great manga (the greatest in my opinion but opinions may differ :) ), the story goes as follows.

As a kid Keitaro made a promise with a girl to go to Tokyo University together since there is a legend that says if two people find each other at TU they'll be happy forever. The only problem is he can't remember who that girl was. 15 years later Keitaro failed the entrance exam for the 2nd time and starts losing hope to ever get in there. His parents threaten to kick him out of the house (as they no longer wanna support him). He decides to visit his grandma who has an Inn and ask if he can stay there.
This is the point where the manga starts: (slight spoilers for the first part of the manga, nothing serious)


What follows is a very chaotic, hilarious manga about Keitaro, the promise mentioned above, and the 5 girls living at Hinata Inn. The greatest thing about these manga are the completely different characters of these 5 girls. You got Naru which is a girl trying to get into TU as well and is rather violent :heh: , there's the extremely shy 12y old Shinobu, a prankster and party animal (most of the time she's drunk or setting up some schemes for Keitaro) Kitsune, Hyperactive, turtle mecha loving Suu and last but not least Motoko (see sig) a kendo specialist.

in short love Hina is Comedy - Romance - Chaos (no other way to describe what happens at times :heh: ) - Ecchi (yes lotsa bath scenes).

Be sure to try it out, it is very good (waaaay better than the anime)

there is something you should kno the manga is kinda different from anime and the ending isnt horriable

also of note is that the Love Hina characters REALLY grow throughout the series, emotionally and physically: (minor spoiler, doesn't really tell about the actual story buuuut:)

There's a lot of unique and interesting characters as well (paving the way for Akamatsu's "Negima" that sports almost 40 different and unique characters)

Anyone heard about those 'Character CDs with the Contract Cards' for Negima? Most people I came across said it one big fat conspiracy of trying to suck the money out of the fans' wallets lol.

Personally, I didn't care for this series. I even gave it the benefit of the doubt and read the entire series. It was too slapstick for me to enjoy. I got irritated with the constant beatings and misunderstandings which lead to beatings. I know that was supposed to be comedy, but I thought it was obnoxious.

If you enjoy reading slapstick comedy, and frequent fan service I am sure you will enjoy it.

Yes , this is one of the strong aspects about the Love Hina manga. Especially Motoko :love: gets some serious character development (Ken Akamatsu actually said he'd rather write an entire manga devoted to her but that that wouldn't work out :heh: ). The same goes for all other characters. For some reason however we don't get alot of side stories which revolve around Kitsune, the only minor point about LH... :nono: . Apart from the main characters the side characters are actually very interesting as well, I mean you can't possible dislike Mitsumi :) she's awesome...

PS Yes yes by manga 14 little shinobu becomes quite a babe :naughty:

yeah, the only things we learn about kitsune is that she went to the same high school as Naru...and likes booze...and is from Kansai

Also, that she had a crush on Seta first but didn't confess so that Naru could.

I bought the volume 1 and regert it. Yes i like comedy, but hate, REALLY HATE fan service in manga (in anime i tolerate a little more). But i think he could have done the manga without all this fan service. But i think i can't critisize for the entire serie since i only read the first one.

Well, the story greatly improves in the following volumes but the fanservice stays, so if you really hate it then maybe you'd better not buy a second volume. But if you like the characters by now (I mean the girls not Keitaro) it's worth a 2nd chance since they are awesome and keep getting into great situations, but the fanservice stays throughout the manga

He never would have sold such a crappy story without the fanservice. In fact, volumes 1 through 9 could have been handled in volumes 1 and 2 if you removed all the fanservice and worthless "plot twists". If you can afford to wade through the crap, then the last few volumes have decent pacing, though.

wow i diddnt realize this post was still going, last time i saw the replys there was only 2. well i went down to a manga room and read LH and i actually though it was pretty good, i even managed to finish it. thnx for the help tho guys.

an akamatsu manga without fanservice is like a Takahashi manga without excessively stubborn main characters (remember, Akamatsu was/is a hentai doujin)
the fanservice of Love Hina is tame compared to the Get Backers (2 page picture of Hevn in tattered clothes bound up screaming her lungs out anyone? oh and when i mean tattered...well...you gotta know...Hevn doesn't wear much to begin with...) or most other shounen manga (ESPECIALLY mahoromatic...for crips sake she's buck NAKED for 5 pages in the first chapter alone!)
manga doesn't have the same limits that anime (televised) does, so excessive manga fanservice and excessive anime fanservice are different...

Mutsumi a side character??? She might not be in the manga as much as other characters, but her role in the plot makes her at least as important as Motoko. That should warrant main character status. May you recieve some watermelon related curse for implying Mutsumi is a mere side character. :)

Yeah, but the team behind Mahoromatic never intended it to become an anime like that. They're a hentai team for crying out loud... hell I... *cough* have there entire collected works in my person manga library *cough*... :heh:

Lol, you're right actually, she does have quite an important role, but as main characters I meant the 5 girls which are always around, contrary to Mutsumi who pops up every once in a while to get the main plot going (and to seduce poor little Keitaro with her ... "watermelons" :heh: ) But yes she is an important character

finished love hina... finally!!!
 

I've just finished reading the love hina manga.. and i must say. OMG. :love:
That has got to be the most emotional moving story i have ever read. Most books ya read don't follow a person/persons so much that you see how they grow, as much as this one does. I mean i really got into the story to the point as to where i couldn;t wait to turn the page and see what happens, and thats rare for me.
i've read A.I. love you and to me it was ok, but when i got started reading LH i couldn;t stop.
I just hope Negima gives me as much as fullfillment as this, probably not as emotional but its hijinks will keep me entertained.

all i can say is :bow: Ken Akamatsu :bow:

Love Hina was the first manga I ever read. I can't quite remember how I stumbled upon it, but I found the scanslations somewhere and started downloading. I was hooked from the first chapter. :D I found so much I could relate to: at the time I was a 19 or 20, no girlfriend, and....well I was in college but I was having a hard time. :heh: I loved how the characters were developed, and I only got more addicted as I continued reading. After I finished it, I read it again. And then I think I read it again after that semester. Then one summer day I was browsing in a bookstore and saw the first volume of Love Hina on the shelf and I was like :twitch: :D :D :D I bought it without hesitation. :) Then I read Love Hina again (read the volume 1 book first, then the rest on my PC). Then I learned of a bi-lingual version and I though "Hey, that could help me with my Japanese studies!" :thinker: So I bought all 8 volumes of the bi-lingual version (which unfortunately only cover up to about the first 6.5 of the actual volumes). Then I read Love Hina again. And again once summer ended and the semester started. My brother got into it too and he started buying the rest of the localized volumes. All together I think I've read it front to back 6-7 times now, I've lost count :heh:

Yes storywise Love Hina manga is great, and the main charcters are all awesome. I especially liked the fact that all the girls are completely different. Also loved Shinobu's crush on Keitaro, always so funny when that comes into play :)