Yuri Events

The Yuriten Yuri Exhibition has opened today in Tokyo. In a newly refurbished space, they are doing same-day entrance tickets for fans who would like to enjoy the exhibition, which is open until October 22, then moving to Osaka. Check out the Yuriten official Twitter account for pictures!

The Girls Love Fest just finished up last week in Asakusa and is already gearing up for an event in January, Girls Love Festival ShinYuri 2 on January 21, 2024 at the Shinyuri 21 Hall in Kawasaki. I actually like the mobility and flexibility of this event that has kept it alive now through well more than 3 dozen events.

Not technically an event, but the I’m In Love With The Villainess pop-up shop is taking place at the Akihabara Gamers store through October 22. AND the Animate HQ in Ikebukuro is holding a chocolate distribution event on October 21.

I’m still hoping that someone, somewhere will open a cool Yuri pop-up while I’m in Japan, but wow is this the week to be there!

We have a new video up for Yuricon 2023! Novelist Laura Weyr hosts a dynamic panel featuring VN team Aikasa Collective co-founder Roxie, web novelist Nara Moore & webtoon creator Ari North to discuss the pros and cons of different media for creators of Yuri in S04 E14 – I Want To Make Yuri, What’s The Right Medium For Me?

Yuricon 2023 continues this month with another terrific conversation coming up next week, and a few more fun things for next month. I’m stoked about the panels and presentations we’re getting from you all. There’s plenty of time to arrange a panel before the end of the year, so if you have a panel or presentation you’d like to do for Yuricon 2023, fill out our Yuricon 2023 Panel & Presentation Application Form!

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Yuri Manga & Queer Comics

Kitao Taki has a new series being serialized on Bookwalker,  Heimin No Watashi Desu Ga Kōshaku Reijō-sama Wo Taburakashite Ikite Imasu, (平民の私ですが公爵令嬢様をたぶらかして生きています).  You can also read free it as each chapter goes live on Yuri Navi. Chapter 3 is up now.

Via YNN Correspondent Patricia B,  The Stranger, by Rosemary V-O, is a short comic that “explores the brief relationship between an old woman who is losing her memory and an android made in the image of her late wife.”

We haven’t had a review of it yet here (although I did read it in Japanese when it came out,) but Rebecca Silverman takes a look at Mikanuji’s I Don’t Need A Happy Ending for ANN.

Via YNN Correspondent & Reviewer, Luce, Seven Seas announced the license for Kabi Nagata’s My Wandering Warrior Eating Disorder, as digital-only release.

The Isaki Uta: Lost And Found Collection from Irodori Comic, has made it’s Kickstarter goal with 18 days to go. There don’t appear to be any stretch goals at this time, but you can be sure you’ll get the collection when it is complete. Congrats to everyone involved!

Yuri Light Novel

Miyazawa Iori, creator of Otherside Picnic has a new edition of an older, pre-OP work out, U ha Uchyuu Yabai no U (ウは宇宙ヤバイのウ) which is a “slapstick science fiction” story about a high school girl at the end of the world – or is she an agent of an interstellar intelligence agency here to save the planet?

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Yuri Visual Novels

Creator Yamino would like to thank the more than 2000 people who have downloaded Act 1 of Phantom of the Black Rose Revue on itch.io, which she describes as “a tale of haunted love, inspired by classic shoujo manga and The Phantom of the Opera!” Act. 1 is currently available at name your own price. ^_^

The postmortem of “survival Yuri horror” VN created for the Spooktober Game Jam, The Final Prize Is Soup, is really interesting! I bet the VN is too, grab that on itch.io.

Other News

Again from Luce, we have news of Lofty Mountains, “an anthology of Sapphic fantasy stories,” reviewed on LGBTQ Reads.

Alicia Haddick is over the moon to report that Takarazuka is doing an engekidan interpretation of Bollywood sensation, RRR. Check out the posters over on her Bluesky feed.

Empty Movement on Twitter noted some interesting commonalities between Anthy and Utena’s residence and the house of notoriously nationalistic, queer playwright/poet Mishima Yukio’s house.

