Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna, Volume 4 (作りたい女と食べたい女)

June 19th, 2023

A large woman with long hair in a ponytail, wearing sweats carries fresh greens, a shorter woman in cream blouse and long, green skirt carries a box of groceries. They are smiling gently at one another.There are so many reasons that Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna, Volume 4 (作りたい女と食べたい女) is an amazing volume of manga, that I’m hard pressed to pick one thing. That said, the best thing about this volume of manga is that it is extremely queer even as the characters basically just sit around eating food. ^_^

I don’t want to spoil anything about this volume because it is just so good, but I will tell you that it includes Valentine’s Day, important backstories and a huge decision that will change everything. I just love how everything in this series is rooted in reality. The story acknowledges trauma, but does not wallow in it. In fact, it offers a clear – and kind – path forward.

In the mean time, Nomoto and Kasuga have developed a family. Nomoto’s friend Yako hosts wonderful food parties, so we can enjoy them making takoyaki. New member of the family, Nagumo, begins to find her own self because of Kasuga’s and Nomoto’s kindness. That, in a word is why this series has become important to me – it is rooted in women taking care of each other, of accepting one another as they are. There is so much pressure even – often, especially – by other women, to conform to certain norms, that a series based around women caring for one another is exceptionally wonderful.

Because so little happens, and the story mostly revolves around people talking and eating, the expressions carry a lot of narrative weight. Yuzaki-sensei’s art is lively and fun, especially when the four are all together having a food party.

I will also tell you that Valentine’s Day is, typical of this manga, more to that than just shared chocolates. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 10 It’s not perfect but the expressions are fantastic
Story – 10
Characters – 10 Ahhhhhh!
Service – 0
LGBTQ+ – 10

Overall – 10

This volume just came out – I bought a print copy, but that wasn’t going to arrive until today, so I also bought this on Bookwalker so I could read it on the 15th. ^_^ Now, having written this review, I’m heading over to get caught up on Comic Walker. ^_^ Not obsessed much.

We’ll be getting She Loves To Cook, She Loves To Eat, Volume 3 in October from Yen Press.





Run Away With Me Girl Volume 2, Guest Review by Matt Rolf

June 14th, 2023

Two adult woman sit up in bed, half dressed, gently touching.What happens when a woman gets to question the path she’s on in a supportive environment away from negative people and the weight of societal expectations? Battan gives their protagonist the space to do just that in Run Away With Me Girl, Volume 2, and the result is a book far more enjoyable to read than Volume 1.

Makimura still holds a torch for Midori, who is still pregnant and engaged to a man. At the beginning of the book the women are not speaking. But, as Midori contemplates the weight of her impending life changes, she breaks down and lets Maki back into her life. Maki takes the opportunity to invite Midori on a trip to see Maki’s friend Komari, a school girl with whom she chats online. Midori, wanting to escape her own life, takes Maki up on the offer, and the women immediately leave for Shōdoshima Island where Komari lives. 

The bulk of the book takes place on Shōdoshima, keeping the reality of Maki and Midori’s real world at bay. It is here that all three women connect with each other and take stock of their lives. The adults find awe in Komari’s fearlessness and honesty as she grapples with the challenges she faces in trying to live her identity. All three observe and encourage each other and use the information to consider what it is they really want from their lives and relationships.

I strongly support the plot choices made in this book. At least some of the characters in this volume are working toward healthier choices than Volume 1, and that’s to Battan’s credit. As with all vacations, there is a bill to be paid upon Midori and Maki’s return.  The bill does not come due in this volume, allowing the characters to bask in the possibilities of a hopeful future.

The artwork is improved in this volume. The dreamy quality of the series overall is accentuated on the island. The backgrounds are more interesting and help set the scene better than Volume 1. Battan wields frame-breaking character features with skill, and uses them more effectively here than Volume 1. My biggest critique is that at times Komari is drawn in a very elfin manner. This accentuates her youth and the un-reality of the island vacation, but at times she just looks weird.

While yuri, this book still exists in a space where the relationships and commitments of the characters are left unstated at important places. A group bath scene with excellent artwork is the service highlight. The scene is tasteful and well-done, and anything more explicit is just not what this series is. The real relationship payoffs are emotional. Midori is moving toward making definitive statements about the sort of relationships she wants, and Volume 3 will give her an opportunity to make good on those movements.

Final Verdict: Leave your troubles behind and get yourself sorted in a steam bath with other women.

Published by Kodansha Comics, with translation by Kevin Steinbach and lettering by Jennifer Skarupa.

