Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yamada to Kase-san, Volume 4 (山田と加瀬さん。)

September 5th, 2024

As you age, one of the absolutely weirdest things is watching the people you knew as children growing up, maturing, starting their own lives. You never know what they’ll turn out like but it is an interesting process and a reminder of our mortality. (When you get to some point, practically everything is a reminder of our mortality, really.)

We, as a collective, have been watching Yamada and Kase-san grow up now for more than a decade. My first mention of them here on Okazu was in 2012. It always makes me happy to see the Hirari Comics imprint on the spine, in fact. The magazine isn’t completely gone as long as we have that. In those years, they have a long road, but they graduated high school, and have moved to the big city to pursue their college degrees. There has been a lot of relationship stuff they needed to work through – Yamada’s low self-esteem, Kase-san’s jealousy. Some volumes felt like there was no progress at all. But here we are at Yamada to Kase-san, Volume 4 (山田と加瀬さん。) and they are all grown up. The kids are okay. ^_^

Yamada has really grown into herself. She’s good at her chosen career, and has a lot of options in her future. She likes her job and is making friends in school and at work. Kase-san, the star of her high school track team is the more fragile of the two and has to work much harder, but is up to the challenge. The two of them plan to move out together when the next school year begins.

At which Fukami, Kase-san’s roommate, snaps. We’ve seen this coming for a long while, but it was good to get it out into the open. Fukami, having fallen for Kase-san in the most toxic and possessive way, demands Kase-san race her to see if she’ll be “allowed” to leave the dorm. Of course this is ridiculous. But Kase-san is at heart a kind person and not very confrontational outside competitive running.

Yamada ends up getting a smaller, less ideal apartment than she had hoped, but finds a place in Mikawacchi’s building, which means our three school friends are reunited. Kase-san races Fukami, says she hopes they can stay friends and is generally the big-hearted and kind person she always is…and, at last, comes home to her girlfriend in their new home together. Squee.

They’ve come so far. Yuri has come so far. We’ve come far together.

Kase-san and Yamada are going to be okay.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Service – 2
LGBTQ+ – 4 Kase-san has to come out for real for the first time
Yuri – 10

Overall  – 9

This was the volume that I was waiting for from this series.  I look forward to more of their adventures “playing house” together.





A White Rose in Bloom, Volume 3

September 2nd, 2024

Girls in green dresses with white puffy-shouldered sleeves pass on a brick walkway. A girl with long pale hair walks with a classmate, but looks back at two younger girls, one with blonde pigtails and one with short dark hair as they argue.Content Warning for off-screen violence and implication of intended sexual assault.

We have thus fa, been paying attention primarily to Ruby Canossa, that breath of fresh air that has come into her staid school that has many secrets, and “Steel” Steph the enigmatic and secretive older girl with a disability. In this volume we belatedly pay attention to Liz, Steph’s sister who is very possessive of and resentful about the older girl. In A White Rose in Bloom, Volume 3 we learn why and…phew, it is a lot.

Liz is, exactly as she seems – attention-starved and spoiled, but trying so hard to find love that she very nearly finds herself assaulted by a tutor. This explains her forcing herself on Steph in turn when she sees the older girl as a savior. It’s clear Steph cares for her sister, but has a lot of baggage with her own life to deal with and little energy for Liz. They both gain our sympathy once again, and now we’re hoping even more that Ruby can form a healthy bond with Liz.

Then we turn back to life at the dorm. A thief, a ghost, dire fortunes and a real-life mystery fill up the pages of the second half of the volume. What is the story of the missing items? Luckily, Volume 4 of Mejirobana Saku,  (メジロバナの咲く) came out last month in Japan (what timing!) but we’ll be waiting until next year to see it in English.

In the meantime, let us again revel in the first full-length serial Yuri from Asumiko Nakamura (creator of Classmates) and how she manages to keep us on a string with a sense of furtive feelings and cryptic histories, even as we delight in the change Ruby brings to the school, and how she forces the people around her to open up. Jocelyne Allan’s translation really manages to capture the dark shadows behind light words that match Nakamura-sensei’s art perfectly. Alia Nagamine’s letting is top-notch retouch for that authentic reading experience. Great work all the way down for the Seven Seas team.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Service – 5 Predatory behavior and gaslighting is gross
Yuri – 7

Overall – 9

This series is probably flying under the radar – but it shouldn’t. It deserves a few soapbox rants, because it is an excellent edition of a fantastic story by a master story-teller.





This Monster Wants to Eat Me, Volume 2

August 30th, 2024

Surrounded by the dark, with only festival lights strung above them, a girl with light hair wearing a long-sleeved dress over a white blouse, turns to look at us over her shoulder, while a girl with long black hair and barrettes, in a pale shirtwaist frock looks at us directly, as they hold hands.In Volume 1, we meet Hinako, a girl who has lost almost everything and, as a result, doesn’t mind entertaining the thought of death. She is befriended by Shiori, a mysterious creature of the deep ocean, a mermaid, who assures Hinako that she wants the girl to live happily, so that she can eat her later.

Hinako’s only other friend, Miko, does not like Shiori and, in This Monster Wants to Eat Me, Volume 2, by Sae Naekawa, we find out why.

But first Shiori asks Hinako the question on all our minds, why is she is such a rush to die? Hinako looks back at the loss of her family and, again, prompted by Shiori, at her history with Miko. Shiori is really a monster, but she seems to think Miko is one, too?