And two personal notes to wrap up. This week should see the launch of me talking with Leigh of the History is Gay podcast about Yoshiya Nobuko…and waiting impatiently for the upcoming book on her life to come out! I’ll be sure to post links when it’s live. In the meantime, you should listen to this podcast, it’s great. ^_^

Also coming this week is a very personal article I wrote about some of the joys I found while watching slice-of-life anime while I was struggling with Long Covid this past spring. Keep an eye out on ANN on the 16th for “The Joy Of The Everyday: Emotional Intimacy Between Women in Slice-of-Life Anime”!  Again, I’ll post a link when it goes live. Thanks to Lindsay for giving me a chance to publish this.

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.

Yuri VN News

Studio Élan held their Élan Festival last week, so we have a number of news items! From their press release: “Please Be Happy has passed over 5k copies sold! PBH will be celebrating its 1st birthday-anniversary next month and to celebrate we have brand new anniversary merch available for pre-order and a reprint of the PBH art book hic et nunc.”

Our Home, My Keeper is a new collaboration with Ebi-hime. This follows an author whose new home comes with a friendly fairy. ^_^

They are overhauling the art for Lock & Key: A Magical Girl Mystery, and they are planning a Kickstarter next year for this VN, but a demo is available now on Steam.

They’ve also announced Love in a Bottle, “a point-and-click yuri romance game about a love demon trying to make it on her own in the world- but there’s too many hot women for her to meet! We’re happy to share that jaxcheese will be composing the game’s OST with hazel contributing to the character themes.” This is slated for a February 14, 2024 release. They ask you to Wishlist it on Steam.

The demo for Bellhouse’s Twofold, a tale of campus club rivalry, is now live on Steam & itch.io. The release for this should be the end of this month. This takes place about a month after their VN First Snow.

Coming up next is Summer at the Edge of the Universe, a sci-fi road trip, the demo for which is available now to Patrons of Élan. ^_^

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Yuri Manga

Adrian Hazra on ANN has the news on Isaki Uta’s newest manga, Leaper. Irodori comics is running a Kickstarter for a collection of Isaki-sensei’s work, Isaki Uta – The Lost & Found Collection. This collection will include four manga centered around queer life.

Kita no Onna ni Tamesaretai（北の女に試されたい）is getting a sequel manga. Read my review of the series on Okazu in 2021 dnd check out the first chapter of the sequel, Kita no Onna ni Tamesaretai – 2nd Trip –（北の女に試されたい – 2nd Trip -) on Yuri Navi!

Nagata Kabi-sensei has announced a new My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness Special Edition in hardcover, with metalic highlights on the cover.

Yuri Anime

Crunchyroll is streaming Power of Hope ~ Precure Full Bloom starting today.  We’ll get to see what happens to PreCure when they grow up a bit. Crystalyn Hodgkins has the details on ANN. I have been assured many times that Gogo Precure has a Yuri couple and the trailer for this seems to at least imply feelings may still exist there. I’ll remain hopeful.

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Yuri Events

The Yuriten Event has put together a nice little promotional video for Twitter. Right now they have locations in Tokyo and Osaka. Their store is online and with a shipping service, you can already place pre-orders for goods! There are drop-downs to browse by series, creator or kinds of goods, which I think is fantastic.

The Shortbox Comics Fair is up and has categories for Sapphic, LGBTQ and Queer comics. This is a terrific way to celebrate and support independent comics creators. Go pick a few new comics!

Other News

The official Wataoshi Twitter account has been sharing illustrations by other manga artists celebrating the I’m In Love With The Villainess anime. Check them out for some lovely art by artists you know and new ones to follow!

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.

Yuri Anime

Set your  alarms! Crunchyroll will begin streaming I‘m In Love With The Villainess  on Oct. 2 and Stardust Telepath on October 9. Thanks to YNN Correspondent Patricia B for the link.

Speaking of ILTV, Rafael Antonio Pineda has the news on ANN that the cast will include Nana Mizuki as Manaria, so I guess a bit of a spoiler as to how far the anime will get. Personally, I’m guessing it will go through the end of the Revolution arc. ^_^ Maybe we can wangle a second season to cover the Nur and DQ arcs. 

