Mimi wo Sumaseba (If you lean out) takes place in Tama, a suburb of Tokyo, in the mid-1990s. Shizuku Tsukishima, a 14-year-old schoolgirl, is a dreamy girl with a passion for novels and stories. The girl often borrows books from her library. But one day, she notices that a mysterious Seiji Amasawa is reading the exact same books before her. Later, when she borrows a new novel, she realises that it is a rare book given by a donor, a certain Amasawa. But who is this person? Does he have a link with this mysterious Seiji?

For his first production at Studio Ghibli, Yoshifumi Kondô, who was to take over the studio, accepts the proposal to direct If You Tilt Your Ear based on the manga of the same name.