Yuri Light Novels
Manga Planet has announced an exciting new license for 7 “Super light” Yuri novels from Parsola, featuring art by popular Yuri creators Akiko Morishima, and Hiromi Takashima, as well as Kitao Taki and others. These all were serialized on the Yomuco platform. These super light novels are formatted for mobile reading, with a few lines of text on every page, and color illustrations. I recently reviewed – and enjoyed! – the first “volume” of Girls Love of the Dead, here on Okazu.
Nio Nakatani (Bloom Into You) and Hitoma Iruma (Adachi and Shimamura) are teaming up again for a new LN called End Blue (エンドブルー) about two former lovers who meet for a second time. It’s very cool to see them teaming up again. Their work on the Bloom Into You: Regarding Saeki Sayaka light novels was pretty terrific.
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Yuri Anime
Via YNN Correspondent Megan, Vlad Love creative team interviews are going up on Youtube.
We’ve got the Battle Athletes Complete Collection up on the Yuricon Store. This classic series is awkward and often servicey…and it contains some obnoxious stereotypes, but the primary Yuri love triangle is right out in the open and Mylandah and Lahrri’s burning desire for one another might be worth it. YMMV.
Adventure Time : Distant Lands – Obsidian is absolutely the Marceline x Princess Bubblegum story we need! It’ll be running on HBO Max. Give the trailer a look – it actually tempts me to add yet another stupid streaming service just for that.
HIDIVE is streaming Yuri anime Fragtime.
Via Chris Beveridge at the Fandom Post, ARIA The CREPUSCOLO‘s first trailer is on Youtube.
Yuri Manga
New on the Yuricon Store is Hana ni Arashi, Volume 7 (はなにあらし), the ongoing charming romance of Nanoha and Chidori may have finally hit a snag with a rival for Nanoha’s affection!
Via Comic Natalie, Yuri manga Yume no Hashibashi (夢の端々), Volume 1 and Volume 2. YNN Correspondent Megan has this to say about this two-vol historical Yuri series: “…this one follows two young women in post-war Japan up to the Reiwa era. The story begins with one of the women, now an old lady, visiting the other at home, though she doesn’t seem to remember her. Back in the 70s as teens, the girls attempted a 心中 (lover’s suicide) together. Later, one of the girls is entered into an arranged marriage, while the other girl arranges one last trip for the two of them before the marriage.”
Via Yuri Navi, we have news of a Yuri android manga, Tengoku no Nakoniwa, by Hirono Tsukiko. You can read the chapter on Comiplex, in Japanese.
Reminder that you can still get a piece of Yuri manga history! Grab WORKS, by Eriko Tadeno and Yuri Monogatari Vols. 3,4 & 6 for $25 – with free US shipping, from our friends at Cheapmanga.com with the code ALC2020!
Yuri Visual Novel
Curse of Kudan, fully voiced, available in English, Chinese and Japanese, is up on the Yuricon Store. This occult-ish Yuri story from SukeraSparo looks interesting, I’m reading the manga as it runs in Comic Yuri Hime.
Yuri Event
Girls Love Fest looks like it’s going ahead in February.
Other News
Once again via Megan, we have the pretty spectacular news about Kodansha’s licensing Boys Run the Riot, a story about trans kids by trans creator Keito Gaku. Adriana Hazra has details of the story on ANN.
Translator Jocylene Allen talked to the folks at Manga Mavericks about her work on Shiminami Tasogare: Our Dreams at Dusk.
Via the Yuri/GL Phillippines group on Facebook, namori-sensei posted this delightful reaction to seeing Yuru Yuri characters plastered around Shinjuku, advocating for social distancing measures.
Seven Seas has teamed up with Bookwalker Global for this month’s licensing survey. Make suggestions and get a coupon for Seven Seas books on Global Bookwalker! Do Yuri, get a coupon! ^_^
Become a YNN Correspondent by reporting any Yuri-related news with your name and an email I can reply to – thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network! Special thanks to Okazu Patrons for helping us reach our 2020 goal of giving guest writers a raise and helping us support queer creators!
The news of the new collaboration between Nakatani-sensei and Iruma-sensei looks pretty interesting. I don’t want to be arrogant and talk about anime, so I’ll just hope that this work will be popular and someday licensed.
As for Boys Run the Riot, I’m still impressed by how refreshing this title is. The author literally passed by all idealized or fetishistic anime and manga clichés about trans male characters. I hope that after the license I can buy all the volumes and find out the end of this story.
I am also very hopeful about the collaboration title. They really brought the best out of each other for the Sayak novels.
Boys Run the Riot looks a lot of fun, and I’m so thrilled that it’s been licensed! I can’t wait to take a look. What an amazing time for queer creators that no only is there work getting some play in Japan, but that US companies are snapping it up to share here. I feel like this is a real moment of change in manga. Anime…well, that has a longer way to go.
Yeah. I find it extremely positive that more and more people are able to share their unique experiences and it won’t be count titles with a local audience like in the days of Wandering Son. When I saw how a short comedy Himouto House literally parodying the state or common homophobia in Japan, I realized that times had clearly changed.
From what I gather, End Blue will be a collection of stories revisiting characters from other Iruma Hitoma stories and I’d be surprised if something like that got licensed.
Possibly not, but you, know, I couldn’t begin to predict, given the popularity of Adachi to Shimamura and the Sayaka novels. We might see those earlier works licensed too, for all I know. ^_^ Thanks for the description.
Only from their yuri works or anything?
Not just from yuri works. At least one story is about women from Crocro Clock, which wasn’t a yuri series. Apparently it’s a story titled 雅な椀 that Iruma had released for free online already.
But based on the blurb End Blue will also feature the central character from Shoujo Mousouchuu, which was a yuri novel, and illustrated by Nakatani.
I enjoyed Shoujo Mousouchuu, and was kind of hoping when you said, other stories, that that was included. ^_^
Thanks for the information! Although my favorite Iruma’s work wasn’t yuri, thanks to Erica I was able to take a fresh look at their work after Sayaka’s spin-off. So, I am always glad to receive any information about their collaboration with Nakatani-sensei.
I was surprised and delighted to see the Boys Run The Riot licensing news – Kodansha in my experience doesn’t tend to be too adventurous in their licenses, so to see a relatively obscure 4-vol trans/fashion manga go straight to a print release is quite something. The manga is absolutely phenomenal and I know I’ll be triple dipping with both EN digital and print!
In yet more Vlad Love news, ED performers have been announced – like the OP, there’ll be different ED versions: https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2020-11-12/alan-and-ayasa-perform-ending-theme-for-mamoru-oshii-vladlove-anime/.166266
Yuri Navi reports on a new potentially Yuri-ish serialisation in Shonen Jump Plus: http://yurinavi.com/2020/11/14/kizudarakeno-start/
If you’re interested in another series about fashion in connection to a trans person, I recommend Colorless Girl by Shirono Honami: https://comic-trail.jp/series/colorlessgirl
Thanks for the links. I might agree about Kodansha, but after Saint Young Men was licensed, all bets about any company were off. ^_^
Wait so Aria is Yuri?
Is it explicit Yuri?
It’s a relatively long anime from what I see and I don’t want to attempt watching it, if it’s just gonna say “fuck you” in the end.
XDXD
It’s not Yuri at all. ^_^