Archive for the LGBTQ Category


Aisarete mo Iindayo, Volume 1 ( 愛されてもいいんだよ)

September 2nd, 2021

In Amano Shuninta’s Aisarete mo Iindayo, Volume 1 ( 愛されてもいいんだよ) we meet Kimura Rin, an office worker who is being sexually harassed by a superior at work. She has no allies among the women in the office, and the harassment is exactly on the line that some men think is being friendly, but is not that, at all.  As she cries alone in the bathroom of the restaurant where her group is having their after-work drinks, Rin encounter Ryou, who thinks she needs to fight back. Ryou tells Rin that she is a lesbian sex worker for ‘Yuritopia’ and tells her how much it costs. Rin takes her up on it, and that experience changes everything.

Rin quits her job and decides to become a sex worker. There’s a lot to learn and of course that learning curve is the story. She sleeps with a Yuritopia sempai and it just serves to highlight how out of her depth she is. Even Ryou turns out to be not what she seems, as the cast at Yuritopia seem kind of cliqueish and not at all kind. Which, I will admit, bothered me quite a bit (and  didn’t make the Yuritopia manager look good. She was nice, but if her employees are jerks, then, uh…something’s not okay.)

Eventually, she gets her first date, a repeat customer of the company who likes to go out with the new girls. The situation is confusing, until she figures out what that customer is looking for and she gets her first high rating. She’s on her way in her new life!

My absolute favorite scene was probably the most ridiculous one, where Rin chooses her working name. She’s stressed out and unsure. The manager gives her a cup of hot chocolate to soothe her nerves (hey, here’s some caffeine and sugar, that’ll relax you!). Rin takes a sip and as the sweet, warm flavor fills her, she decides her name will be Cocoa. It was very her. ^_^

Amano-sensei’s art is really interesting in this series. It’s well-drawn, but she’s focused on partial views, shadows and  skewed perspectives which really works well to communicate Rin’s feelings. As the story ends, the panels become straighter, the backgrounds a little more detailed, giving us a much more grounded feeling.

This volume ends with an interview with Obou, a straight male representative of a lesbian sex work organization, Club Tiara. the same organization made “famous” by Nagata Kabi-sensei in My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness.  I knew it was a guy who ran that, but it still makes me feel icky that it’s not a woman in charge, so I declined to read the interview, but the questions seemed to focus on the technical details. What are the various courses, how are cast chosen, that kind of thing.  I checked out Club Tiara’s site and found that they offer options for women, men and couples, which makes perfect sense. They have specific infor for lesbian customers, a phone service, naturally, and a guide to using their service. I didn’t  check to see if they do streams or sexts. As websites go, it’s got a welcoming, not an exploitative “Hot girls live! XXX!!” feel, which is reassuring. If anything, their site felt a bit like a josei manga magazine. I don’t know if this is something I want for myself, but am glad that it exists in the world.

They also are promoting a number of manga on the Club Tiara site, including Nagata-sensei’s and Lesbian Fuuzoku Anthology from Ichijinsha that I reviewed here on Okazu, along with the sequel.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8 Rin really grew on me
Service – Not really? It’s about sex, and isn’t coy or creepy; the art is artsy, rather than explicit. So sex, but no fanservice.
Yuri – 9

Overall – 8

Volume 2 is out now in Japan and I imagine I’ll read it, (probably on Bookwalker, since I’m out of space..again. ^_^





Silk & Steel: A Queer Speculative Adventure Anthology

August 15th, 2021

Some days, the weather is just perfect and all you need is something plain fun to read. Silk & Steel: A Queer Speculative Adventure Anthology is very fun to read. There are no bad stories and, depending on what you like, there are a lot of good stories and a few that just gut punch you in the right buttons and are otherwise great.

The anthology starts off strong, with a wonderfully whimsical story by Alison Tam, “Margo Lai’s Guide to Dueling Unprepared,” and continues on with a wide array of fantasy and science fiction (which, at this point, are largely identical, only, one involves spaceships, generally speaking,) and queer characters of all kinds.

For me the gut punch of greatdom came in the form of Freya Marske’s “Elinor Jones vs the Ruritanian Multiverse,” for entirely mushy story of little Erica and her little wife reasons. Back in middle school we had a tricky tray auction and I had excitedly gotten a tray of three books, one of which was The Prisoner of Zenda. The punchline was that the person who had created the tray was my now wife. “Awwww.” (The other two were A Swiftly Titling Planet, still my favorite of the trilogy, and one of the Elric books, which have now been thoroughly, permanently and hilariously ruined for me by Bimbos of the Death Sun.)

The world borrowing and building in so many of these stories are a real testament to the skills here of the authors. Cara Patterson’s “Little Birds,” and Yoon Ha Lee’s “The City Unbreachable” feel like stories we have already been told so many times and know so well. Aliette de Bodard’s “The Scholar of the Bamboo Flute” borrows a world we’re all so, so familiar with here on Okazu, and still breathes a whole new life into it.

For my money, the two best stories are “Positively Medieval” by Kaitlyn Zivanovich, which seamlessly melds fantasy and cyberpunk in a wholly unique and disarmingly adorable way and “The Parnassian Courante” by Claire Bartlett which was…perfect. Paros no Ken, step aside, this is the correct ending to that scenario.

Ratings:

Overall – 9

With a diverse cast of characters and writers, Silk & Steel was fantastic read.





