IS (manga)

IS: Otoko demo Onna demo nai Sei (IS 男でも女でもない性), is an ongoing drama manga series by Chiyo Rokuhana, first published in Japan in 2003. The IS of the title stands for intersexual(s) and the story follows the pain and troubles such people go through in their lives, such as gaining acceptance for who they are and their inability to reproduce.

IS won the 2007 Kodansha Manga Award for shōjo.

Story
The first volume of IS is a collection stories about two different intersexual characters and their separate troubles. Volumes 2–8 deal with the life of intersexual Haru Hoshino, starting just before his birth and continuing past high school.

Characters

 * Hiromi
 * Hiromi is an intersexual who was raised as a girl, who works as an office lady. She is the focus of the first part of the first volume.


 * Ryoma
 * Ryoma is an intersexual who was raised as a boy, but later in the story changes his gender to female. She is the focus of the second part of the first volume. At the beginning of the story, Ryoma is a teenager.


 * Haru Hoshino
 * Haru Hoshino is an intersexual who does not have a surgery at birth to make him look like more of one gender than the other, but at 10 months old he has to have his testicles removed due to a medical condition. From preschool through middle school, he always plays with the boys his age in school, and is raised as a boy because of that. However in high school, because his birth certificate shows that he was a female, he is forced to live as a female for three years.