We’re right on the cusp of the big merge now. Here were are at Volume 21 of Yuri Hime. One more volume of Yuri Hime S and then they will combine like two galaxies, which I’m sure could be a really funky extended metaphor if I had an ounce of energy to do it. ^_^;

This volume begins with a interview with Shimura Takako, creator of hit Yuri series Aoi Hana. Questions about drawing Yuri, love between girls and the BL and Yuri audiences are asked and answered.  It’s very much a public figure interview, so don’t expect massive personal revelations or spoilers for Akira and Fumi, but as interviews go – it was a good one. Most interesting to me was the use of the word “Yuri” to describe the work and the audience. It might not seem like a big thing to you, but it’s been a decade’s worth of work for me. ^_^

“Renai Joshika” starts to tie up loose ends, as Himeno and Shiraha shed some baggage in order to be able to move forward together.

In “Watashi to Kanoujo” two girls are together, while in “Hoshitotsu  Bokuro” two girls are separated.

Shio’s hair is really pretty and Kanako loves to play with it, but when classmates are unkind about their friendship, Shio puts some distance between them, in “Yuri Yuri.” After a short, tense time apart, they decide that they’d actually like to become closer and the other girls can suck it up.

Takemiya Jin’s “Love Aroma” follows a student who can’t get the scent of the new teacher out of her mind.

The Black Cat Mansion series tries something totally different – two adult women! Kumi and Nozomu are a great couple and ought to be very happy together…but aren’t, until a visit to the Black Cat Mansion forces them to have the conversation they weren’t having, but needed to.

Next up is a “commercial message” from Furutsuji Kikka, the creator of Knife-Edge Girl on the critical topic of her characters’ bust sizes. Oh, and don’t forget to buy the book!

“Hime Koi” and “Para Yuri Hime” are both short and forgettable, and the pages that follow outline manga that won the most recent contest held by Ichijinsha. We can expect to see some of the newcomers in the upcoming issues.

Which brings us to “Love DNA Double XX” which is steadfastly not going where I thought it would, for which I am very, very thankful. Aoi and Sakura begin a duel over competing ideas of honorable behavior and do not conclude it quickly at all. In fact, I think I really actually began to like this story, when 20 minutes later they are still fighting – and their audience is getting tired and bored. ^_^  Does the end come in the shining flash of a sword – tune in next issue to find out!

Which brings us halfway and to the “Petit Yuri Hime” 5-year anniversary pamphlet. 5 years. That makes Yuri Hime the longest-running Yuri/lesbian-focused magazine in Japan. Something to be proud of, for sure!

In ten more years, when Yuri Hime turns 15 and Yuricon 20, I wonder what the Yuri landscape will look like?

Short overview today, because it’s been a really long day today. I’ll finish it up tomorrow!

Once upon a time, a friend of mine told me a story about a guy she went on a lunch date with. When she inquired about the possibility of a second date, the guy said that he couldn’t. She asked why not, because she thought they had gotten on well. His reply was that they had and he really liked her and he could see himself falling for her and then they’d get serious about one another and maybe think about marrying and kids and he just wasn’t ready for that. She stared at him seriously for a moment, shook her head and said, “I was asking about lunch.” She walked away and never regretted it.

I have met many people like that man, people who construct elaborate fantasies in their heads about small things blowing into huge things, but the bulk of us can tell when we’re making it all up in our heads. I mean, we’ve all done it, haven’t we? Fantasized about “what we’d do if” somethingsomethingsomething.

In Kuchibiru ni Saketa Orange  (くちびるに透けたオレンジ), Chizuru is busy making up stuff about Kae in her head. In reality, she’s got Kae on a really high pedestal, and doesn’t even consider herself worthy of dusting the base. Chizuru is a child-faced incoherent who never quite manages to answer a simple question simply, but blushes and stutters and always lags behind.

Kae is perfect, according to Chizuru. She’s beautiful and smart and stylish. Chizuru’s goal is not as high as to be noticed by Kae – she just wants to have something in common with her object of desire. Her wish is granted in the form of an orange-colored lipstick.

Chizuru gets together with Kae, was there any doubt that she would? How, why…I’m not quite sure. They just do, because they have to. And they live happily ever after wearing gaudy lipstick, one supposes.

