Is The Delinquent Girl Beside Me Suddenly Dyed Her Hair Black Worth Reading? Review & Where to Read

Quick facts
Format	Manga (shōnen)
Run	2024–present · ongoing
Community score	AniList 6.5
Content	None notable

Overview

Shimizu is the kind of girl the whole class quietly avoids — a blonde delinquent with a reputation and a permanent scowl. Then her deskmate casually mentions, to a friend, that his ideal girl has long black hair and carries herself well. The next day, Shimizu shows up with her hair dyed black. From there, every time he offhandedly describes something he likes, she starts doing it: showing up to the cooking class she used to skip, packing him a homemade lunch, trying just a little too hard to seem like she isn't trying at all.

What it does well

The premise is simple, but it's used well. Watching an intimidating delinquent slowly, transparently reshape her habits to match one guy's offhand comments is funny on its own, and the manga gets real comedic mileage out of how badly Shimizu hides the effort. She's not smooth about any of this — her attempts at seeming effortlessly perfect keep cracking under the weight of how much she actually cares, and the gap between her tough reputation and her very obvious crush is where the comedy lives.

Crucially, the manga never punches down at her for it. Shimizu's awkward sincerity is played with real warmth rather than mockery, which keeps the whole thing charming instead of mean-spirited. The male lead, for his part, stays believably oblivious without becoming an irritating idiot — he's just a normal guy who hasn't put the pieces together yet, which keeps the dramatic-irony engine running without making him hard to root for.

The chapter-by-chapter structure also works in the story's favor. Each installment tends to build around one small escalation or one new thing Shimizu tries, and the pacing rarely drags a joke out longer than it needs to. It's a comfortable, quick read that knows exactly what kind of story it's telling.

Where it falls short

Because the manga is still fairly early in its run, it's mostly running on one central engine — Shimizu's quiet transformation attempts — and it's an open question how much range that premise has over a longer series. The supporting cast beyond the two leads hasn't had much room to become more than background yet. And there's no official English license as of this writing, so English readers are currently limited to unofficial scanlations rather than a legitimate purchase option.

Verdict

This is a warm, funny, low-stakes high school romance that gets a lot out of a simple hook and a genuinely likable lead. It's not reinventing the genre, but if you want something sweet to read a chapter of between heavier series, it delivers exactly that.