Archive for the LGBTQ Category


Just Friends by Ana Oncina, Guest Review by Em Evergreeen

January 10th, 2024

Two women hold hands by a vast, purple sea under a yellow sky. One has long curly red hair, wears a hat and and a yellow denim skirt. The other has short black hair, wears a pink shirt with long black sleeves, a backpack and shorts. A large white cloud in the distance billows up from the horizon.Em Evergreen is a lonely lesbian with a manga addiction. Find her at linktr.ee/em.evergreen.Just Friends is a one volume Yuri manga by Spanish mangaka Ana Oncina. Originally published by Planeta Cómic in Spain in 2021, the English edition comes to us courtesy of Tokyopop, with translations by Nanette Cooper-McGuinness. Just Friends was awarded a silver medal at the Japanese Ministry of the Exterior’s International Manga Awards in 2023.Just Friends has the form of a manga, with right-to-left paneling and Japanese-language sound effects, but the lower-line-count art style hints at its overseas origin. It’s an opportunity to read a different type of Yuri, one that plays with the tropes of a culturally distinct adolescence – no sailor uniforms, student council officers, or onigiri are in evidence. Instead our story is set at sleep-away camp, where our teenage characters wear graphic tees and eat pizza and baloney sandwiches.Our protagonist, the introverted Erika, is reluctantly packed off to said camp without any close friends. On the bus there, she meets her polar opposite Emi, who takes an immediate interest in Erika and declares them “inseparable” before they even arrive. The story of their whirlwind relationship that summer is framed by more brief flash-forwards into their future, where we see them meet again as thirty-somethings. As with any good real-life sleep-away camp, the setting gives Erika the chance to step outside her comfort zone, figure out some things about herself, and perhaps explore that most new and exciting phenomenon to a teen – romance.To some young adult readers, especially queer ones raised in a similar context, the story will at times be almost painfully relatable. The realistic depictions of social anxiety, bullying, awkwardness, and underage-drinking-fueled misadventures might resonate a bit too strongly for comfort, but you’ll likely chuckle more than cry. Erika and her peers don’t have the communication or conflict resolution skills of adults, but their conflicts aren’t the focus. This is a romance at its core, with a side of navigating heteronormative expectations while figuring out who you are.Just Friends is very much not a Yuri without lesbians. Its mix of LGBTQ issues and romance is distinguished from recent standouts like Shio Usui’s Doughnuts Under a Crescent Moon or Sakaomi Yuzaki’s She Loves to Cook, She Loves to Eat by its strong focus on the drama of adolescence. In that respect, it calls to mind Yuhki Kamatani’s Our Dreams at Dusk, though it’s lighter in tone and less ambitious in scope. Just don’t go into Just Friends expecting a neat and tidy ending, or a sweet story of first love. It’s too grounded in the complexities of real-world romantic relationships, teenage and adult, to give us that. Like all good one volume manga, it leaves you wanting more.Art – 5, effective if not awe-inspiringStory – 8, a nostalgic, bittersweet romanceCharacters – 6, more realistic than memorableService – 3, sex isn’t ignored, but the teens aren’t leered at or sexualizedYuri – 10, Houston, we have lesbians (and/or bisexuals)Overall – 7

 





Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou. Volume 7 ( 私の推しは悪役令嬢。)

December 21st, 2023

A nun with silver hair and red eyes stands in the center of the cover, flanked by Rae and Claire. Lilies bloom and ice shards fly around her.In Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou., Volume 7 ( 私の推しは悪役令嬢。) a new characters is introduced that will (arguably, has) changed the course of the narrative. Cardinal Lily Lilium, daughter of Prime Minister Sala Lilium enters the story proper and chaos ensues.

Claire has been brought face to face with the plight of poverty and Rae has incited her to learn more and find solutions to the issue of poverty in Bauer. At Prince Yu’s suggestion, Claire and Rae head to the Spiritual Church, a Catholic-ish organization that runs the hospitals and orphanages, feeds the poor, and tends to the spiritual needs of the populace.

Right away, Lily is a strange character. Stuttering and shy, she blurts out rude comments from time to time. Her own nuns do not respect her and although she seems sincere, there’s something off about her.  She takes a liking to Rae, when Rae defends homosexuality and becomes a cast regular almost immediately. Claire and Lily push Rae into a story about her first love, from her previous life. This segment is both frustrating and poignant as a character who we later learn was struggling take their misery out on other people. I cannot accept that, even if we are told that everyone made up later. 

Then Lily drives us full-tilt into the next arc which will refer back to Rae’s story…

…but first! A game of dodgeball.

As one does.