Ratings

Art – 8
Story 8 – Not as harsh as volume one, and that’s most welcome.
Characters – 7 We’re getting there.
Service – 5 We don’t have to take our clothes off to have a good time.
Yuri – 8
Overall – 8





My Future Starts Today ~Miku&Kyoko~, Volume 1

June 12th, 2023

On a background of blue hydrangeas, are two girls in tan sweater and red skirt school uniforms are back to back. Standing, one holds a camera. The other reaches back above her head to hold the other's ponytail and reaches behind her to hold the other girl's wrist.Do you remember Blue Drop? It began as a manga, then had a couple of Drama CDs. Some years later it was given an anime that was both very interesting and kind of forgettable at the same time.  Funimation licensed it, releasing a complete collection in 2010. That’s practically a human lifespan ago and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you didn’t remember it. But the point is, that the creator, Yoshitomi Akihito has gone on to make a number of stories and few series, most of which center on sexualizing schoolgirls. None of them have made it over here. I was very surprised to learn that My Future Starts Today ~Miku&Kyoko~, Volume 1 has been localized and released as a digital volume.

Kyoko and Miku have been friends since childhood, but Kyoko doesn’t really understand Miku. So when Miku tells Kyoko she’s in love with her, Kyoko has no idea how to feel about it. It doesn’t help at all, that Miku offers Kyoko her body to do whatever she wants with.

Miku sets about trying to appeal to Kyoko, to seduce her, but Kyoko…while not opposed, per se, really doesn’t know what Miku is thinking. Miku ramps up the seduction with every chapter until Kyoko pushes her away, causing a separate misunderstanding. As this volumes ends, Kyuko hears rumors in school that Miku is hanging with the predatory lesbian Nana-sempai! 

The major down side to this story is Miku’s behavior. She’s written and drawn like every pervy middle-aged dude who thinks high school girls are seductive, thinks girls are like. It’s frankly exhausting. But this has always been Yoshitomi’s oeuvre, so I can’t say I was surprised. That said, both girls stay mostly full dressed (Miku does undress a little) and while they do kiss, when Miku tries to touch Kyoko is when she is pushed away.

This series is complete at Volume 2 if you’d like to see what becomes of Kyoko and Miku. I think I can guess. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7 Very clean and understandable, lots of “sexy” poses
Story – 5 Miku wants Kyoko, there’s not that much subtlely
Characters  – 7 Other than the immediate circumstances, we don’t learn much about the as people
Service – 7
Yuri – 7

Overall – 7

I’ve encountered the publisher MediBang and Media Do Co., Ltd.once or twice, but I finally looked them up. MediBang seems to be a publishing and art platform, while Media Do describes themselves as “one of the largest eBook distribution companies in the world ” – and they own Netgalley, for those reviewers out there. On the translation side they seem to be doing a fine job, but this manga hardly had complicated ideas to communicate, either. They don’t credit humans for the production and I have a nagging feeling that some or all of this is automated. I hope I am wrong.





Mejirobana Saku, Volume 3 (メジロバナの咲く)

June 8th, 2023

Two girls in flower-like green school uniforms, pass another girl in the same uniform, on a brick path.It was summer 2021 that last time we visited this manga by the insanely hard-working Nakamura Asumiko. When I initially encountered it in the pages of Rakuen Le Paradis in 2018(!) I did not expect it would keep going as it has. But as I spend time with the characters, I find myself more interested in them.

In Volume 1 we met Ruby Canossa, a young lady at a private school for girls and Steph, the engimatic older student who fascinates and terrifies her. In Volume 2 a crisis pops up when it appears that means that Ruby may have to leave school. Ruby’s reluctant and resentful roommate Liz rises to the occasion and helps out, but don’t assume she’s a friend!

Now in Volume 3 of Mejirobana Saku (メジロバナの咲く) our attention is turned towards Liz…and Steph. The circumstances of Steph’s injury, Liz’s complicated feelings for the older girl…and a teacher’s grooming of Liz are all entwined in a way that makes this volume compelling, incredibly hard to read and emotional. Content Warning for off-screen violence and implication of intended sexual assault. It wasn’t an easy volume.

Now, at last, we understand the undercurrents that wrap around Ruby. And now, a new plot has appeared. There are rumors of a ghost are starting to appear around the school and small items are going missing…! <shiver>

Nakamura-sensei’s art is so distinctive and so evocative. When a scene is getting intense, it’s really intense. Because the magazine this series runs in is quarterly, we’re only getting a volume every other year, but every volume has been a delight. It’s impressive to see Nakamura-sensei do such an interesting and pretty unique Yuri story, given that the setting is pretty Class S and she’s best known as a BL artist. That said this is a really great story.