Not yet announced for streaming, but I’m betting on it, Kibou no Chikara – Otona Precure (キボウノチカラ～オトナプリキュア‘23～) premieres on NHK in Japan on October 7. Whether this gives us a taste of the Yuri everyone saw in the original series is anyone guess, but there is a hint in the trailer. Click the link and see if you see what I see. ^_^

The Vexations of a Shut-In Vampire Princess will be streaming on HIDIVE in (checks…) 170 hours. Look for this on October 7th, as well. Fanservice Yuri hijinks undoubtedly.

Yuri Manga

The Crunchyroll store still has no category for manga, only anime ,and I’m waiting to hear back about an affiliate account, so for the moment RightStuf links are staying put, but may soon become unusable. I apologize for any inconvenience while we wait to see how this shakes out. 

This weekend Global Bookwalker is doing a huge Manga Haul Sale for National Comic Book Day with discounts and coin back on many selected titles!  This sale is good through Oct 1. 

Via YNN Correspondent Patricia B, Kodansha is offering a Yuri, BL, and LGBT Manga Sampler on Global Bookwalker for Free!

Newly added to the Yuricon Store: 

I’m playing catch-up on Kimi to Tsuzuru Utakata, Volume 3 (君と綴るうたかた). This series will be ending shortly and I want to get it all up. The Summer You Were There, Volume 3, is up on the store, Volume 4 in English will hit early in the new year.

Cheerful Amnesia, Volume 1  is hitting English-language shelves in October.

With the addition of Vampeerz, Volume 9 (ヴァンピアーズ), I am finally and fully caught up on that series, which ends with this volume. 

Ichijinsha on Twitter has offered us cover reveals on Watashi no Oshi  ha Akuyaku Reijou., Volume 7 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。) and Watashi no Oshi  ha Akuyaku Reijou. Maid Kitchen, Volume 1 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。メイドキッチン) I’ll get these up on the Yuricon Store asap.

Via Comic Natalie, Sekai Ichiban Oppai ga Suki!  (世界で一番おっぱいが好き！) is ending with a final volume 8. Volume 7 of Breasts Are My Favorite Thing In The World  will be out in October from Yen Press. I’ve never read any of that series, so if you are enjoying it and would like to review it for Okazu, drop me a line!

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Yuri Audiobook

The first pre-order links for the I’m In Love With The Villainess Audiobook are live and up on the Yuricon Store. I’ve added it to the newly renamed Voice Drama & Audiobooks category on the Store, and I’ll start weeding through the old Drama CDs and adding new voice dramas….and audiobooks… as we get them! 

Yuri Light Novel

There was a first look at the cover design for Yuusha ni Naritai Shoujo To, Yuusha Narubeki Kanojo (勇者になりたい少女と、勇者になるべき彼女), inori.-sensei’s newest LN. Amazon JP and Melonbooks have pre-order links up for it, so I went ahead and put it on the Yuricon Store. ^_^  Here is the synopsis as given on Amazon JP: After the end of the war between humans and demons, humans established a school of heroes using the magic tool “gear” to train successors. Ruchika, a demon girl who admires being a hero, meets Leonie, the daughter of the hero who defeated the demon king, when she visits the capital to enroll. Ruchika likes her and asks her to marry her even though she is in the middle of her exams. Although she is flatly rejected, Ruchika continues to attend school with the aim of becoming her hero, and approaches Leonie to become even closer.

The girl-meets-girl school fantasy of girls with different motivations begins with a bang!

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Yuri Visual Novel

Popular fan artist Yamino announced a new Visual Novel The Phantom of the Black Rose free demo will be released as part of the itch.io Spooktober Game Jam. The art is pure 70s shoujo, like a Takarazuka Phantom of the Opera, shoujo style. I may have to give in and get this one. ^_^

Studio Élan’s Élan Festival begins tomorrow night on their Youtube Channel. Check in for news updates and more!

