Konatsu’s father has been transfered overseas, so she is now living with a relative in a small seaside town in Ehime. Although she is from Tokyo, Konatsu is a little reserved, afraid to assume and careful about making friends. Even when the girl who sits next to her in class is outgoing and friendly, she’s worried about seeming too forward. But compared to the school star Koyuki, Konatsu is downright outgoing. A chance encounter bring the two girls together and almost immediately they feel something much more than mere friendship. In order to be near Koyuki, Konatsu joins the aquarium club. They help each other out in club, but also out of their social shells. When they both find themselves able to express anything, it seems to be more than they expected.

When I reviewed Nettaigyo ha Yuki ni Kogareru, Volume 1 (熱帯魚は雪に焦がれる ) I called this “a charming little love story about two girls and a cute salamander.”  A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow, Volume 1 is still charming and the salamander is still cute.  Both Koyuki and Konatasu live very much in their own heads, are a little fearful of expressing intimacy. Unusually, this puts them in the position of falling for one another before actually being friends (or frenemies, even,) something we don’t see all that much right now in Yuri romance.

This Viz edition looks lovely. The cover is made to look very much like an aquarium, but more importantly, the binding is lovely. I have no idea why I am enamored of the binding, but I picked this book up and the first words out of my mouth were, “wow, what beautiful binding.” ^_^ All in all, it just looks great. Other than marine life jargon, the dialogue here is not complicated, nonetheless translator John Werry, Eve Grandt’s lettering and touch-up (a fantastically difficult job that does not get enough attention!), Yukiko Whitely’s design work and Pancha Diaz’ editorial touch made this a relaxing read. I was able to just settle in to the narrative and let both Konatsu and Koyuki do the worrying for me.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 1 on principle only, there really isn’t any
Yuri – 7

Overall – 8

I know what’s coming and I’ll just warn you all to be patient. There will be no rushing this story, I assure you.

Volume 2 will be released in February.

Thanks very much to Viz Media for the review copy!

We are edging ever closer to the event horizon where Yuri manga in English is coming out at the same time as in Japanese. It was only March of this year when I reviewed this book in Japanese. Here we are, a mere 7 months later and we’re looking at Akashi’s Still Sick, Volume 1 in English, from Tokyopop.

Shimizu Makoto is a hard-working team leader for an engineering group. She’s also an otaku, with a hobby of drawing Yuri fanzines for comic markets. When she’s discovered by her coworker, Shimizu is desperately afraid that Maekawa will use the knowledge against her. Instead, Maekawa turns out to have a secret of her own. The two of them grow closer almost against their will. It’s not a bad relationship, but it isn’t a good one either. Maekawa uses Shimizu’s emotions against her to protect herself, Shimizu is hiding from everything to protect herself. It’ll take some serious work for the two of them to move forward. In the meantime, they are becoming more of a team and closer as friends…it’s all very messy and human.

There are a number of translation choices that are worth noting. “Fan comics” and “fanzine” for doujinshi are spot on, and I laughed at the use of “headcannon” because…yes. ^_^ The definition of “onee-sama” as being used by bottoms to address tops is a bit dodgy. It’s not wholly incorrect, but not really correct, either. In any case, I probably wouldn’t have described it that way. ^_^; The discussion of Yuri in between chapters was solid, no complaints here. Overall, Katie Kimura did a decent job translating. Tokyopop’s technicals are solid, all the visuals and the font are comfortab;ly legible, even in digital format.

Of all the working society Yuri manga I have been reading, this is one of my favorites. The characters are slightly broken, in a very human way, and the outcomes of their exchanges are not at all predictable. Still Sick gives us a very otaku view of office relationships, and a very human perspective on Yuri.

Ratings:

Art – 7 Solid, not outstanding
Characters – 8
Story – 8
Yuri – 3, with a lot of potential
Service – 0 so far

Overall – 8

This is not girl meets girl, girl falls in love, the end. This is broken woman meets broken woman, they don’t fall in love, but they kind do, only not really, and there’s some other stuff they need to work on, not the end.

Thanks very much to Tokyopop for the review copy.

And so, Shiramine Ayaka’s long quest is over. In Kiss and White Lily for My Dearest Girl, Volume 10, in and around the graduation festivities, surrounded by students leaving the school, Ayaka struggles to figure out her feelings, for her rival, her friend, her confidant, her support, Kurosawa Yurine.

To get herself to that conclusion, Ayaka revisits all the people, all the couples and all the relationships…all the Yuri tropes… we’ve seen in this series, giving us one last time to enjoy them before they and we move on.

As the curtain is drawn on this series for the last time here on Okazu, Ayaka finally figures out what we have seen for basically 10 volumes – that she is in love with Yurine. Yurine responds to this with white lilies and a kiss.

Now we say good bye to this series. It was always entertaining if rarely groundbreaking. Canno-sensei had a chance to spend the last six years on this series, working on her art, her characters, her comedic timing and it shows. Her lines, both drawn and spoken are more confident. After this breakout series, I’m looking forward to seeing where she heads with her work. I hope,of course that she’ll be working on something original, but we can see her current Starlight Revue project, Starlight no Ou on Pixiv.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Characters – 8 Ayaka was, in my opinion, the best character of the series
Story – 7
Service – 0
Goofball grin-making Yuri – 10

It feels like the closing of a beloved picture book, to be set back on the shelf as we turn towards something more adult. It’s not that we love it less, it’s just that it has become less relevant to our lives as we matured.

It’s time to get dressed and ready for adult romance. ^_^

Many thanks to Yen Press for the review copy!