Rascal Does Not Dream of Petite Devil Kohai

I’ll admit: I went into *Petite Devil Kohai* expecting another run-of-the-mill rom-com with a supernatural coat of paint. Boy, was I wrong. This audiobook *hits* differently—like if *Haruhi Suzumiya* and *The Girl Who Leapt Through Time* had a snarky, emotionally intelligent lovechild. The time-loop premise isn’t new, but Kamoshida twists it by making the reset *personal*. Sakuta isn’t just reliving a day; he’s forced to confront his own complacency, his sister’s trauma, and the fact that his ‘dream girl’ might not be the real prize here. The real star? Kaede, whose devilish grin and razor-edged teasing mask a loneliness that’ll gut you when it surfaces. Andrew Grace’s performance is *so* good it’s almost distracting. His Sakuta is the perfect slacker-philosopher—equal parts bored and deeply observant—while his Kaede oscillates between bratty menace and heartbreaking sincerity. The pacing is relentless, with loops unfolding just long enough to let tensions simmer before resetting, though I’ll critique that the middle act drags slightly with repetitive beats (a time-loop hazard, I suppose). My only real gripe? The ending feels *slightly* rushed, like Kamoshida had one too many thematic threads to tie up in 20 pages. But the audio production? Flawless. Subtle background noise shifts—distant school bells, footsteps—ground the loops in reality, making Sakuta’s frustration *visceral*. If you love urban fantasy with bite, narration that *gets* teen angst, and stories where the ‘villain’ steals the show, this is your next obsession.