Other News

Via Sr. YNN Correspondent Cryssoberyl: CW: VERY DARK, Guro, Body Horror, Cannibalism, yet beautifully animated, The Lovers,  is “An animated thriller about the romantic tension between a seafood chef and a siren, set in a dark fantasy Philippines.” If horror this is your thing, there is a Kickstarter for the animated film, the debut work from Studio Heartbreak. If you are squeamish, maybe skip this trailer.

Ayashi no Ceres is now on the Viz App. I mention this because, much like Fushigi Yugi, creator Watase Yuu was clearly working through some stuff about gender and sexuality (and sexual violence) in days before they came out as X-gender. It was an interesting read but – in my very personal opinion – ultimately disappointing for exactly the same reason FY was, including, but not limited to, the use of rape as a casual plot point more than a few times. The resolutions for what we now can see as non-binary or trans characters did not work for me, either.

While working on adding the ILTV Audiobook links, I noticed that one of the sites also had a book I had been wanting to listen to. Andrew J. Robinson, who is probably best know for his role as Elim Garak on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine has written a DS9 Novel  – A Stitch in Time, which he narrates as Garak. It is both an excellently well-written novel, which makes me want to read the other books he’s written AND it is a stellar voice performance. Garak is written as bisexual although, like the TV series, it so far hasn’t committed to more than being interested in other men. What the novel does do though, is really deeply develop Cardassian society, politics and mindset in ways that fully explain everything, except Dukat somehow becoming the leader of Cardsassia without being knifed immediately. I recommend this very highly as an audiobook.

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.

I’m In Love With The Villainess News

Some great news to start this week’s report – Seven Seas has announced an audiobook for I’m In Love With The Villainess, featuring Courtney Shaw as reader. The book is so far available on Bookwalker and a few other systems – we’ll be getting it this November.  Click the link for a sample!

The full trailer for the upcoming I’m In Love With The Villainess anime is up, with subtitles and a bit of the end theme from Crunchyroll.

Ichijinsha shared these photos of an ILTV ad display in Shinjuku station. There will be a ILTV pop-up store on October 7-22nd at the Akihabara Gamers store. Click the link, you will be able to purchase goods from this store online and with Tenso or some other shipping service, they’ll ship to you!

The third and final volume of the Claire POV spin-off, Heimin No Kuse Ni Namaikina! will hit as a digital book in Japan this week.   Volume 1 of She’s So Cheeky For A Commoner! is available in English from Seven Seas now.

inori’s newest novel, Yuusha ni Naritai Shoujo to (Boku), Yuusha ni Narubeki Kanojo (Kimi) (勇者になりたい少女と、勇者になるべき彼女) is already up for pre-order on Melonbooks and Amazon JP. I’ll get this up on the Store as soon as it has a cover.

And, finally, after many delays and illnesses on both sides, I am proud to announce that our interview  with inori.-sensei for Yuricon 2023 is live! We of course talk a bit about how she got into becoming a novelist and the global success of ILTV.

We have a bunch of new panels lined up for Yuricon 2023, so I’m excited to share more as they go live!

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Yuri Events

The Yuriten Exhibition has announced their Tokyo and Osaka locations. If you are going to be in Tokyo from October 14-22, you can find the Yuriten at studio fab in Morishita, and in Osaka from October 28-November 5, at T5 Studio in Osaka’s Minato-ku (not that far from Universal Studios Japan.) I am definitely looking for someone to cover one of these events for Okazu, so if you are going to attend, please contact me!

Yuri Manga

ROLL OVER AND DIE: I Will Fight for an Ordinary Life with My Love and Cursed Sword! Manga Volume 4 hit shelves this week.

Mikanuji’s Assorted Entanglements, Volume 3 came out this week. We just had a heckuva a review for Volume 2 here on Okazu by Matt Marcus.

Seven Seas announced the license for the “salacious Yuri” manga by Kiyoko Iwami, My Girlfriend’s Not Here Today.

Also heading our way in November from Seven Seas is Sheep Princess in Wolf’s Clothing, Volume 1. This fluffy soft princess is an animal in bed.

This winter we will see sono.N’s muscled women vs monster action series continue with SHWD, Volume 2.

