Suiiki presents classic Japanese themes and motifs such as confronting the past only to ultimately deciding to move on, choosing to dwell in the present and not the past, and the importance of a strong familial household in an effective and new way. The story while not starting with these themes, develops them over time as a result of the plot, and ending with a more unified family and bright future.

A take on the story (not as much a synopsis) is that Chinami is confronted by her family past in the form of dreams that she enters, usually when she falls unconscious. In the dreams she is left to confront and interact with the family's proverbial dark horse (the thing not talked about but always present in peoples mind) Sumio, who serves largely as an anchor keeping the family tethered to the past and their old village (now at the bottom of a dam). Chinami finds peace and relief (from the heat wave) in the dream and from Sumio's company, and is ultimately has to choose whether to live in the dream past or live in the present, actual world.

The art is constantly good, with lots of background artwork that makes every panel look lively and busy, but the characters (personalities) unfortunately don't have nearly as much character as the art. That said its understandable why the characters are moreover not particularly unique, its a drama, and they're meant to be normal people, and normal people are not heavily energetic and overly expressive; another reason probably being that the characters serve as a stand in for not just the family we see, but other family that lost their villages to other dams else ware. While the characters are not anything new, they are still interesting and endearing.

I normally pace out my reading but with this I found myself binge reading it to completion, curious the whole time with questions like -"what is this dream, how real is the dream, when is the dream, what does the heat have to do with it, how will they get Sumio out of the dream etc."

It has a beautiful mix of drama and supernatural that makes it an easy recommendation.