You know how some manga series can give you the 10-star impression from the beginning, but halfway through it all falls apart? Like Bleach. Well, this one's the opposite: nauseating at the start but improving rapidly by the current chapter.
The premises are very, very unbelievable - so "perfect" I can't even call them cliche. The boy likes the girl from the get-go for no real reason whatsoever other than that the plot has to flow and there has to be romance. Oh, and this love remains - if not grows - even though, as the boy himself notes, she really only mouths three syllables throughout: "ah", "oh" and "uh". (To unsuspecting readers out there: this is NOT something even remotely attractive.) If you have no stomach for unwarranted mushy behaviour from a supposed former-yankee (I bet most people would've forgotten that little detail, especially the author), then you might not want to try it at all.
But the saving grace comes in the middle, when a new character is revealed as the old one, and this new character (thankfully) has some level of complexity, history AND isn't the shoujo airhead that every other girl here seems to be. Plus, she's on the good side, and has to be converted back later on. Ibuki really is the saving grace, and she pulls everyone else up: Kotori is forced to mature, and Yukito finally plays a boyfriend role other than obsessive pervert.
This manga has potential to eventually hit even 9 on my rating scale, if it continues this winning streak and has a powerfully touching conclusion. I recommend it so long as you can tank the cheesiest shoujo cliches, else you'd better skip the first 5 chapters.