Comic Yuri Hime, February 2024 (コミック百合姫2024年2月号) is an excellent volume of this magazine. Right off the bat, the stories about evenly split between stories I am reading and stories I am not reading. 50% is an almost unheard of percentage for me. But there is another thing in this issue, I want to discuss, because it was really good.
I talk a lot about Yuri literary fiction here on Okazu. I’m unapologetically as much a literature nerd as I am a comics nerd. Many school years of reading literary fiction somehow did not manage to break my interest in the idea of fiction. In fact, this year I am actually a judge for an award for independently published fiction and overwhelmingly, the books I have been reading are very interesting. Reviews to come when the embargo is lifted.
So yes, in this volume Aki and Shiho go out on a date in “Sasayakuyouni Koi Wo Utaa” finally, and Rae comes up with a bold and dangerous plan to rescue Yu from an imposed gender curse in “Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou” and the climax to “Kimi to Tsuzuru Utakata” was a fucking sucker punch *even though we knew it was coming for the entire story.* And the King in “Kiraware no Majoreijo to Dansou Ouji no Konyaku” is a dip and we applauded Eve for yelling at him, and Kiki and Michiru danced their hearts out…even though Kiki was injured and it was really stupid, in “Odoriba ni Skirt ga Naru.” These and many other continuing stories were great.
And we got the first chapter of a very old-school shoujo romance feeling “Toi Et Moi” by Nakato Nui. And “Daiuki Desu!” by nmi, among others both of which were very good.
But what I really want to talk about is the short story, ” Tsuitou Juu-shunen Tokubetsu Kiji ‘Tousakusha Sakakiba Mizue no jinsei’.” by Maruchou. This translates to Special Article On The Tenth Anniversary Of Her Death, “Plagiarist Sakakiba Mizue’s Life.” This was the grand prize winner of the 5th Yuri Literary Short Story Contest, co-hosted by Pixiv, Comic Yuri Hime, Shinchobunko, Early Wing and Shosen Bookstore. And yes, it absolutely deserved the prize.
This was a fantastic fiction that is presented as a non-fiction about the life of a person who “everyone knows,” but who never existed, with interviews with people who knew her and one of the best endings I have ever read in my life. Oh my gosh, this was SUCH a good story. You can read it for free on the contest website. Please go read this, even if you just use google translate. Seriously, it was gorgeous work. 10/10.
So both thumbs up on this issue.
Ratings:
Overall – For the short story alone, it’s a 10
I also have the March issue here and am digging right in!
Wow, that must be an exceptional short story! I wish Maruchou the best moving forward and hope their writing gets wider recognition. On a related note, I hope we get more yuri prose translated in the near future. I enjoy a good light novel, but it wouldn’t hurt to diversify what gets translated.
It was. ^_^ The more I think about it, the better it gets.
Light novels make sense, as they have the pop-culture tie-in. Prose is harder generally. Literary prose costs more to translate, and the sales of translated novels in English are usually very small without a famous name, like Murakami.
So Yuri/lesbian prose short stories have such a small audience to begin with. The ROI is probably not there yet.
I agree that I’d like to see more. Baihe novels coming over might actually help broaden that audience’s interest in prose. Now…we need some REALLY good lesbian novels to come from Japan and ride that wave. ^_^
I agree, light novels currently make the most sense to license and translate in comparison to prose novels. The fact that we’ve gotten Nahoko Uehashi’s “Beast Player” *and* “Deer King” novels translated and released in the span of five years is frankly miraculous. Still doesn’t hurt to ask publishers when we can, because if we don’t ask then they really won’t get considered!