Archive for the English Manga Category


Farewell to My Alter, Nio Nakatani Short Story Collection

August 3rd, 2021

Farewell to My Alter, Nio Nakatani Short Story Collection, from Yen Press works equally well as a Yuri collection, a science fiction/fantasy collection, or a collection of Nakatani-sensei’s stories from the Éclair anthologies +. Anyway you look at it, this book has a variety of stories that all are firmly rooted in “short story” telling beats, with a requisite number ironic, ambiguous or open endings.

My favorite story is probably the most obvious, as a Virtual Designer fails to notice the reality right in front of her.

The art for this collection spans a pretty good range of time before and during Bloom Into You, and it’s not hard to see that Nakatani-sensei’s earlier chapters are less polished than her later. As I wrote in my review of the Japanese volume:

“If you’re a huge fan of her work, or you like short manga stories with slightly uncomfortable edges, you’ll want to get this collection. It definitely is an excellent overview of her art changing over the last decade or so. as it evolves quite considerably from beginning to end in a way that would not be obvious if you didn’t see the stories laid out one after the other…”

Technicals here are well-handled by the team at Yen Press. Since they only give me two names, I can only call out translator Eleanor Summers  and letterer Erin Hickman for their efforts, and so I will. It’s never easy to do this and I always appreciate the care and attention they give to it.

Ratings:

Overall – 7

For fans of Bloom Into You, this is a great way to survey a creator’s artistic development, along with some solid speculative fiction by Nakatani Nio.

Thank you very much to Yen Press for the review copy!





The Conditions of Paradise: Azure Dreams

July 26th, 2021

It was 2009 when I read this book the first time. Here was what I wrote at the time,

In Ruri-iro Yume (瑠璃色の夢) Morishima Akiko gets to realize a dream of hers … . She is able to draw a series of stories about adult women in relationships with other women.

As I read that now 12-year old review, I find that I could have cut and pasted a great deal of it into this one, as most of the references she’s made to her other series still have not been licensed. Hanjuku Joshi had a brief sojourn in English with JManga, but is otherwise not available here. Neither are Renai Joshika (Volume 1 and Volume 2) or Renai Joshi File (レンアイ・女子ファイル) .

So here we are, getting to see what Morishima-sensei was thinking about more than a decade ago – and it may be even more relevant to today’s Yuri than it was then, now that adult women and their dreams are the subject of more Yuri than ever before. Here we are at The Conditions of Paradise: Azure Dreams.

As a collection of shorts, this volume holds up rather nicely, I think. Morishima-sensei’s art style is still cute, and this look at different couples and different kinds of relationships makes for a nice variety. I summed up that 2009 review with, “In any case, Morishima’s art is super-duper cute. But her stories are smart, poignant and often very real. And, okay, sometimes her stories are super-duper cute, too. ^_^” And that holds true today. ^_^

Interestingly, in a kind of time warp, the characters from Hanjuku Joshi (from whom you met Chitose and her fujoshi sister) are back again, in “Motto Hanjuku Joshi” which runs right now in Galette magazine. It’s still a delightful series and one half the most problematic couple has aged out of school, so the problematic part of their relationship is less so. ^_^  Is today’s the motto, “everything old is new again” or “old Yuri doesn’t die, it’s just moves magazines”? In any case,

I really like that these three books are being sold as a series and I hope one day you’ll get to read the rest of the stories from which several of these shorts have been spun off.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 9
Yuri – 9
Lesbian – 7
Service – 7

Overall – 9

It is so lovely to see Elina Ishikawa working on a Yuri manga again – we worked together on the Jmanga volumes. ^_^ Very fine work from Asha Barton on adaptation, CK Russell’s lettering and retouch is a thankless job, so appreciate those sound effects! Nicky Lim’s cover design work is on point, as always, and let me just say, I weep with joy at seeing the proofreaders and Dawn Davis and Danielle King, credited along with editor Shannon Fay. The one thing Seven Seas does that I love most, is give you a glimpse of the entirety of the number of people who work to make this book happen. My sincere thanks to Rhiannon Lissa, and Julie as well. It’s a team effort and most readers have no idea how many folks have to put time in to get a book on their shelves. Thanks so much to the team at Seven Seas.

It has been absolutely wonderful to see more of Morishima-sensei’s art in English! Now, can I ask favor? I really want to see Takemiya Jin’s work in English, too. Pretty please? ^_^





Strawberry Fields Once Again, Volume 3

July 23rd, 2021

In Volume 1, we met Akira, a withdrawn loner and Pure, an outgoing and positive transfer student who tells Akira that she’s from the future where they are lovers.  In Volume 2, Akira slowly and surely grows to love Pure, only to find that the other girl has disappeared.

In Strawberry Fields Once Again, Volume 3, we find ourselves in a cascading series of fractured timelines. As we watch Pure and Akira miss each other over and over, we begin to pick up the thread of the story and it turns out that indeed Pure was from the future!

