Totsuzen Nantonaku Tonari no Seki no Douryou to Kiss Shitaku Narimashita.(突然何となく隣の席の同僚とキスしたくなりました。)

January 29th, 2021

I am so pleased to be reviewing this book today. Miura Kozumi’s Totsuzen Nantonaku Tonari no Seki no Douryou to Kiss Shitaku Narimashita.(突然何となく隣の席の同僚とキスしたくなりました。) is the first Yuri collection I have by this prolific contributor to Yuri anthologies. We’ve seen her work in the White Lilies BRIDE’s Anthology, and several issues of Galette MEETS, Ichijinsha’s Yuriqueur alcohol-centered anthology and Shueisha’s Yuritora Jump anthology. Her work is clean and stylish and often adult in several senses of the word. This collection also marks a new imprint to look out for, Taiyotosho’s Lily Love imprint. You know how happy it makes me when we get another player on the field.

The first story follows a workplace sempai and kouhai who find more than work in common. The title story follow Kobashi, a straight-laced office worker and Hayami, her colleague who sits next to her, as they realize that they both want to have sex…and decide that having sex with each other works for them.  Both these stories come back in later pages and we see that Hayami and Kobashi, despite trying to not let their personal lives ooze into their work relationship, really can’t. They like each other too much, These stories are wrapped around a few shorts that cover a vast array of set-ups from school to work to a woman picking up a stranger on the street.

The stories here occasionally have some angst, but generally they are all very pleasant, nicely drawn and many of them feature things that appeal to me, personally, like dinners out and couples being blissfully happy.  Just the kind of collection, I’ll return to to re-read and re-enjoy.

Ratings:

Art – 9 Just my type
Stories – Variable, but let’s say 8
Characters – I adore Hayami and Kobashi, so 9
Service – 2 Sex scenes are sensual and stylish, rather than fanservice-y. There is some partial nudity
Yuri – 10

Overall – 9

I’m ridiculously happy to have this collection from a creator whose work I enjoy. Thank you and welcome to Okazu, Lily Love Comics!

Posted in Yuri Manga | No Comments »


Nettaigyo ha Yuki ni Kogareru, Volume 7 (熱帯魚は雪に焦がれる)

January 28th, 2021

The connection between Konatsu and Koyuki is extremely tenuous. They both are aware of this, but whenKonatsu begins to avoid club…and Koyuki it comes to a head. Nettaigyo ha Yuki ni Kogareru, Volume 7 (熱帯魚は雪に焦がれる) is fraught.

(I appear to have not reviewed Volume 6 in Japanese.  It will not radically affect this review. I’ll review A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow, Volume 6 in English when it comes out next month!)

Faced with a future without Koyuki, Konatsu is unable to move forward. It’s not until her father comes for a visit and comes very close to throwing his own future away for his idea of his daughter that she realizes what she’s giving up to avoid having to look ahead. For once it’s Koyuki who can be strong for Konatsu.

In a series which has had a number of very good “talking it out” scenes, this volume has several which stand out. As much as this series looks like a shoujo series about girls in school, it runs in a seinen magazine, Dengeki Mao. What stands out  about that for this series isn’t a matter of fanserivce at all, but unusually instead, we get adult characters who act like adults and function as parents for their children, something that is surprisingly thin in manga as a whole, which tends to rely on hyperbolic daily situations. ^_^

So here, Koyuki has a heart to heart talk with her mother that helps her decide what she needs to do, Konatsu overhears her aunt and father talking about her and then has a conversation with her father about it. Finishing up the volume was something that I don’t think I’ve ever read in a manga before – Konatsu’s father and Koyuki’s father have a conversation about their daughters that was…really nice, and supportive, of both the girls and of each other. It was so absurdly pleasant to see fathers in manga being decent, concerned, and supportive of their children and another parent. I’ll take more of this please! (Also a feature of I’m in Love With the Villainess, by the way. Rae’s parents when we meet them, are super supportive, and Claire’s father dotes. ^_^)

And in the meantime, Konatsu and Koyuki open up to one another a little bit more.

