A review by simonlorden
I Cross-Dressed for the IRL Meetup 1 by Kurano

4.5

 Big thanks to the publisher for making this available on NetGalley.

I had a lot of fun with this comedic gender feels manga. "Cocoa" has been making friends in an all-girls sweets group, but she has a secret - he's actually a guy who just likes crossdressing, and he visits the meetings mostly to stare at her crush. However... her crush is ALSO a guy who likes crossdressing. Now what?

I think the way identities are talked about in this manga can be seen as "problematic" by Western modern standards, but like, you have to look past that to the intent. There's no intentional malice or transphobia here, just a bunch of characters exploring their gender expression and getting into comedic (but sometimes embarrassing) double identity shenanigans about it.

Also, although she is a side character, there is an actual trans woman (who is also a lesbian), which I thought was a nice contrast with the guys who like crossdressing.

Overall, I think identity is complicated and fluid, and cultural norms differ, so I don't want to use any labels to describe these characters that weren't used in the work itself - but I enjoyed their shenanigans a lot.