End of Summer 2020 Lucky Boxes! – All Claimed

September 6th, 2020

I need to do a doujinshi clean up, and to do that, I need to make room to do a doujinshi cleanup, so once again, it’s Lucky Box time here at Okazu HQ!

This time we have 2 Large Premium boxes, 1 Medium Yuri box and one last 1 Medium BL doujinshi box, with some other non-BL stuff in there.

All of the boxes include books, other media, random paper goods  and/or stickers/magnets/toys, and candy from Japan. I just tried the adzuki bean candy and they are pretty good…but the Hana Kuchizuke candy is still my favorite and the Hokkaido milk candy is my wife’s. The Premium boxes include clearfiles and other flat fun things like artbooks and whatnot. I’m still – and probably will be for years – going through Bruce’s books. I still have 2 dozen boxes downstairs, so we’ll be doing this seasonally as I need to straighten up.

I will once again assure you that this is all 100%, unadulterated stuff. Like all my grab bags, these are created by me shoving a bunch of things in boxes until I can barely tape them shut. I no longer remember what went in, so no..I can’t tell you what is in each box. I do try to put random things like postcards and papers in there to make the unpacking process an adventure. ^_^

When you email me, please refer to the box you want by the title and #1. First come, first served and these always go fast! These are listed out so I can cross them off as they go.

Large Premium Box 1 – $50

Large Premium Box 2 – $50

Medium Box 1 – Claimed

BL Doujinshi Box 1 – $20

***

To be eligible to buy a Lucky Box, follow these instructions carefully. Please. Thank you. Failure to follow all of these instructions will disqualify you. It’s not personal, they go fast and I don’t have time to track you down for a piece of information.

1 – You must live in the Continental USA (contiguous 48) only, no APO/FPOs – sorry about that, really. It’s vexing, I know.

2 – You must be over 18, I am not policing books or recipients.

3 – Email me at anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com with the subject “Lucky Box”. Use an email you check regularly. Because I will reply asap.

4. *****Please include your name, age, mailing address. ***** Tell me which box you want. Even if you’ve given me your address previously, please include it, I am very lazy.

5- I will contact you at that point and give you details about payment by Paypal. Please be prepared to check your email and get payment out so this post doesn’t linger. Thanks in advance.

This whole process will be handled with utmost capriciousness, as usual. ^_^ 

Ready? Get your Lucky Boxes!

 

 

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Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – September 5, 2020

September 5th, 2020

Yuri Event

I’m absolutely ecstatic to announce that the Yuriten Yuri Exhibition, which was canceled due to the pandemic last spring has announced a new online event! I’m so delighted that the organizers have decided to do this online…which means with luck, we’ll all be able to “attend” and view the various artworks on display. Depending on how complicated or simple ordering will be, I will consider taking event goods orders for folks and doing some North American distribution. Let’s wait and see what the details are. So far no dates, but the official announcement includes a nice thanks for the efforts of healthcare workers. ^_^

 

Yuri Anime

The anime adaptation of Adachi and Shimamura is slated for an October 3 debut, reports ANN’s Rafael Antonio Pineda. Check out the trailer on Youtube from Funimation.

Canadian fans will be able to watch Sailor Moon streaming on Crave, reports Jennifer Sherman on ANN.

Variably Yuri, Healin’ Good Pretty Cure and the much Yuri-ier KIRA KIRA☆PRETTY CURE A LA MODE are streaming on Crunchyroll. I have my hands pressed together that we get Heartcatch Precure, which is still my favorite. ^_^

 

Yuri Visual Novel

Via Yuri Mother,  “Korean game company Cinamon Games released its first English Yuri story to its otome game platform Maybe: Interactive Stories. The story, called Flower Lane: A Record of Romance is a one season long story consisting of 19 episodes.”

 

Yuri Manga

Let’s start with some new license announcements from this week.

Seven Seas announced School Zone, a gonzo Yuri school comedy by Ningiyau.