Usui Shio’s series “Onna Tomodachi to Kekkon Shitemita” will be ending in the next issue of Comic Yuri Hime, writes Joanna Cayanan on ANN.

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Yuri Anime

ANN’s Egan Loo points us to the third Hoshikuzu Telepath trailer, which debuts the end theme of the anime.

Yuri VNs

Via YNN Correspondent Matt Marcus, Witches and Lilies is a new Yuri VN from Stromatsosoft on Steam, where the game is described, ““Witch and Lilies” is a 3D dungeon RPG with a theme of romantic relationships between girls. Players form a party of five girls from 10 different job classes and navigate dungeons to clear them while managing the relationships between the girls.”

Other News

Also via Matt, this amazing music video by Mashiro Shirakami of his song Kawaranaide as an official collaboration with How Do We Relationship? by Tamifull. It’s a beautiful animatronic. The song is perfect  – Matt says that Shirakami says he was inspired by the manga to write it. The animation really highlights the art.  Give it a “like” on Youtube if you enjoy it!

Alex Henderson writes on Queer time and the quarter-life crisis in contemporary yuri for Anime Feminist.

Worth your time is Sara Moon’s documentary about the anime/manga localization industry, By Fans, For Fans. I have a short segment as do a bunch of other folks in or adjacent to the industry. Sarah’s funny, and incredibly insightful about the history of the anime, manga and gaming translation as we know it. She describes this opus as “Anime, a history lesson, and multidimensional time travel shenanigans.” ^_^

You may have heard the news that RightStuf is closing on October 10 and their operations will be moving to Crunchyroll on October 25. RightStuf links on the Yuricon Store are still working, but we may need to do some re-jiggering this winter, so heads up. No one is particularly happy about this, and decreasing competition is never a good thing for customers. We’ll have to see who gets to be the next up-and-coming smaller business that steps in. Tokyo Otaku Mode, Robert’s Anime Corner Store (if they ever update that website…). I guess we’ll see.

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.

Light Novel News

Seven Seas has announced that they are doing an audiobook edition of I’m In Love With The Villainess! Click the link to pre-order and to listen to a sample, narrated by Courtney Shaw.

Via Sr. YNN Correspondent Sean G, two Adachi and Shimamura novels are coming out in Japan in November. He says, ‘one is a SS volume, one is “Vol 99.9″.”

Yuri Anime

I’m In Love With The Villainess has a Japanese broadcast schedule up on the official twitter account. We’ll be getting it from Crunchyroll, undoubtedly asap. Voice actresses for Claire and Rae,  Yu Serizawa and Karin Nanami, respectively, are undertaking some silly challenges to promote the series. Watch those on Twitter with the hashtag #わた推しチャレンジ. ^_^

As part of the 25th anniversary celebration, Serial Experiments Lain has launched a Lain chatbot, where you can “speak to Lain.” Richard Eisenbeis has the story over at ANN.

Via Yurimother, we learn that Aniplex announced Puella Magi Madoka Magica -Walpurgisnacht: Rising- for a winter 2024 debut. The trailer is up on Youtube.

From VIVERSE, the same folks that brought you the Birdie Wing Museum, now have a special offer for players of the Nintendo Switch Game (reviewed this week on Okazu by Eleanor!). You can pick up an outfit for Eve and Aoi – and VIVERSE is holding a cosplay event in the “museum.” Dress as Eve or Aoi and join other fans of the series.

Other News

LilyGL Net is a new Yuri-themed online art gallery. If you register, you can customize what kinds of art you see. I unallowed AI-generated art, but left everything else as it. Hopefully they’ll get more works to share as more folks join.

From meow on the Okazu Discord, Princess Peach is getting a new game, in which she is taking on the bad guys and gaining new forms and power. In effect, they’ve created Cutie Peachie for Princess Peach: Showtime!

Alex Henderson takes a look at Queer time and the quarter-life crisis in contemporary yuri over at Anime Feminist.

We’re wrapping up today with a thank you to the lovely folks at CitrusCon for hosting me as I talked about why BL and Yuri are not Opposites At All.

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.