This becomes a bridge to the next major arc, which will again, throw things into chaos. In a huge way. In fact, as I look over my reviews for the novels, “chaos” seems to be the defining characteristic. Reading reviews of the anime, again chaos seems to be the main takeaway, as most of the things seeded by the time the anime ends, won’t become apparent until a second anime season. In the meantime, we have the manga with Aonoshimo’s amazing drawings to fill in those gaps.

I’ve said it before but, really, the manga in many ways improves upon the Light Novels, as Aonoshimo’s art is so very good and doesn’t have the LN habit of being mere portraiture. And the anime, while being absolutely excellent in terms of characterization, did have pretty basic animation. For folks looking for a satisfying visual version of this story, the manga is highly recommended. Volume 5 is out now, in English, which takes you to the same point the anime ended.

Ironically, I was listening to Volume 2 of the Audiobook this week and ended up on the same exact place that Volume 7 ends. So now I’m primed to move forward into the last major arc before the chaos becomes a revolution.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 8, although I find Rae’s backstory tough going
Characters  – 8 Lily is not my favorite character, but she is crucial from here on
Service – Not much, maybe a panel here or there
Yuri – 8
LGBTQ+ – 9

Overall – 9

I had purchased this volume at Kinokuniya here in the US, but it came with no extras, so while in Tokyo, I bought a second copy to get the extra “Claire in Wonderland” comic from Gamers. It’s a cute little “weird dream” comic that includes series characters dressing up as western and eastern iconic fictitious characters exactly as one might expect. Very cute!





She Loves To Cook, She Loves To Eat, Volume 3

October 23rd, 2023

Last winter I reviewed Yuzaki Sakaomi’s Volume 3 of Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna (作りたい女と食べたい女), expressing my delight over the entire volume – even squeeing throughout. Today I was able to revisit those moments of joy with the release of She Loves To Cook, She Loves To Eat, Volume 3 out now from Yen Press.

In Volume 1 we met Nomoto Yuki and her neighbor Kasuga, two women who bond over their use food as a form of escape from stress and entertainment. In Volume 2, Nomoto realizes that her feelings for Kasuga are more than friendship.  Here in Volume 3, Nomoto finds another friend and confidant with her online pal Yako, a woman who loves food, but doesn’t care about cooking.  And Kasuga befriends the neighbor who lives in between then, Nagumo, a young woman with a very fraught relationship with food. The four women build a family together, a space in which every one of them is accepted for who they are and their needs are accommodated. This volume is moving and funny and adorable in equal measure.

Yako gives Nomoto a primer in sexual diversity, freeing Nomoto up to stop comparing herself to other people and find her own story. Yako’s light-heartd acceptance and casual speech really blasts barriers away, so it’s an especial delight to have Caleb Cook’s outstanding translation here. In this volume we also get to see the core issue between Kasuga and her family, which is, simply, lack of respect. This is echoed by Nagumo, so they become close over the shared experiences of dealing with family that blames them for not being compliant. I don’t think I have to tell Okazu readers how powerful a message that is. When Kasuga comes to understand how she feels about Nomoto, there are layers and layers being addressed.

In this month, where we have I’m In Love With The Villainess in anime, with heartfelt discussion of queer experience, this manga is the perfect pairing for even more discussions of diversity within sexual and gender minorities. ILTV is a great ice-breaker for folks unused to these conversations in their entertainment, but She Loves To Cook, She Loves To Eat, Volume 3 is rooted in real experiences and reflects the kind of community that we as queer fans create for ourselves.

An outstanding volume of one of the best LGBTQ manga of the last few years.

Ratings:

Art – 9 Yako and Nagumo give Yuzaki-sensei a chance to ramp up expressions to 11
Story – 10
Characters – 9 (only to give them room to be even more wonderful)
Service – 0  Unless, like Nomoto, you consider watching Kasuga eat “service.”
LGBTQ+ – 10

Overall – 10

I was also pleased that letterer Phil Christie get to retouch S/Fx, at least on some pages, where it wouldn’t affect the art. More of that, please!

There is one more volume available right now in Japanese, but since Chapter 40 of the manga, the series has been on hiatus due to the manga artist’s health. Were’ all wishing Sakaomi-sensei a safe recovery.





My Date Is A Total Ike Woman

June 11th, 2023

A short dark-haired woman in red and black carries a woman with short light-colored hair in a denim jacket and white pants, who gently strokes the dark-haired woman’s chin. The title “My Date Is A Total Ike Woman and a small image of a merry-go-round in lavender. Logo that says Tomboy in the upper right corner in blue. In the upper left, also in blue read “Butch x Butch” and “Presented by Natuo Mutsumi.”Mustumi Natsuo is a name with which we at Okazu are familiar. Mutsumi-sensei was the face of the Boyish² Butch x Butch Yuri Anthology project last year. This year, Mutsumi-sensei ran a Kickstarter for a new work, also a butch x butch comic. And, like the last project, this one blew past early goals. In fact, we’ll be getting a voiced reading of the comic at some point, since stretch goals were likewise met.