Watashi no Oshi ha Akujyaku Reijou., Volume 2 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。)

July 21st, 2021

Watashi no Oshi ha Akujyaku Reijou., Volume 2 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。) gets into the first of my two favorite arcs in the first WataOshi novel – Rae and Claire are recruited to the Academy Knights.  One-on-one magic battles! Whee! I absolutely love this arc and the school festival (for obvious reasons when we get there.)

The tryouts for the Academy Knights are pretty much a forgone conclusion – at least two of the three Princes are a shoo-in, Claire, Misha and Rae are competing for the other positions with, sorry to be cold, but clearly its Thane.

But first Rae finds herself examining her own sexuality for real, out loud, at lunch with Claire, Misha and Lene. And when I say “for the first time,” I mean for the first time in both lives. By her own admission, Rae had fallen in love with women, but also mostly unobtainable women, women who did not return her feelings. Rae can see that her interest in Claire is true to her usual pattern, then. Of course we know that that will change, but at the moment, Rae has no idea.

When the students help with taking out magical monsters, Thane and Claire team up to beat a massive slime, but it doesn’t boost Thane’s confidence. It does bring Relaire into our household, so we have a brand new adorable slime monster of our very own.

Then, at last, we get the beginning of the Academy Knights battles! And…the volume comes to a close. Argh! So much good stuff, but we’re still a few chapters off from Rae and Claire facing off. /pouty face/

The art in this volume has settled in nicely and Aonoshita-sesnei’s art is super on point. We already know we love the story…and this volume has the eye-opening discussion about being a sexual minority that sets a tone for the rest of the series. Rae is openly lesbian, and she will stand at the top of a veritable army of queer characters by the time this story is done.

On a different topic, I bought this book from Melonbooks online, for the single reason that if I did, I got a color insert and a bonus comic. Here’s the insert I chose, tell me if you can guess why I picked it. ^_^

Overall, a very strong volume of a series that I fully expect to have nothing but very strong volumes for the forseeable future.

I believe I did not review the Japanese edition of Volume 1 as (due to the delay of material in the Suez Canal,) my volume arrived almost simultaneously with Volume 1 in English.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Characters – 9
Story – 9
Service –  1Very little for this series
Yuri – 10

Overall – 9

I cannot wait to see the battle between Rae and Claire – and their cafe at the festival. ^_^





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.

 





DC PRIDE #1

July 1st, 2021

2021 is not the best timeline ever, but this year both Marvel and DC decided to acknowledge the queercreators and characters in their line-ups. A few days ago, I took a look at the Marvel Voices #1, their Pride collection. I had no particular expectations for either anthology, but expected that DC might do a better job, as they’ve had a bit more experience and a handful of more well-known characters who are out.

Marvel took the opportunity to talk about all the “firsts” they’ve done, without noticing that those firsts often lack follow-up. It made for a self-congratulatory feature that, I’m sorry to say, wasted some top-notch talent. In the end, I came into the book not knowing some of the characters and I left in the same state. Yes of course I can look the characters up, but why should I have to?

So here we are at DC Pride #1, and again, I had no idea what to expect. What I found was a really interesting approach. DC took their currently known, beloved characters from their DC TV Universe and focused on them. It was innovative in a way, because they were offering up two ways to engage with these characters at once – in comics and on television.

Again, I didn’t know every character when I began the book, I don’t watch DCEU on TV. I tried, most of the shows just didn’t hook me. But I do like Batwoman, and I’ll be the first person to tell you how much of a surprise that is. I even like Alice. I mean – I really like Alice as a character now, so far removed from the stuuuuupid origin story. And Javicia Leslie gets two thumbs up from be as Ryan Wilder/Batwoman.

So, I sat down to read this anthology…and by gum, I enjoyed it. Trung Le Nguyen’s art in the Batwoman story was fab, but I love-love-loved Lisa Sterle’s art for “Clothes Makeup Gift.” The Harley x Ivy story was a bit weak. I don’t much like Harley, but I especially dislike that Ivy ends up being the good cop to Harley’s chaos agent schtick. “Try the Girl,” written by Vita Ayala was a fab story all around and well drawn and colored by Skylar Partridge and José Villarubia. Of all the stories, I thought this one stuck the landing best.

Also, let me remind you, that I have permanently retired “Date Night” as a title, so dear comic artists, don’t use that anymore. Ever. It’s over. Done. The story was solid, I liked “meeting” Nia (again, I don’t watch TV much…) I loved seeing Brainiac, because I always did think that Silver Age Braniac was a bish. ^_^

Overall this anthology did exactly what I wanted both anthologies to do – introduce the queer characters from that universe and give me a taste of their personalities and powers. If you know someone queer who wants to get into American superhero comics but has no idea where or how or even if to start, you could do worse than hand them this anthology to get a broad idea of who is out there, what their stories are  and why they might be interested. Dear Marvel – this is what anthologies are supposed to be. Do this next time.

 

Ratings:

Art – 8 Overall excellent, some sublime moments. And Lisa Sterle!
Story – 7 Generally very good, a little performative, but each choice served a purpose
Queer – 10 Yes, and… old school and current and varied in a way that I truly enjoyed
Service – Shockingly little

Overall – 9 Hands down this anthology was a winner

 

If you haven’t picked this issue up yet and aren’t virulently opposed, hop over to Comic Shop Locator and find a comic shop near you! Or, of course, you can get this digitally on Comixology.

After how much I really disliked DC’s Love is Love Anthology, (“searing white-hot rage” is a quote from my review)  Pride #1 was a relief and a genuinely enjoyable read.