In this eye-opening volume, in which much of what we were told turns out to be half-truths or full lies, Hinako will continue to reevaluate all her choices. When I read this in Japanese in 2021, I commented that it was a “freakin’ brillant volume of a manga” and I stand by that with this English edition. There is an underlying tension to this series that just fills one with foreboding, even when nothing in particular is happening. When the truth is uncovered, it is both a huge relief and a new chill on one’s spine.

This series is just the best summer horror tale with chills, thrills, a little blood and darkness, thus far rooted wholly in Japanese youkai – what lurks in the shadows in Japanese folklore. Caleb Cook once again brings a fantastic, nuanced translation. You can tell who is talking by how they talk. I can “hear” every character clearly. Bianca Pistillo’s lettering is good. I wish she was able to be amazing, but Yen’s house style of subtitling the sound effects is their style and I will just always whine slightly about it. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8 Ominous and compelling
Characters – 8 The more we know, the less we know
Service – Blood. Violence. Monsters From the Deep. Secrets. More Monsters.
Yuri – Miko is possessive, Shiori is infatuating

Overall – 8

This volume is headed your way in mid-September. Don’t miss out on this fantastic low-key horror book. It takes all the mortifications of school life and gives it extra claws and fangs. ^_^

I have Volume 8 of Watashi o Tabetai, Hito de Nashi (私を喰べたい、ひとでなし) siting here on my to-review pile and I’m once again hyped to re-read and review it.

Thanks very much to Yen Press for the review copy! This is such a fantastic series, I always can’t wait to read it. ^_^





I Can’t Say No to the Lonely Girl, Volume 3

August 26th, 2024

A girl with blonde hair and a light blue sweater over a white blouse. leans on the shoulder of a girl with long, dark hair wearing a navy blazer over a white blouse.We ended Volume 2 with a good feeling about whatever was building between Sora and Ayaka, however screwed up it was at the start.

But both of them had had kept Sora’s “favors” in one emotional box and now her feelings are threatening to leak out on to the rest of their lives. Now, in I Can’t Say No to the Lonely Girl, Volume 3 people around them can see that they really need to address whatever is going on, but since they began their time together in a place that was too intimate, neither of them know how to broach what they feel. Sora has her “favors” to draw on, but how is Ayaka supposed to respond? And just as they almost come to understand each other, Sora is going to transfer schools! At last, we finally see the “why” of Sora’s behavior and realize that she had been struggling all along.

Ayaka tres to face down Sora’s mother, but is rejected. Ayaka find strength and support in all her friends and her brother and decides that Sora is worth the risk she’s about to take.

This is the volume where the story gets good. Sora and Ayaka dancing around each other is a little hard, but Ayaka finding herself and deciding to save Sora is a fantastic climax for this volume. It is at this point there is now doubt that we’re rooting for them. Kashikaze’s art has matured quite a bit. Sora’s blank expressions have more depth to them, especially. Another excellent production from Kodansha.

Volume 4 is headed our way in a few weeks and the story is just starting to get good. ^_^





Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou., Volume 8 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。)

August 21st, 2024

A girl with long silver hair stands in the foreground, a girl with collar-length brown hair behind her, both wearing fantasy school uniforms of red jacket and blue skirt with white underskirt, both looking concerned. Behind them a blonde woman in a white shift dances in front of a display of blue flowers, bathed in light from the moon.Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou., Volume 8 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。) is the climax of Yu’s arc and, as a result it is poignant and touching in about 4 different ways.

To begin with, the entirety of Rae’s conversation with Misha is expanded upon with their meeting as children. Misha, ever practical, finally demands to know the truth about Rae, who she insists is nothing like her childhood best friend. When confronted with the truth, we learn two key things – one that Rae was adopted and two, sometimes in this world children just…appear from nowhere. No one knows where the Children of the Forest come from, Misha says and this seemingly random fact will come back several times in this story in surprising ways. 

With Rae’s unbelievable, yet truthful admission, Misha, at last is ready to help the team free Yu. In an epic moment, in front of the eyes of virtually the entire capital, Yu takes her place as the woman she is, throwing her mother’s plan to dominate the throne into complete disarray. It’s a fantastic moment, drawing magnificently. This will not be the only trans narrative in this story, but it and the other are both very good.

Rae is punished of course, for her actions and ends up being removed from the Royal Academy…again, a seemingly small moment that will have massive repercussions later in the story. Which makes me think about the ping=pong nature of so many epic Japanese stories. How many Gundam series, for instance have world governments overthrown and replaced and overthrown again in the course of what has to be a few months at most? And here is Rae, who catapults to the top of the school, is named a Knight, saves everyone from a chimera, now is thrown out, works for the King, thwarts a revolution and will eventually return to the school as an instructor, only to leave almost immediately as an exchange student to Nur, where she foments revolution there. That seems like a perfectly normal couple of years. ^_^;

Anyway…this volume is fantastic and beautiful and you should definitely get it!

Ratings:

Art – Excellent, with one egregious choice that…woof.
Story – Fanastic
Characters – The princes step up like crazy
Service – Everyone deserves to have their needs served, not just the salacious ones.
Yuri – The main relationship is set on the back burner in service to the larger narrative

Overall –  A brilliant volume of manga.

Volume 7 is on the way in English this October from Seven Seas!