I started reading this years ago but stopped at about volume five. When the anime came out I didn't really remember it, so I watched it and enjoyed it for the most part. I felt some story things were lacking and wanted to see how/if they resolved, so I started reading the manga again right afterwards - and while I did enjoy it, I definitely didn't leave satisfied.
The art is good (this is a small thing, but I appreciate that the characters occasionally change hairstyles and are still recognizable), and the premise of 'straightforward and serious girl attracts wild and emotional boy' was fun; the story flips the cliche confession trope right off, which was interesting, and kept doing it as well (frankly, I think the third time was pushing it, but I can appreciate the the manga both trying to do something different and also keep the 'pining' aspect that is so crucial to most shoujo). I liked the characters a lot, and I really loved how friendships worked and grew throughout the series. It actually reminded me a lot of Kimi no Todoke in a way, where many of them needed to learn how to make friends and grow as people while still being true to themselves. The secondary characters are really what kept me reading by the end, and I would have loved more side stories and backstories with them. I would have appreciated some other romantic relationships as well, especially since, like I said, I ended up being fond of basically every character and several of them spent...years? in one-sided loves that clearly weren't going anywhere, which was a bummer.
It's the lack of resolution in this story that really bothers me. We spend a lot of time building up Haru's family drama and his relationship with his brother, and ultimately that is never wrapped up or hashed out. We also never meet an important member of Shizuku's family, which again, felt like it was something the story was leading to only to just...stop? And the whole ending felt very weird and rushed to me. I know it's typical to do a time-skip and for the third year to be more rushed (or skipped completely), but this really felt like it came out of nowhere.
(For Haru to leave - for the whole year - without any real prior discussion - AND NOT COMMUNICATE AT ALL during that time - just completely lost me. Like come on Shizuku, this guy is the worst, clearly at that point just pick Ken-chan.)
I don't know if the mangaka didn't know where to go with the story or just wanted to be done with it, but everything felt so thrown together and, having lost the ability to root for our main couple, I almost just decided to not finish the last few chapters.
tl;dr: With an interesting premise for shoujo and a good protagonist, this had the roots of a really good story, but everything needed to be flushed out more to make it really worthwhile. While this was enjoyable for one read, I wouldn't go through it again.