And this, in a nutshell, is why I am still reading this story. Nothing is “happening” but everyone is growing.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 1 on principle only, there really isn’t any
Yuri – 1

Overall – 7

We know that this series will end with Volume 9, so I’m even more interested to find out what will become of them.

Posted in Miscellaneous | 3 Comments »


Assault Lily: Bouquet, Guest Review By Day

January 27th, 2021

It’s my favorite day of the week – Guest Review Wednesday! And today we welcome back Day – it’s always a pleasure to have Day’s insight, so I hope you’ll give them a warm welcome back and settle in for today’s review. Take it away, Day!

In a world in which monsters known as Huge (yes, really) present an existential threat to humanity, teen girls known as “Lilies” are what stands between these monsters and the rest of humanity. Riri Hitotsuyanagi, a newly-minted Lily, is beginning her new life at an academy dedicated to training and housing Lilies. Riri has dreamt of being a Lily herself ever since she was saved by one, and has especially looked forward to academy life since it’s a chance to reunite with that very Lily, Yuyu Shirai. Riri is particularly interested in being able to form a “Schutzengel” pair with Yuyu, a big sister-little sister style relationship that allows for mentoring both on and off the battlefield. But Yuyu dashes her optimism somewhat, as she’s grown cold and stand-offish sometime in the interim.  

And so begins Assault Lily: Bouquet, a series that is attempting to adapt a line of Azone International dolls with weaponry and short biographies into a cohesive single cour anime series. And that I phrased it that way may give the key hint to how that plays out ultimately, as while I strongly enjoyed the first few episodes as being exactly my kind of garbage (albeit with entirely too much thigh-gazing), alas, it cannot maintain that garbage truck pace. Instead the garbage truck stalls, it catches fire, and the structure ultimately dissolves into goo that really wants to kick some tears loose from the audience. And it even lacks the grace to do so using the story the shows launches on! Sure, pink-haired genki girl tries to melt the icy exterior of an aloof dark-haired girl is old hat, but it’s at least something, and that Yuyu is haunted by either a ghost or a hallucination of the partner she may’ve killed should make for plenty of fodder. I did wonder what the show would be about after they neaten up this problem in the early going and the answer is – not much, although it does give us plenty of time watching the characters bathe. The show does manage to remember that Yuyu has some trauma issues toward the end, but by then it is simply too late; I am bored senseless.  
 
Not helping matters, the entire cast is a set of cookie-cutters. Some are certainly even more distinctly lacking in life than others, but even with the ones I like, I can’t deny that they’re well-worn variations on well-worn types. That the show sees fit to print the names of every character on-screen every time they first appear in an episode, no matter how regular a member of the cast the person is, leads me to think even the production crew knew no one was going to remember who half of them were.  
 
The visuals are a bit more interesting than the story or the cast, but not in a positive way – there’s just some rather odd choices made with the visual presentation. Shaft is the studio, but outside of a few shots (including some in the primary ED), one would never guess so from how generic everything looks. The animation does kick into a higher-gear from time to time, but rather than doing so during battle scenes, its most often for moments where there is little reason to bother splashing out. Bafflingly, the show also insists on using CG for a tea-set the cast uses throughout the show, a distractingly bizarre move when it appears in scenes that are otherwise wholly 2D.  
 
People weren’t precisely wrong to smell Yuri fumes whiffing off of this one, but anyone searching for something substantive is going to come away disappointed; outside of suggestive shots in the ED, Yuri cred mostly hangs on the thin thread of intense gazes and intense friendships… and Kaede Johan Nouvel, who in a different show would be the evil psycho lesbian, but here is mostly played for jokes for her obsessive focus on Riri.  
 
Ratings:
 
Art – 5  
Story – 4
Character – 6  
Service – 5 (no full nudity but plenty of thighs, baths in crotch-emphasizing towels, and characters who enter scenes boobs-first)  
Yuri – 1
 
Overall – 4
 

I might actually be more upset over this not being good garbage than I end up feeling upset with shows that start out as Good before swerving off the road into crapsville! Good trash is hard to find! 