So today, I thought we’d take a look at My Date Is A Total Ike Woman, the English language edition of Date Aite Ga Ikemen Onna Datta Kudan (デート相手がイケメン♀だった件). Both Japanese and English language editions are available on the Tomboys Booth.pm page, where you can purchase them both as a physical book and as digital. When I backed the Kickstarter, I pledged for both the JP and EN editions as physical books. As soon as the PDFs became available, I scooped them up, so I could talk about them here!

The title of this comic is a pun on the Japanese word ikemen (イケメン) which means an attractive guy. We’ve seen that in some works here, like, Ikemen Onna to Hakoiri Musume and Ikemen Sugidesu Shiki-senpai! For anyone familiar with the term, this title would be expressive.

My Date Is A Total Ike Woman is a 37-page comic about Ushio and Asahi, two otaku butches on a blind date at an amusement park. In this short story, there are so many qualities that makes this comic worth owning and reading. When they meet for the first time, they are both blown away how cool each other is…and immediately become intimidated in rather cute and relatable ways. They spend their date negotiating boundaries both mental and physical. Both are otaku, with different interests, but both have had some negative experiences and don’t want to give up to much and get hurt. As the date goes on, they learn to open up and be honest with each other. This comic ends in a perfectly satisfying way that makes me hope for a sequel some day.

The translation is very good. In an early page Asahi sees Ushio for the first time and thinks, “Crap, their hotness level is clearly over 9000!” which of course made me laugh out loud, being a good otaku myself. The art is simple, with fantastic body language and facial expressions. When they should look cool, they look very cool indeed. For sample pages, check out Mutsumi-sensei’s Twitter page. 

If you’d like to read an engaging comic featuring two butch women on a date, definitely get yourself over to Tomboys and grab yourself a copy!

Ratings:

Art – 9 100% in wheelhouse
Story – 9 Covers a lot of ground in few pages
Characters – 9 So cute
Service – Well, ahem, cute butch women, so…10 for me
LGBTQ – 10

Overall – 9

The book ends with an interview of Mutsumi-sensei, about trying to create more queer comics in Japan. Obviously, I will always support that.
I hope we’ll get more of these two and their various otaku pursuits. ^_^

 

 
 

 

 





Doughnuts Under A Crescent Moon, Volume 4

May 15th, 2023

Two women face us , holding hands. One with long brown hair wearing a brown skirt and white blouse, smiling brightly, shorter woman with short black hair, where pants and a white blouse, smiling gently. "Doughnuts Under A Crescent Moon" is written in orange letters, with a chocolate glazed doughnut for the letter O, and a crescent moon just above and to the left of the O. Number 4 in the upper left hand of the page, a squiggle line, the Art & Story by Shio Usui.When Kaketa Tsuki to Donuts, Volume 4 (欠けた月とドーナッツ) landed in summer 2022, I said this about it, “…this was the perfect, most exactly correct ending to this series that we could have hoped for.” Now, in 2023, as I read Doughnuts Under A Crescent Moon, Volume 4, I would not change a word of that. This was the perfect ending for this series. We could not have asked for better.

Hinako is every person who has been measuring themselves against a set of criteria that do not fit at all. Asahi is everyone who is spending their energy on someone else so they don’t have to think about themselves. When they meet each other, their ill-fitting facades begin to crack. Neither of them have ever had the leisure to develop any adult relationships. Asahi, because of her parents death, has kept her one old friend, but been unable (unwilling?) to make others. Hinako’s friendships are – she believes – based upon the construct she had created to pass in society, while she blames her failures to build romantic connections on herself.

This is a lovely, gentle story of lonely people breaking out of the habit of loneliness that they built up as the cornerstones of their lives.

This manga checks off so many of the things that makes  a good manga for me – adult women building different kinds of relationships with the women around them, emotional intimacy of differing kinds with those women and adult women breaking free of the constraints put upon them by society, family and themselves. Joyfully, this manga is also full of adult friends who continue to be friends when their friend basically stops pretending to be someone they cannot be.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 10
Character – 10
Service – 0
Yuri – 10

Overall – 10

Asexuals are getting their time in the manga limelight right now, as well – if you were looking for a book about adults understanding themselves better, this should definitely be on your list.

I was *sure* that Doughnuts Under A Crescent Moon was a shoo-in for a best Yuri manga of the year when Volume 4 hit, but it has to compete with Birdie Wing and She Loves to Cook, She Loves to Eat, both of which are so outstanding. That said, this is an excellent manga and you should not miss it!