Tokyopop has announced Alter Ego, “a new addition to both  International Women of Manga and LOVE x LOVE imprints. The Girls Love title from Spanish creator Ana C. Sánchez deals with unrequited love and the difficulties of confessing a gay crush to a friend who appears to be straight.” Honestly…you can imagine that this plot made me roll my eyes pretty hard.

Yen Press announced the Adachi and Shimamura manga for a winter 2021 release.

Sasamekikoto/Whispered Words creator Ikeda Takeshi has a new Yuri series, about a voice actress and a scriptwriter living together as roommates, but who become more to one another in Futari ha Daitai konna Kanji (ふたりはだいたいこんなかんじ). I’m super excited to read this.

We have some new titles on the Yuricon Store!

Lonely Girl ni Sakaraenai, Volume 1 (ロンリーガールに逆らえない) is back in print! Ayaka is a great student who hates tests. Her teacher makes her an offer she can’t refuse – “Get Honda Sora to come to school and I’ll give you a good recommendation.”

Sasayakuyouni Koi wo Utau, Volume  3 (ささやくように恋を唄う) continues the charming romance of Yori-sempai and her underclassman Himari.

Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 3 (不揃いの連理), Heke and Lala get to know one another better online, while they say nothing to each other face to face in the workplace.

Canno Tanhenshuu Mushoku to JK  (缶乃短編集 無職とJK) is a short story collection by Kiss & White Lily for My Dearest Girl creator, consisting of her Éclair anthology stories.

The Canelé Souer Yuri Anthology (カヌレ スール百合アンソロジー) is, as it sounds , an anthology of older students and younger at school, bonds that go beyond sisterhood or friendship, a Yuri anthology of “souer” romance.

Crunchyroll Expo and Bookwalker Global are offering 50% on all manga and light novels released by August 4th.

 

Yuri Light Novel

ROLL OVER AND DIE: I Will Fight for an Ordinary Life with My Love and Cursed Sword! digital release from Seven Seas hits this week on Kindle and Bookwalker.

 

Yuri Doujinshi

It’s sale season for those of you looking to fill up your doujinshi collection. Melonbooks is doing a 20% sale, for those of you who want Comitia and Comiket releases from Japan, while Lilyka is also offering 20% off for their translated doujinshi, which includes some new titles. Irodori Sakura didn’t get the sale memo, but does have a new title on offer.

 

Other News

File this under “Serendipity”: In our most recent Yuri Studio video, “What Makes A Story Yuri?” I discuss manga as Art, and talk about how manga actually stands at a crossroads of “Art” and “Literature,” but is rarely thought of as either by fans. Amazingly this week, the International Society for Education through Art Quinta da Cruz. Estrada de São  (InSEA) has release, for free as a PDF, Manga!: Visual Pop-Culture in ARTS Education, edited by Masami Toku & Hiromi Tsuchiya Dollase. This is an amazing resource you should all grab a copy and give it a read!

This week, the Goodle Doodle in the USA honored cartoonist Jackie Ormes. She is known as the first African-American woman cartoonist and creator of the Torchy Brown comic strip and the Patty-Jo ‘n’ Ginger panel.

Via any number of sources Jezebel‘s Angelica Frey has a lovely article on the The Haute Couture History of Sailor Moon.

Austin Asian American Film Festival is presenting a celebration of queer cinema in its virtual six-film series, Prismatic Taiwan.

 

Become a YNN Correspondent by reporting any Yuri-related news with your name and an email I can reply to – thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network! Special thanks to Okazu Patrons for being an important part of the Okazu family. I couldn’t do it without you!
Posted in Yuri Network News | 6 Comments »


I Love You So Much, I Hate You

September 4th, 2020

Writing is hard. Creating plots are hard. So, it’s not surprising that old plots are suddenly new again, as Yuri moves out of school scenarios, into adult life.  When I reviewed Yuni’s office life drama, Nikurashi Hodo Aishiteru, I wrote “The initial premise, which is not yet all that common in Yuri manga, is the same plot as a zillion lesbian romances of the 1990s. ^_^ As a result, it felt both fresh and incredibly comfortable at the same time.”

