Is The Prince Doesn't Cry Over Onions Worth Reading? Review & Where to Read

Overview

After the war, Anna's restaurant is what holds her village together. She takes in strays, rebuilds farms out of war-torn fields, and generally keeps her community fed and standing. When a lumbering bear of a man named Bertram wanders into town, she puts him straight to work chopping onions — a task that should make anyone's eyes water. He doesn't shed a single tear. Instead, he explains he's there to repay a debt owed to her late father. What Anna doesn't know yet is that Bertram has been stripped of his ability to feel emotion altogether, and her ordinary warmth is doing something to him that nothing else has.

What it does well

The onion test is a genuinely clever piece of storytelling. Rather than opening with a dramatic curse reveal, the manhwa lets a small, mundane detail — no tears while chopping onions — carry the weight of Bertram's condition, and that restraint gives the premise real elegance.

Centering the story on Anna's restaurant and her role in rebuilding a war-torn village gives the romance a grounded backdrop that most fantasy love stories skip past. This isn't just two people falling for each other in a vacuum; it's happening inside a community actively working to recover from loss.

Bertram's debt to Anna's late father is a smart narrative choice, too. It gives him a legitimate, non-romantic reason to stick around from the start, which lets whatever grows between them develop out of sustained proximity and small kindnesses rather than an artificial spark.

Where it falls short

The story's quiet, patient pacing fits its premise, but it does mean the early chapters ask for real patience from readers hoping for quicker romantic or plot momentum.

Bertram's emotional numbness, while the whole point of the hook, naturally limits how much he can express as a character until his thaw genuinely progresses — which is by design, but can make him feel distant in the meantime.

And since the series is ongoing, the deeper nature of his curse and the "forces converging around the village" mentioned in the premise are still mostly unrevealed.

Verdict

This is a gentle fantasy romance that finds real emotional intelligence in a small, specific image — a man who can't cry over onions, slowly undone by someone else's warmth. If you want a slow-building story about healing through ordinary kindness rather than dramatic gestures, it's worth the patience it asks for.