Ai Rabu Yuu Yori Aishiteru (愛羅武勇より愛してる) by Kumichou takes a common trope, grabs it by it’s ear, drags it out behind the school then gives it a big kiss on the forehead. ^_^

Takaoka Risa is the quiet, loner, smart girls glasses type. She eats alone, studies alone, but she is not lonely. She’s fine by herself.

Tough girl Shinjou Kazumi is always getting into fights. She also has no close friends, but when she sees a bunch of upperclassmen trying to bully Risa, she jumps in to save the other girl, although she really has no idea why.

When Risa later spies Kazumi being set upon by a large group, she likewise jumps in to stop the beatdown, and in the mix tells everyone that she likes Kazumi. Kazumi is embarrassed, but finds Risa interesting enough that she wants to be friends.

What follows is a sweet, awkward courtship by Risa, who knows what she wants, but doesn’t care why and Kazumi who isn’t sure, but really likes to be around Risa.

They both aren’t sure, until they have it out in a major blowout, whether what they feel is “like.”  When it becomes apparent that “like” it is, they both accede to their interest without difficulty.

An extra story about an low-achieving athlete and the girl who cooks her wonderful food rounds out the volume.

The art is cute, the characters are cute, the feels are cute. I enjoyed this story when it ran in Pure Yuri Anthology Hirari and as a collected volume.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 9
Yuri – 7
Service – 1

Overall – 8

This book strikes a pleasant balance between the one-note plot needed for a single volume romance story and my desire to read stories about characters with character.

When I wrote my article, Yuri: A Genre Without Borders, last year for Eureka magazine’s “Current State of Yuri Culture” issue, I ended it with a short discussion of how Yuri is thriving beyond Japanese borders.* In the article I discussed a number of non-Japanese Yuri collections, including Yuri Monogatari and  Lepakkoluola from Finland. Had I written the article this year, I would have been able to add World Canvas, Godley Malabanan’s Tagalog Yuri comic, the Frey and Freya anthology (which I will review in the future) and Ratana Satis’ Lily Love out of Thailand.

Volume 1 of Satis’ collected webcomic was available only by special order through the author herself, but the story is available online on the translation team website, Three Musqueerteers, who provide unpolished, but more than adequate English translations. You can read it in Thai on Ookbecomics. Update: Thanks to Three Musqueerteers’ Alextasha, we now know that an official English print volume is in the works as well. ^_^

Donut goes to an all-girl’s school, is shy and nerdy, but becomes captivated by a neighbor in the dorm, Pew. Pew is adult and cheerful, and has recently broken up with a girlfriend, she admits. They become close, very quickly. Donut’s not sure what her feelings are, and is especially confused after they get drunk and very nearly kiss. Donut realizes that her feelings are not merely friendship, and runs after Pew, who is about to board a bus for Chiang Mai. Admitting her feelings, Donut finds that she’s still not sure what her relationship with Pew will be like, but the two of them continue to become closer. Volume 1 ends a chapter past the English translation with their first real kiss.

Like Malabanan’s manga, Satis’ story is firmly rooted in basic Yuri tropes, without any sense of irony. This story has been told hundreds of times, but everyone who writes it, writes it like no one else ever has. For Donut, this is all new and terrifying. “But we’re both girls,”  is the repeated refrain of stories like this, like GIRL FRIENDS, or so many before and so many yet to come. And there’s nothing wrong with it, although I’ll always favor UKOZ’s post-all-this relationships. ^_^ But I will give Satis this – Donut is kinda cute and Pew is very honest, and Donut’s friends are all good about when they figure it out. There’s no bullying or ostracization to deal with.

The art is lovely. Professional quality all the way through. The book itself, published through Ookbee Comics, is above and beyond most self-published efforts. For the art and book alone, this was worth getting.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Characters – 8
Story – 6
Yuri – 6 in the story, 9 in the associated art pieces on the website.

Overall – 7 and I look forward to more.

*One of the more interesting critical comments I received on Japanese blogs was that I was being optimistic. I think that I’ve been proven right. My collection of non-Japanese Yuri is growing enough that it’s going to deserve a shelf of it’s own! (First I gotta figure out where I can put a new shelf…) ^_^

In Morinaga Milk-sensei’s  Ohime-sama no Himitsu (お姫様のひみつ), Miu has been given some really questionable advice by her mother. Her mother has repeatedly expressed the need for Miu to care about her looks and be as pretty as possible in order to attract a prince and live happily-ever-after. Worse, as Miu attends an all-girl school, there’s no opportunity to even meet a real prince.

When cool, dashing, athletic Fujiwara-sempai is thrown into Miu’s path, she comes up with a plan to at least try out being a princess for a while, and asks Fujiwara to fake date her. It’s a great idea, only Miu forgets to account for the feelings of the students around her who admire Fujiwara-sempai, sempai’s teammates, Fujiwara herself and ultimately, her own feelings.

As cute as the art is, and as sweet as her writing is, the fundamental flaw here is the plot device I think of “I’m with you anyway, so I might as well fall in love.” We’ve seen it time and time again in romance media where two people, when placed in proximity, find themselves attracted to one another, no matter what actual obstacles could potentially arise.

What if Fujiwara was totally straight and played along only because Miu had power over her? Obviously, there would be no book, but its way more likely than the two of them falling in love just because. Is it likely at all that Fujiwara would fall in love with someone who blackmailed her into dating her? No, not really, but it makes for a more fun book than if she was sulky and resentful for 200 pages, then shed Miu like a winter coat at the first opportunity.

On the positive side, Miu starts to break out of the “must look cute to succeed” mold and starts to become more of a person mid-way through the book. It’s her best friend who lays it out for her, that by monopolizing Fujiwara, she’s effectively stolen her away from her fans. Yumi in Marimite talked about having a “fan’s pride” as well. And I think I can relate. We want to have the right to squee and bounce and maybe even glom on our favorites, but we also acknowledge the need for distance. Should someone cross that DMZ and enter our admired person’s life, we demand that it be real and not just some empty relationship. If a fan, or the admired person breaks that unspoken pledge, it hurts the other party.

Of course by the end, the relationship in this book is not empty at all. Both Miu and Fujiwara have come to realize that they actually love each other as they are and they go on to live happily ever after, after all.

A short extra story “Houkago Kanojo” is (to my eye) a fan story about Honoka and Nagisa from PreCure. ^_^ Smart nerdy girl and cool girl in science club, bond over killing bugs.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 7 Problematic in the beginning, by smooths out over time
Characters – 7 for Miu, she also smooths out over time, but Fujiwara gets an 8 for being real throughout
Yuri – 7
Service – 3 bits here and there

Overall – 7

“I’m with you anyway, so I might as well fall in love,” will never be my favorite romance plot, but it is undoubtedly a popular one. If I were Seven Seas looking to do more Morinaga releases, I’d choose this over Himitsu no Recipe, definitely.