In the second story Miwako and Anzu are cousins and lovers. A misunderstanding about a boy threatens to break them up, but it was only a misunderstanding.

And in a final “Plot, What Plot,” best friends Rio and Yui have sex, because.

Now that I think about it, I think I read all of these same stories in Mist magazine, only with adults instead of young woman. I liked them better that way.

The title is translated as “A transparent orange in the lip,” so the book wins as the strangest title I’ve read in a while in both Japanese and English.

Ratings:

Art – 5
Characters – 5
Story – 5
Yuri – 8
Service – 6

Overall – 5

Check out the entries to  our “Orange In The Lip” contest in the comments!

I am feeling like crap tonight on account of food poisoning last night and yet, here I am writing you a review. Aren’t you moved by my dedication and focus? Don’t you want to shower me with praise (and if you’re my wife, kisses?) I thought you might. Thank you.

Today we have Rose Meets Rose, a collection of several Yuri Hime phone comics, by Shinn Yui.

I was reading this book before bed every night and quickly realized that it might not be the best choice for that, as the stories are the opposite of relaxing.

The first story is particularly uncomfortable, as it follows the anger, denial and ultimately, love, between two girls who may well have been responsible for the death of a pedophile who kidnapped them when they were children. It turns out that they were not, in fact, killers, but somehow it didn’t sit well with me that they suddenly found comfort in each other, when five seconds before they loathed one another for the secret they had been keeping.

In the second story, Sen falls in love with a girl in a painting. When that girl, Mai, transfers to her school, she asks Mai to pose nude for her. Mai has a reputation for having had an affair with the man – her teacher- who had painted her, and Sen knows it, but can’t stop herself from obsessing about Mai. The rumors fly about Mai, while Sen tries to protect her from the fallout…and tries to get her to open up a bit. When Mai gets a call from the teacher, all of a sudden Sen sees what a transformation love can make. Taciturn Mai blossoms into a beautiful woman. Mai will be leaving to join her lover in Europe, but Sen never stops loving the girl in the painting. This was my favorite story of the collection.

The third story was sci-fi-ish. Two girls break out in “love” with a rose-colored and -shaped rash. The more intense the love they have for one another, the more of their bodies are covered. After a late-night swim in the pool they are completely covered, of course.

And, finally, a girl with the nickname Dorothy is brought back from wanting to die by a “cowardly lion.” This story was too reminscent of those bad-old lesbianism=mental disease days for me to really like it, even though it had a sweet ending.

In keeping with the rest of the Ichijinsha phone manga, I found this all to be not *quite* satisfying. None of it is bad, the art style is pretty classic – reminiscent of Kakinouchi Narumi (Vampire Princess Miyu, Uta-hime) and now that I think about it, the stories are a little reminiscent of her’s too. But the tragic heroines were too melodramatically tragic for me to ever truly enjoy it.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Stories – 5-8
Characters – 6
Yuri – 7
Service – 4

Overall – 7

So, not stellar, but not bad either. Definitely not relax-y bedtime reading though. ^_^

Knife-Edge Girl (ナイフエッジガール)by Furutsuji Kikka, is a collection of several graphic novellas that had previously run in Comic Yuri Hime.

The book begins with the titular “Knife-Edge Girl” a story about two friends with completely different approaches to life.

The second story is a personal favorite of mine, “Graffiti,” in which two women who use the same desk at different times of the day communicate in drawings on the desk top. When they finally meet in real life – purely by accident – the attraction is instant on Kana’s side…and maybe not on Rise’s. Or maybe, it is.

In “Torte Fromage” Miwa’s boring OL life is suddenly thrown into glamour and excitement when she meets avant garde actress Nakae-san.

And as an omake, we get Rise’s point of view on her relationship with Kana and how she saw it develop.

Of all of these stories, the closest to actually having a lesbian in it was “Torte Fromage,” in which Miwa is asked if she is Nakae’s new girlfriend in a way that implies that that would not be unusual.

This collection breaks no new ground, but with good art and new spins on “Story A,” I found the book to be enjoyable in every way.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 7
Service – 1

Overall – 8

Because of the difficulty in bringing adult books over here, if Seven Seas wanted to restart their Strawberry Line with more Ichijinsha works, I’d recommend this and Otsu’s Clover to begin with.