Erica here: Just a reminder to commenters – I know at least one of you has strong feelings about AL:B and so I remind you that if you liked this anime, you may feel free to express what you liked about it. We would be delighted to learn what you though made it good. But you may not be rude about this review or other comments, unless you are able to be very, very funny and rude. ^_^

Thank you Day for another insightful review. I agree, it is hard to find good garbage…and that this was not it. ^_^

 
Posted in Day, English Anime, Guest Review | 5 Comments »


Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou. Volume 3 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。)

January 25th, 2021

I don’t really know how to review this book. ^_^;  There’s so much to tell you and so little I can say!

In Volume 1, we met former office worker Oohashi Rei, who wakes up one day in the world of her favorite otome game, “Revolution,” as the protagonist Rae Taylor. As Rae, she opts out of the usual romance routes and instead focuses all of her acumen and knowledge of the game on her actual interest, the villainess Claire François. Then the revolution comes crashing down over the two of them.

In Volume 2, Claire and Rae, now a couple, work together to create a better world for themselves, their friends, their country, and…

spoiler warning/ Because both these books are available from Seven Seas in English, I am going to assume you have read them. If you have not read them, this review will contain inevitable spoilers, starting with the cover, because it is right here next to these words and I can’t hide that. If you haven’t read the first two volumes, this review may be largely incoherent and there are even MORE spoilers ahead. Don’t keep reading if you want to avoid spoilers. Do go read Volume 2, then come back. ^_^ /spoiler warning
So, going back to my previous statement.

Claire and Rae work together to create a better world for themselves, their friends, their country, and…their children.

Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou. Volume 3 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。), which I read on US Kindle in Japanese*, begins a year after the revolution. Claire, Rae, and their children Aleah and Mei**, the orphans they adopted in the tear-jearker epilogue to volume 2, are a happy family who are dealing with some major issues that are clearly foreshadowing future plots. Rae and Claire are teachers at the Academy they formerly attended as students, when they are approached by the government with a life-changing request: Diplomatic relationships with the Bauer Kingdom’s former (possibly current?) enemy, the Nur Empire is being established. A team of exchange students are being shared between the two countries. Several students from the Academy are going…and so are Claire and Rae, who decide to take Aleah and Mei with them.

We’ve already established that all norms are off the table in this series, so the plot here is a little bit of everything – school drama, romance, socio-political drama, and some other things and then the demons arrive. From this point on the book is spinning plates and juggling balls and then an axe or two on a high-wire.  And it all works, except I have about 300 questions. ^_^  I’ll just hope that some of that is clarified in future chapters and, eventually, volume 4.  I was worried through the entire first half of the book about two things that were never the problems I thought they’d be. But…what? Why? How? I’m not unsatisfied, I just want more!

I’m going to be really impatient until all of you have read it, too, so I can scream all my questions at you! ^_^

The second half of this volume are a series of deeply schmaltzy and satisfyingly goopy extra chapters that cover a number of celebratory events in Rae and Claire’s life, like birthdays and Christmas and their wedding. Rae and Claire get more and more touchy as the story goes on. Apparently Inori-sensei has offered up the bed scenes as an extra on her Pixiv Fanbox (which I think is a terrific idea and admit, I’m tempted. For the record, her Fanbox is being translated into English and Korean, so don’t be afraid to support her.) Rae and Claire’s wedding is a very pointed commentary on modern Japanese life and laws and an incredibly sweet scene. For a second time, the final scene of the book had me reaching for the tissues. How far Claire and Rae have come in a year is laid bare for all for us to see. (happy tears)

But, Erica! I hope you are flailing your hands at me in an attempt to get my attention. Did you say Rae and Claire’s wedding?!? Yes. And that is not the only wonderfully gay bit – nor is it arguably, the most important gay thing in this book. There are at least three other incredibly important conversations that I hope like heck have made a difference for someone, somewhere. And Rae and Claire are VERY clear about what they are to one another to the people around them in so many words.  They are physically affectionate with each other and with the twins, as well. I honestly loved that affectionate kisses and hugs and touching were just normalized in this story.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 10
Service – Kind of? You’ll have to trust me that its fine, really.
Yuri – 10
Queer – 10

Overall – 10

Absolutely fantastic, but I have so many questions.

