You can tell that this has been an unusually busy season when I fall behind on a quarterly magazine. ^_^; But hey, I think releasing a new book on the history of Yuri counts as a really great reason for falling behind! If you haven’t picked up By Your Side: The First 100 Years of Yuri Anime and Manga, now is a great time to call your local bookstore! ^_^

Galette No. 21 (ガレット) is the 5th anniversary issue of this crowd-funded, creator-owned quarterly Yuri manga magazine. That is an incredible achievement, especially in light of the multiple upheavals it has been through. So congratulations to everyone at Galette Works! The cover is appropriately sparkly for a celebration.

The volume starts off with a number of color pages on the 5th anniversary, including a short interview about Galette.

The magazine is actually split. The first half includes the ongoing chapters of manga like Morinaga Milk’s  “Watashi no Kawaii Neko-chan,” which has been licensed by Seven Seas as My Cute Little Kitten, “Houkenshitsu no Ano Onna “by Morita Miyuki and stories by Hamasaki Ringo, Yatosaki Haru, Neko Hariko, Kuchiko, and Haruno. This is followed up by a “Collaboration,” a short text story paired with a manga.

The second half of the book continues Hakamada Mera’s manga “Aikata System.” I reviewed  both volumes of that manga in 2020 here on Okazu. It seems to go a bit darker, so I’m going to have to re-read this carefully. ^_^ This manga was released by Dougenzaka Shobo, which was putting out a few decent Yuri titles…then just stopped and refocused on BL only. Shame, I really liked their stuff.

The endnotes include a crossword puzzle! How fun is that? I’ve never tried to do one in Japanese before.

Ratings:

Overall – 10 for making it to 5 years!

Galette, No. 22 is actually already out, but I’ve been much too busy to read, so have fallen behind on ordering books, as well. Woops. I’m going to have to pull myself together asap and grab that pretty soon.  Time for a shopping spree. ^_^