Author Archive


Yokohama Shopping Log, Volume 3

March 11th, 2024

A woman with green hair, wearing a light blue tank top, beige slack and white sip-on shoes, leans back as she sits on shallow stone stairs by the sea, Seagulls fly above her in broad blue sky.In Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, Volume 3, Alpha, an android, can see that time passes – and so can we. The adult humans she knows have gotten older, the children she played with are now young adults. There are fewer and fewer people. At her cafe, which never managed more than a few visitors on most days, now goes many days without anyone coming by. 

And yet, Alpha is mostly content to enjoy her time, sipping coffee, exploring the local area, until a crisis pushes her to leave the cafe behind and go on an extended tour of as much of the country as she can visit on foot in about a year.  While she is gone, we learn more about Alpha from Kokone’s discussions with the professor who was part of the design team than we even learned from Alpha herself.  However, like the end of humanity, there are still many holes in that story…we are unlikely to get them all filled in.

In this volume we learn, too, that Kokone truly has no room for anyone other than Alpha in her heart. And, while Alpha treasures Kokone as a friend, she’s not thinking about anyone that much…not even the owner she used to be waiting for.  She’s pleased with the small joys of existence; eating a giant chestnut, meeting a new android, finding a new place to stay and work. We also learn that Meruko is interested in Kokone, but is rejected for Alpha.

As nature takes over the landscape, and humans pass out of existence…how much longer will the androids exist without humans to need them? Nai’s plane will need fuel and Alpha needs beans for her coffee. Who would Kokone deliver to? I assume Meruko would probably make art regardless of whether she had an audience, as artists often do.

It’s hard to feel anything other than the melancholy of the passing age, in between the small joys here. What will life look like when the humans are gone? And how can we get to a point where this gentle twilight is humanity’s end instead of what we appear to be headed towards?

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Service – 1 pinups of Alpha are drawn with love, not service
Yuri – 6

Overall – 9

Yokohama Shopping Log, Volume 4 is out now from Seven Seas. Come for the coffee and company. Relax and enjoy the end of the humanity.





Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – March 9, 2024

March 9th, 2024

A blue silhouette of a girl with a white flower in her hair, embracing the earth. Blue block letters read YNN Yuri Network News. Art by Lissa P. For Okazu.LGBTQ Events

April is the second-best month to be in NYC, so if you’re around, join me and Rica Takashima at the Rainbow Book Fair at CLAGS: The Center for LGBTQ Studies in midtown. Pick up a dual-signed copy of By Your Side: The First 100 Years Of Yuri Anime And Manga in person!

 

 

Anime News

Whether you think they will be “Yuri” or not, the YURI TIMES has an overview of what they think is the upcoming season’s Yuri anime in Yuri Anime of Spring 2024!

To start, the definitely Yuri anime Whisper Me a Love Song, which will be premiering in Japan on April 13. Adriana Hazra has the details over at ANN.

Also check out the write-ups on ANN for maybe-there-will-be-some-Yuri series; Seiyuu Radio no Ura Omote (which initially was being promoted as Yuri, then that disappeared, so who knows), Highspeed Étoile  both by Crystalyn Hodgkins and I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level, Season 2 by Egan Loo.

Definitely not Yuri, but golf, because they think golf is what made Birdie Wing great, Sorairo Utility. Joanna Cayanan covers this one.

In the Ep. 24 cast commentary for Mobile Suit Gundam – The Witch From Mercury, the cast and staff once again take the opportunity to note that Suletta and Miorine are married. ^_^ I love that they are not letting that go.

Toei Animation noted on Twitter that March 7th is the anniversary of the very first time Sailor Moon appeared on Japanese TV.

 

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Yuri Manga

Heading our way this month is How Do I Turn My Best Friend Into My Girlfriend? Volume 1 from Seven Seas, by Syu Yasaka, creator of Monologue Woven For You.

Maitsuki Niwatsuki Ooyatsuki – Monthly With Ooya, Volume 4 (毎月庭つき大家つき) by Yodokawa is out in Japan (and on my to-read pile!) Monthly in the Garden with My Landlord, Volume 2 will be headed our way in English this month from Yen Press!

Usio Shio, creator of Doughnuts Under A Crescent Moon, is starting a new Yuri series starting in Storia Dash called “Koi ni Koi suru Koibito no Kankei.”

 

Yuri Light Novels

Stellar Step, Volume 1 (ステラ・ステップ)  tells the tale of a post-apocalyptic Earth in which idol competitions take the place of wars.  Undefeated Rain meets and has her life changed by Hana, whose song moves her heart. This is the first of a series.

Via Yurimother, we have news of Miss Savage Fang: The Strongest Mercenary in History Is Reincarnated as an Unstoppable Noblewoman, which is about, according to Yurimother, “a gender bender light novel focuses on a male mercenary reborn as a woman and becomes involved in a bisexual love triangle.”