What about <spoiler>? What did they do?
What is the deal with <spoiler and spoiler>?
Were the <spoiler> there for shits and giggles?
What is going to happen with <spoiler>????
Why on earth is <spoiler>?????????

*The one thing I do honestly like about using Kindle for Japanese-language books is the translation function. It’s not perfect, but it helps not having to do more than highlight a term once the JP dictionary has been downloaded.

** In case it is not obvious, Aleah rhymes with Claire in Japanese and Mei rhymes with Rae.

Posted in I'm in Love With the Villainess, inori, LGBTQ, Light Novel, Light Novels | 5 Comments »


Yuri Network News (百合ネットワークニュース) – January 23, 2021

January 23rd, 2021

Yuri Manga

Just as I was working on last week’s report, Yen Press announced two new Yuri titles: The Whole of Humanity Has Gone Yuri Except for Me, and the Nakatani Nio Short story collection, Farewell to my Alter, (which I reviewed here in Japanese last summer) Thanks to Senior YNN Correspondent Sean G for the heads up!

Syrup Yuri Anthology, Volume 2 is out from Seven Seas.

Travel-ish, Yuri-ish Futari Escape, Volume 1 (ふたりエスケープ ) from Comic Yuri Hime is available.

YNN Senior Correspondent Shannon L. wrote in to let our French-speaking friends know that Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou is getting a French release as Escale à Yokohama from Meian! They are describing it as a “feel-good” story. Which is true, if you ignore that it is also a science-fiction story about the twilight of humanity. I envy our French readers, this is a magnificent series.

Seven Seas is promoting a Yuri pack of manga on Twitter, featuring 5 Yuri titles!

On Twitter, Kaishaku announced the publication of Volume 1 of their new sequel(ish) to Kannazuki no Miko, Himegami no Miko (姫神の巫女).

 

 Anime News

YNN Correspondent Evie wants you to know about the upcoming anime for Tai Ari Deshita. ~Ojou-sama wa Kakutou Game Nante Shinai~ (対ありでした。 ～お嬢さまは格闘ゲームなんてしない～). Komatsu-san has the details on CR News about this game competition anime set at a girl’s school!

The new anime EX-ARM has already been the target of much critical analysis of the production team and the animation. Now it’s added a new chapter of conversation (or controversy, if you prefer that kind of clickbait headline ) with a possibly(?) censored same-sex kiss. Yuri Mother has the details. Personally, I think the whole anime is a decent example of The Peter Principle, with everyone involved just completely out of their depth and leadership promoted to their level of incompetence.

My Next Life as a Villainess All Routes Lead to Doom! anime is getting a second season. Fans of Maria and Katarina will be so happy. ^_^ ANN’s Rafael Antonio Pineda has the report. 

PA WORKS has debuted a promotional video for upcoming anime Shiroi Suna no Aquatope (白い砂のアクアトープ). It’ll hit a lot of buttons – pretty location scenery, nice animation, “girl zoo” Yuri anime.

Blue Period, which has a gender nonbinary character (I haven’t actually read the volume, which is on my to-read pile) is getting an anime. I’m not sure how sensitive the character portrayal is, yet, but I’m told that it is not negative or malicious.) Alex Mateo has the details on ANN.

 

The first Okazu goal for 2021: Sustainably pass 100 Patrons. This will put us nearer to our next Microgoal. More Yuri Studio Videos, a raise for our writers here on Okazu and another new queer creator we’ll support! Become an Okazu Patron today!

 


 

Yuri Light Novel News

The second volume of Girl’s Kingdom is available for pre-order on Kindle and up on the Yuricon Store. An exchange student is going to throw Misaki’s life into turmoil, oh no! ^_^

 

Other News

Fans of Comic Yuri Hime series Wataten, Watashi ni Tenshi ga Maiorita! (私に天使が舞い降りた!,) might be excited to learn that Wataten 5’s first Solo Concert Delicious Smile! is set to stream overseas on February 6, 2021.  Visit E+ for ticket information.

 

Become a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share and be part of the Yuri Network. ^_^

Thanks to our Okazu Patrons who make the YNN weekly report possible! Support us on Patreon to help us give Guest Reviewers a raise and to help us support more queer creators!

Posted in Yuri Network News | 10 Comments »