Akira and her brother Ruri, after the death of their mother, each chose to withdraw from life in a slightly different way. Akira dedicated herself to otome games and unbeknownst to her, Ruri dedicated himself to repairing what he believed was the true timeline. But – and this is really an important point in real, life, I think – Ruri only sees his parents from a child’s point of view and doesn’t account for them having lives as adults that he’s not privy to. From his immature and self-serving perspective, the timeline he’s seeking to restore is the “correct” one…but as we learn, there is no timeline in which his family is restored in the way he wishes.  But selfishly, he puts his energy towards stopping Pure, rather than himself, becoming what passes as this series’ bad guy.

When Ruri is confronted with this truth, he relents and Pure and Akira finally meet up after a series of failures in Pure’s time-travel attempts.

In the end, the timeline for Pure and Akira are restored enough for them to find one another and be married, and what started out as a kind of weird little typical school drama, ends as a weird little time-travel story with a Yuri wedding and a happy ending for mostly everyone.

So yeah, this book travels a long distance from that first chapter, but now that we’re here at the end, it was definitely an interesting ride. In Japanese I ended up reading this volume through 3 times, just to make absolutely sure I understood it and, if I had not, I probably would have had to read this English-volume through more than once. ^_^ Amanda Haley does a fine job on the translation, so it’s not on her – honestly a very excellent job, as she helped me clear up some small details I had missed or ignored, and I enjoyed the clean look of Abigail Blackman’s lettering – also, not credited, but whomever did the editing, nice job! (Yen, could you please give folks credit when they work on a book? ) The rough-texture of the cover stock is intriguing addition, I think this series might have been better served by glossy, but I kinda like the feel of this anyway.

Overall, a strange little series that was totally worth reading.  ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 8
Character – 7
Service – 2
Yuri – 6

Overall – 7

The main weakness of the story was character, it was very hard to actually like anyone until after you understood the whole picture and by then, it was too late for about half of them. ^_^;





A Witch’s Love at the End of the World, Volume 3

July 9th, 2021

At the end of Volume 2, Mari and Alice found themselves in the “real world” only something has gone wrong with the timeline and nothing Mari remembers is true.

Here in A Witch’s Love at the End of the World, Volume 3, the real mover of the story is revealed. This, it turns out, is a story that transcends time. Of course, Mari isn’t particularly interested in the whys and wherefores…she’s only concerned with Alice. Alice, who is suffering from loss of power, due to her feelings  for Mari.

We learn the whole story at last. And then we turn to watch Mari rewrite the entirety of history – which was worth it. Mari changes the world so that she and Alice might live in a timeline together without the hatred between humans and witches and, frankly, everyone can go hang.

KUJIRA’s art is solid throughout, and the story, while not earth-shakingly unique, was honestly pretty well put together. If it has a fault at all, its a bit of oversentimentality, but I wouldn’t not recommend it on that account.

If you’re looking for a little magic in your school girl Yuri, this series is available now from Yen Press!

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 0
Yuri – 5

Overall – 7





Sex Education 120%, Volume 1

July 7th, 2021

Sex Education 120%, by Kikiki Tataki, with art by Hotomura was a very good book. I’m saying that right up front.

I won’t belabor us all with the details of how execrable “health” education is in school. We all have our own excruciating tales of teachers unwilling or unable to talk plainly or parents bent out of shape at even basics. I probably am old enough that my sex education, despite it’s heterocentrism, was at least still accurate…if not wholly adequate. And since then, it’s pretty obvious that the adequacy has dropped even further, which is why I think I would definitely give this book to a tween if I knew one to give it to.

The story is straightforward, Tsuji is the health teacher in a Japanese high school who is teaching the kids actual sex education, despite the constant push-back from her colleagues and administration. But that’s only half the story. Yes, the sex education as far as it goes (and it goes relatively far) is both accurate and adequate, but the story is about a lot more than just sex. 

There’s a chapter on coming out, as two of the girls admit to being in a relationship – and we get a discussion of dental dams and how they work. Same sex couples are given some quality time. A goofy chapter ends up educationg readers on the fact that love hotels are not allowed to discriminate against same-sex couple. There is a chapter about masturbation. There’s also a lot of (mostly useless and goofy, ala Heaven’s Design Team)  tidbits about animal behavior, and a nod to omegaverse and BL. We learn enough about Tsuji to root for her and enough about sex to pass part of an exam…there are notable bits about heterosexual stuff left out, presumably either to appear in later volumes.

The characters were likable, the lesbian couple is cute and Tsuji’s enthusiasm is just exactly ridiculous enough to keep you rooting for her and this was an incredibly fast and fun read. Thanks to CW for letting us know about it just before it was licensed by Yen Press.  On the sensible premise that the sex education most people get is limited and barely adequate, I highly recommend this series.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 10
Service – Not really, except to make a point about salaciousness.
Queer – 10 the lesbian couple is out by the end of this volume

Overall – 9

I picked this book up on Global Bookwalker with some extra coins I got from Yuri Day specials and was very pleased with my purchase. ^_^ It’s also available on Amazon, RightStuf and a manga seller near you! Volume 2 will ship in October.