Upcoming star in the planning department, Fujimura, and her competent and supportive boss Asano…are having an affair. It’s pretty much a crass office affair, as Asano is married and pretending that she’s happy, and Fujimura is lying when she says that this is all she wants from their relationship. When rumor of an affair between a manager and their subordinate spreads around the company, it puts a damper on their own affair. But Asano isn’t happy in her marriage and Fujimura does want more.

I Love You So Much, I Hate You, from Yen Press, is a very decent guilty pleasure read. In real life, Fujimura and Asano and their hidden-in-plain-sight affair, would probably be absolutely intolerable separately and together, but as a fiction, it all feels, well, kind of sweet…and, with an epilogue that ties the story up, satisfying. Yuni’s art is stylish and adult. The characters feel like real adult women in a real world, caring about their clothes and their professional success. This book also had the added benefit of someone, somewhere actually having talked to a woman who has had lesbian sex. I will leave it to you to discover what I mean, but those of you who know what I mean probably smiled, as I did. The sex itself is tasteful and evocative, rather than pornishly explicit.

Yen only credits the translator and letterer, so let me say that both translation by Eleanor Ruth Summers and lettering by Erin Hickman contribute greatly to an authentic reading experience, of a very likable, yet slightly guilty, new-old adult life  lesbian romance.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 9
Service – 3 Nudity, but mostly tastefully done.

Overall – A strong 8

I’m a big fan of Yuni’s work and hope that you too, will enjoy this translation of some fun, tawdry Shakaijin Yuri.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 6 Comments »


Galette, No. 15 ( ガレット)

September 2nd, 2020

Galette, No. 15 ( ガレット) continues the excellent work that we’ve seen all along, with names that are engraved now into a kind of Yuri Hall of Fame: Morishima Akiko, Morinaga Milk, Hakamada Meru, Inui Ayu, Morita Miyuki, Kitta Izumi and Momono Moto…

…and Akiyama Haru.

I know I sat up straight as can be when I saw that name on the masthead. It’s long enough ago now that maybe the Yuri-reading audience doesn’t remember Akiyama Haru’s adult-life series, Octave, but I sure do. A decade ago, before the current rise of Shakajin Yuri, Octave was a lovely, complicated story about complicated adult women in a complicated relationship, both professional and personal. It’s pretty exciting to see the name back and in Galette magazine, no less. It’s a good day for Yuri.

This volume is once again available in print, JP Kindle, digital on Bookwalker or digital, in Japanese on US Kindle. It has the usual lovely interior illustrations, and pen’s stylish cover art. The only thing missing from this issue is completely understandable, but somehow missed the more for that. This issue has no photography, a stark reminder that there is a pandemic out there.

Ratings:

Overall – 8

Overall, a good volume, and I’m glad to see that the hiccup that made Volume 14 a collector’s item is history. Manga artists are surprisingly resilient.

Next issue, we welcome back Amano Shuninta! You’ll excuse me, if I hope to see Takemiya Jin again soon, as well.

Posted in Galette, Magazines | 2 Comments »


“What Makes A Story Yuri?” on Yuri Studio

August 31st, 2020

I am so very excited to present the newest Yuri Studio video today. One of the most common things I’m asked to do is explain when and how and why a series is considered Yuri, so today on Yuri Studio, please enjoy “What Makes a Story Yuri?”

 

It was a true team effort, with not only our amazing team here at Okazu – with many thanks to Louise, whose editing I rely on so heavily. This time we also have the special guest voices from Yuri Mother, LumRanmaYasha from Manga Mavericks and Sarah and Kit from TomoChoco Podcast! It was a a lot of work and a lot of fun.  This video has English-language subtitles and we’ll be adding Japanese in the future.

Please give it a like on Youtube, subscribe to YuriStudio, and if you’d like to have your questions answered in an upcoming video, become an Okazu Patron!

Posted in Yuri Studio | 6 Comments »