It is said that behind every successful man is a woman. The saying represents the sacrifices women have made to support their husbands in their work – sometimes curtailing their own careers, or putting in long hours of caretaking, for no money and no credit.

Kuroyome (くろよめ) by Kazuto Izumi proposes the idea that for women to truly be successful, they too need a helpmeet and caretaker…in other words, a wife.

On the one hand this idea makes my teeth grind, and on the other it makes my teeth grind.

The stories in this volume are mean to be cute and sweet, about a high-powered business woman who finds comfort and care in the capable hands of an adorable and adoring wife for rent…and then treats them like crap and drives them out until they realize that they are helpless when it comes to doing the least little thing to take care of themselves and run back to their “wife,” beg forgiveness and ask to be taken back.  *If* these high-powered women were high-powered men, there’s a good chance we’d say, “Don’t do it! He’s a selfish asshole!” But because they are women, we’re supposed to smile and nod and be happy for them.

Yome, Komomo – Don’t do it, run, she’s an asshole!

The stories are not stabbingly awful, but as each hinges on a crisis created because the high-powered businesswoman is an asshole to the wife I just can’t like it. Yome and Komomo are competent women and I want them to find someone who appreciates them, not just for the dinners they make.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 6 (I imagine this appealed greatly to the otaku crowd, see below)
Characters – were 4 and were 8 and sometimes both at the same time
Yuri – 7
Service – 10 – Otaku have very conservative ideas about gender roles and marriage. It would make sense to most of them that a “wife” is, because *she is a wife,* submissive and supportive. Clearly, these gentlemen did not grow up in my household.

Overall – 6

Real feminists train their sons to make their own goddamn beds. Just sayin’

We’ve gotten very efficient about shopping in Tokyo these days. We arrive with a “to-buy list” and hit the stores closest to our hotel and most likely to have the things we’re looking for. Once we’ve acquired all the items on our list, we’re free to start browsing.

One of the best browsing places in Tokyo is in Shibuya. In the basement of the Shibuya BEAM store, Mandarake is like digging through someone’s attic, or a never-ending flea market of…stuff. (There are a number of Mandarake stores in Japan, and several in Tokyo. The Mandarake stores in the Nakano Sun Mall are probably the best known by most otaku. I suggest you hit up at least the stores in Shibuya and Nakano. Give yourself plenty of time to just wander and stare. It’s quite overwhelming at first.) The negatives of browsing shelves this way is that you will think “Oooh!” and start to reach for something about 1752 times. They have used manga, soundtrack CDs, Drama CDs, figurines, doujinshi, books and random goods you would really like to have but…. You may think I’m kidding, but I was >this< close to buying a Patlabor anniversary iPad cover, despite the fact that I will never own an iPad. But it was Patlabor! I never see Patlabor goods!)

The postive side of shopping in Mandarake is just slowly wandering down the aisle and reaching out to look at something old/obscure, something you heard about but never actually saw before, something random and wonderful. I have found all of the above at the Shibuya Mandarake.

The last time we were there, I couldn’t help but notice that there was an honest-to-god Yuri section at the end of one of the used manga aisles. I had already purchased or already owned pretty much everything there, except for a few titles I had committed to not getting. This book and its companion were two of those. I had no intention of buying them, because I’m very uninterested in the particular mix they represent. But yeah, whatever, I got them. Of the two books, this was by far the superior.

In Daisuki – Hikaru to Sakura (だいすきっ-ひかるとさくら), Hikaru is a shrimpy little girl who has decided she wants to make Sakura her wife. Sakura isn’t resisting, really, and when we come into the story, they are already a couple. Each chapter follows them during a month of the school year, in which “typical cosplay trope of the month” is blended with sex. It’s not exactly rocket science. The girls wear gym clothes, bathing suit, cat ears (for the cat ear maid cafe of course. Good god don’t Fanboys ever get *tired* of that one? Heaven knows I’m am) yukata, and the props are love umbrella, Valentine’s chocolates, etc, ad nauseum. Nothing new, everything typical as can be.

On the positive side Hikaru and Sakura really, really love one another. That is never in doubt and no coercion or non-con need apply. On the negative side, I was not able to like either Hikaru, with her pouty face or Sakura with her somewhat clueless passivity. It is abundantly clear that I am not the target audience for this series. This is for fans that like everything predictable, in a fantasy bubble of a school setting of a year with no growth, just change, protected from the real world or adult concerns; a timeless, endless, eternal school year with a Yuri relationship. If this appeals to you, this is a book you’ll want to read. This book is exactly for the crowd that wants no lesbians in their Yuri.

Ratings:

Art – 6 Tending towards moe, with the usual dissonance about female anatomy that seems to accompany it
Story – There really isn’t one. The relationship never changes, there’s no crisis that lasts more than a page. – 4
Characters – 4
Yuri – 9
Service – 10

Overall – 5

Nothing happens, nothing changes, Hikaru and Sakura have sex and love each other very, very much, but the happily is permanently “now,” never “ever after.”

I read Concerto under advisement from Yuricon Chief Lackey Bruce. I had no expectations and found myself pleasantly surprised.

Each chapter is a “Plot, what plot?” type story; i.e.. a very thin frame of a story wrapped around a sex scene. And while each and every story had the opportunity to become gross, exploitative or annoying…none of them did. I found myself slow to relax at first, all ready to be grossed out by bodily fluids and no real emotional commitment, but eventually it dawned on me that that wasn’t going to happen. By the final story, I was more or less in a “well, this was kinda nice” headspace.

In each chapter two girls are brought together by pretty typical tropes – mutual love of music/art, a sempai/kouhai story, a student/teacher thing, and the final story, which was worth a synopsis.

Two girls are staying together while the one’s parents are away. The are in love and are lovers, and playing at living together. When the parents come home and find them kissing, Mom is quick to see what was going on. The two girls run away. They take the train to nowhere, and spend what may well be their final night together. When they return the next day, they find Mom perfectly willing to be complicit in their secret relationship, because she also had a same-sex relationship in school, so just don’t tell Dad, ‘kay? It was a meaningless – and if I thought about it for too long, potentially enraging ending. So I decided not to think about it and take it for what it was, a meaningless handwave that gave the final story a happily-for-now ending.

Bruce noted that the artist, Hattori Mitsuru, is someone he’s been following for some time and who has long been just on the edge of a Yuri story. So, he’s really happy to see Hattori-sensei go full bore on the Yuri. I found the art pleasant enough and, indeed, it reminded me of a few doujinshi artists I’ve liked. But what made the book really readable was that all of the characters have or develop genuine affection for one another. It’s “Plot, what plot?” with love and kindness and caring. Not just sympathy sex or some other tortured setup. That makes a huge difference for my enjoyment level. Because what I like to read is stories of girls in love, not in heat. ^_^; I was rather happy that this collection was published by Hakusensha under the Jets Comics imprint. I haven’t seen anything Yuri from Jets in a really long time. Hakusensha is clearly investing in more Yuri these days, which makes me very happy.

In any case, thank you Bruce for this suggestion, it was a surprisingly pleasant read. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – Averaged out at 7
Characters – Same
Yuri- 9
Service – 6

Overall – 7

If you’re looking for a decent Yuri short story collection, Concerto is definitely worth taking a look at.