Nakamura-sensei’s art is so distinctive and so evocative. When a scene is getting intense, it’s really intense. Because the magazine this series runs in is quarterly, we’re only getting a volume every other year, but every volume has been a delight. It’s impressive to see Nakamura-sensei do such an interesting and pretty unique Yuri story, given that the setting is pretty Class S and she’s best known as a BL artist. That said this is a really great story.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Service – Nothing overt, but the implications were dark
Yuri – 7

Overall – 9

Great stuff and I always look forward to more. We’ll be getting this volume in English as A White Rose in Bloom, Volume 3 in January 2024.





If I Could Reach You, Guest Review by Luce

June 7th, 2023

A woman stands looking out onto a purple night sky, holding a sitting girl's hand.Welcome once again to Guest Review Wednesday! We have a whole bunch of guest for the next few weeks, so let’s this part started! Today we once again welcome back Luce, who will be taking a look at a completed series. Take it away, Luce!

I’m Luce, collector of books and sometimes I even read them. I come bearing a review of a series that’s been out for a while and is complete, If I Could Reach You by tMnR. Enjoy!

The very first pages of the manga, tinged with blue, show us the exact moment Uta realised that she’d fallen in love – the exact moment her sister-in-law became her crush. A year later, Uta is in high school and is living with Reiichi, her older brother, and Kaoru, the aforementioned sister-in-law. No matter how she tries, she cannot get over this love, her ‘too late’ love. If I Could Reach You is the examination of this binary star system of Uta and Kaoru, and how they keep circling each other, never quite able to clear that distance, nor leave.
 
A tragedy, to me, is a story in which fate cannot be fought. It marches on, tramples over all in its path, and death seems the only escape from it. Is this a tragedy? No, not really. But I think it shares some similarities. It is circular, somehow, an invetability to the telling of it. Uta loves Kaoru. Uta knows it’s hopeless, but cannot give it up. She knows that Kaoru sees her as a sister only, which only makes it worse – Kaoru wanting to be closer in a familial way speaks to what Uta wants, but not for the reasons she wants it. The manga is seven volumes, so it’s not so prone to the endless circling that some romance manga seem to get into, but it’s certainly not decisive in its action. It moves quite slowly, building up layers of paint onto the canvas, until you finally get the whole picture – or is it? Some things are left untold even by the end, left to our imagination.
 
The drama felt pretty realistic and down to earth. It’s fairly obvious that Kaoru and Reiichi’s relationship isn’t quite working even at the start – the blurb of the first volume tells you that – but the actual reason is kept right until the end of the manga, as the issue comes together. The fall out is realistic. It’s not so much a soap opera of a shoujo manga, but a more melancholic tide of no one quite being happy, but none are able to address it, nor particularly face it, so it continues.
 
Having said that, I don’t see this as a depressing manga. It doesn’t feel hopeless, to me. It feels like a snapshot of lives not my own, just watching them play out, unable to impact them in any way. There are plenty of moments of levity, and characters that change the tone, not interested in dwelling in pity. Kuro, and her relationship with Miyabi, is an interesting aside, and Konatsu, although she has her own regrets, has her own unique way of dealing with things too. I think this manga is about uneven relationships, really, where feelings don’t quite match each other, and the strain that can put on them – and whether they can survive it. I’m not so keen on the portrayal of love as some unending emotion, unable to be shaken or swayed, but I can forgive that, as I do with many manga.
 
The art is fairly simple, but gives itself space to breathe – the emotions come through clearly. There was a panel in the first volume, where Uta has a dream in class about Kaoru kissing her – the panel of her jolting awake is the thing I remember most. The despair, the horror, perhaps the relief that it hadn’t actually happened, or the disappointment. It was this panel that really caught me, and made me carry on with it. There are lots of big panels and expressions which made me stop – if I had one complaint, it would be that everyone is a little stretched, with long limbs. It’s not unusual for manga, but does make me wonder about everyone’s heights, sometimes.
 
Although I enjoy this series, I’m having trouble with who to advise might like it. It has a little of the realism of How Do We Relationship? But isn’t so swift in its story-telling. It doesn’t really have the clear narrative of many shoujo, and it’s neither a wholly happy story nor a big drama. Perhaps if you like stories with something of an open end, this might appeal. If I had to compare the mood of it, it would be to Solanin by Inio Asano, in its relatively mundane, melancholic realism in depicting messy and imperfect relationships.
 
Story: 6
Art: 6
Yuri: 5
Service: 3 (the odd bath scene, not done salaciously as far as I recall)

Overall: 6

E here: Fantastic review, Luce. “…this manga is about uneven relationships” really puts it all into perspective for me. Terrific. Thanks so much!