 

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Other News

I am incredibly pleased to announced that Rediscovery: Science Fiction by Women, Volume  3 (1964-1968)  is now available from Journey Press. I was able to contribute to this volume in a small way, as I wrote the end word for the story by Miriam Allen deFord. I also contributed to Volumes 1 and 2 and am thrilled to be in such amazing company as Seanan McGuire and Marie Vibbert. I hope you will pick this book and the rest of the series up. It’s amazing stuff.

 

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Chaser Game W

March 6th, 2024

by Frank Hecker, Staff Writer

One result of yuri’s increasing popularity is the creation of more and more live-action yuri series, like the popular Thai production GAP: The Series and the recent Japanese series Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna (based on the manga currently being released in English as She Loves to Cook, She Loves to Eat). Some of these productions are follow-ups to or re-workings of non-yuri material, like the Thai series Love, Senior (a gender-swapped version of the Thai BL series SOTUS). Such is the case with the subject of this review, the eight-episode Japanese series Chaser Game W, which originally aired on Tokyo TV and is now streaming internationally on the Taiwanese LGBTQ-focused streaming service GagaOOLala, with subtitles in English, Spanish, Chinese, Thai, and Indonesian.

The “W” stands for “women”. Chaser Game W is a spin-off of Chaser Game, a previous manga and live-action drama about a male game developer; it shares a setting but not much else with the prior work. The subtitle, “My Evil Boss is My Ex-Girlfriend”, states the premise: 27-year-old Harumoto Itsuki is a closeted lesbian working as a team lead for a game development firm. One day she finds that her girlfriend from university, Hayashi Fuyu, has returned to Japan as the representative of a Chinese company looking to contract with Itsuki’s firm to create a game adaptation of a yuri(ish) manga (or manhua?). Unfortunately, Fuyu has brought with her an older husband, a young daughter, and a vengeful attitude — the result of Itsuki breaking up with Fuyu in college to (apparently) pursue a boyfriend.

Being a yuri production this state of affairs can’t continue unchanged, of course, so the show finds various (and at times contrived) ways to throw Fuyu and Itsuki together and encourage them to re-kindle their relationship. However, corporate intrigues and the demands on Fuyu as a wife and mother threaten to derail it once more. Nakamura Yurika does an excellent job portraying Fuyu’s transition from office terror to a woman approaching her breaking point, while former idol Sugai Yūka acquits herself well in the less demanding role of Itsuki. The two also have good chemistry as partners in romance, although some viewers may bemoan the relative lack of kisses and other physical affection. I should also mention Kurotani Tomoka as Ro Asami, an older corporate manager who takes over the villainess role midway and does a bang-up job of it — although her motivation when revealed proves to be more than a bit clichéd.

Other notes: Beyond the three characters mentioned above, the others in the game development team are also women, while the men are all side characters, ranging from innocent and even sympathetic bystanders (Fuyu’s husband) to sexist buffoons (a character designer himself caricatured). The series finds multiple occasions to favorably portray Japanese work practices and social mores as more relaxed and tolerant than those of China, something I found quite amusing given Japan’s reputation in the West as a land of overworked employees and conservative attitudes. Finally, the epilogue, which occurs after a time skip, gives viewers a happy ending, but I found it a bit rushed and hand-wavy. I would almost have preferred something more bittersweet as being more in keeping with the show’s relative realism about being a lesbian in Japan (or, worse, China).

Ratings:

Story: 7

Characters: 8

Production: 7 (it has its cheesy moments, most notably in a coming out scene that’s accompanied by sound and lighting effects more appropriate to a Gothic horror movie)

Service: 3 (a fairly tame bedroom scene)

LGBTQ: 7 (both Itsuki and Fuyu are explicitly lesbian, although Itsuki is initially closeted and Fuyu entered into a heterosexual marriage due to family pressure)

Overall: 7

Chaser Game W is well worth watching if you’re a GagaOOLala premium subscriber, and worth checking out during a free trial period if you’re not. GagaOOLala has recently established itself as _the_ place to go for current Japanese live-action BL series; perhaps Chaser Game W is a harbinger of an increased GagaOOLala focus on Japanese live-action yuri as well.

You can watch the official GagaOOLala trailer for the show. GagaOOLala also released several scenes from the show on Youtube; spoiler warnings for all these, but especially the second:

Fuyu in vengeful mode

Fuyu’s backstory

Reminiscing about their past

A contrived excuse for wedding cosplay

A romantic moment





Hana Monogatari, Volume 2 (はなものがたり)

March 5th, 2024

An older woman with collar-length brown hair, wearing an orange blouse, looks in a mirror in which she is reflected towards us, as she applies blush. A flower-patterened dress hang in the background.In Volume 1, we met Hanayo, a woman whose husband has passed away, leaving her both free to do whatever she wants and confused as to what that might be. She meets Yoshiko, a woman of similar age, who runs a cosmetics store in town and her life begins to change.

In Hana Monogatari, Volume 2 (はなものがたり), Hanayo begins to build her new life and runs into a new version of an old problem. We learned in Volume 1 that her husband lacked imagination and greatly impeded Hanayo’s chances at growth. When he retired he clung to her selfishly, forcing her to continue to cater to his needs until the very end. She loved him, but she had been ready to start fresh at retirement. Now that he is gone, she finally has a chance at that fresh life.

Hanayo signs up for a college class on Yoshiya Nobuko’s and ends up with a surprising new acquaintance. Subtly, in the instructor’s story, schwinn-sensei’s shows the kind of disdain Yoshiya’s works received for decades at the hands of academic literary scholars. And then a crisis occurs.

Riko, Hanayo’s granddaughter has been fabulously supportive of her grandmother and her daughter-in-law knows what she’s doing and supports it as well. Almost predictably the only person who is not on her side is her son…a man who clearly takes after his father. He condescends at his mother, claiming she is not able to keep up with the times (a projection, as he himself is unable to) and sneers that this is the influence of that “old lady” friend of hers. When Hanayo demands he show respect to her friend and stop being an ass, again predictably, he storms off, his feelings hurt.

Around this time when the series was coming out, schwinn-sensei noted on social media  that her editor started making fun of this story  – not in a kind way. He undermined her confidence in exactly the same way that the son attempts to do with Hanayo.  I don’t know if this chapter was in response to the editor, or was the inciting incident, but it is clear that, like Hanayo’s son, this  guy found even the mildest of criticism of men undermining women’s work too hard to accept, thus proving the problem. Apparently Comic Flapper was not at all supportive of this work.

At least in Hanayo’s case, but one hopes in scwhinn-sensei’s case, as well, standing up for herself brought renewed dedication and strength. Hanayo invites Yoshiko out to what turns out to be a lovely birthday dinner. They tell each other their ages…and Yoshiko admits to having dated older women before. Yoshiko suggests that they do this again next year. Adorably when she gets home, Hanayo freaks out about the idea that it was a date – and is thoughtful at the idea of “next year.”

Another key point in this story is a great deal of Yoshiko’s history. She goes out with friends – on the screen is an older idol celebrating a 20 year retrospective and we learn that she and Yoshiko were once lovers.

Ratings:

Art – 8 Hanayo is adorable
Story – 10
Characters – 10 They have lives, and family and society, like real people do
Service – 0 salaciousness, 10 empowerment
LGBTQ+- 9
Yuri – 7 It notches up

Overall – 10

While this series did not get the love it deserved from its editor, it has been popular enough to be translated into Korean and Chinese in Taiwan and, sxhwinn-sensei announced on Twitter last month that it is coming out in French! I am endlessly hopeful that someone in the US will pick it up for localization, because we definitely need more older adult Yuri! I say “older” but Yoshiko is only a few years older than me at this point. So, yeah, gimme old lady Yuri because I am an old lady. ^_^





I’m in Love with the Villainess Audiobook, Volume 4

March 3rd, 2024

We left Rae and Claire in the Nur empire at the end of Volume 3, and in I’m in Love with the Villainess Audiobook, Volume 4 we get into the weeds of so many plots that I’m still reeling from the tone shifts.

Rae and Claire may be “exchange students” but they have revolution on their minds and spend the beginning of the book thinking how they can train Princess Philene up to be the revolutionary leader they need.

But first, we have a cooking contest! And a formal ball. And a murder mystery, and a mysterious magical item, and a kidnapping. And helping out many different people in their various personal issues.

And, of course, that revolution.

There are so many plates being spun that the foreshadowing is barely noticeable, except when it’s a bat to the back of the head.

This is a story that, despite the light-hearted opening, becomes quite serious by the end. Nonetheless, there are many funny scenes* here, as well as a number of sincere discussions of queer existence. When all of that is set aside, the story digs in and becomes both politically and magically, dark.

Once again, narrator Courtney Shaw does a fantastic job at voices. Pronunciation is still an issue, however. Pronouncing Lene “Lean” is a matter of interpretation. But sakura? How is sakura being pronounced “sa-KOO-ra” in 2024? Please.  Oh well. I blame the director. This kind of thing is easy to check. I had some qualms about accents, but I’ll get over listening to a German cook with a Italian accent and a lisp. It was kind of funny after a while.

This 9 and half hour book is a lot of entertainment for the money and while it sets up the final volume of the series, doesn’t really prepare you for it when it arrives

Once again, I think this audiobook allows for a different appreciation of the story for those of use who have read or watched it, and offers accessibility to folks who use audiobooks as an assistive tool. I’m 100% for that and glad to see more Yuri available in this format with Yen’s The Executioner and Her Way of Life added to the roster this winter.

Ratings (for the adaptation only):

Overall – 10

*I even laughed out loud at a breast size scene, possibly for the first time ever.

Volume 5, the final volume, is available this month from Seven Seas Siren.