Nakatani Nio Short Story Collection Sayonara Alter ( 仲谷鳰短編集 さよならオルタ)

August 24th, 2020

Nakatani Nio Short Story Collection Sayonara Alter ( 仲谷鳰短編集 さよならオルタ) is the collected volume of short stories by the Yagate Kimi ni Naru /Bloom Into You creator. The stories in this collection come from Nakatani-sensei’s work in  Dengeki Daioh, the Éclair anthology series, doujinshi and an original work for the collection. There’s a kind horror-esque feel about some of the stories that make me feel super creeped out. ^_^;

In the titular story two girls aren’t twins so much as two halves of the same person, and when one dies, the other is there to continue being her. This was followed by a fantasy story about a young man, and a grim little story about a girl who eats a giant snail, which skeeved me in evrry possible direction.

A pianist’s hand is broken and her friend has to be there for her. A friend falls in love her friend’s passion for an idol group. A girl finds herself interested in a wolf girl who transfers into her class. A woman who designs androids has a multilayered relationship with her first triumph.  Two women decide to buy a double bed, and admit that their relationship had changed. The original story for this collection tells about a complicated relationship between a a boy and a girl in high school.

If you’re a huge fan of her work, or you like short manga stories with slightly uncomfortable edges, you’ll want to get this collection. It definitely is an excellent overview of her art changing over the last decade or so. changes, as it evolves quite considerably from beginning to end in a way that would not be obvious if you didn’t see the stories laid out one after the other.

Ratings:

Overall – 7

An eclectic volume by an artist who is now known for one kind of story, it’s also a good reminder that Nakatani’s work is not just Bloom Into You.

Posted in Nakatani Nio, Yuri Manga | 3 Comments »


Galette, No. 14 (ガレット)

August 23rd, 2020

Galette, No. 14 (ガレット) marks a shift in my collection and starts with a multi-layered tale of woe. ^_^

Due to the  pandemic, this issue was offered in limited amount to backers as a physical publication, and eventually, it was offered to overseas backers but, for a number of reasons, I was unable to purchase the physical copy. Mostly, it was timing.

Jumping forward, Volume 15 is also being made available to backers but due to chicanery and corruption on both sides, packages sent by Japan Post to the USPS are now being held up for a minimum of 8 weeks on the Japan side, and who know what will happen on the US side. This is not hyperbole. When I shipped a package from Japan in July, I had the choice of around $200 by DHL (around, but I was completely unable to get an actual estimate off the DHL site, because the English-language page wouldn’t accept the Japanese address and vice versa, of course.  Apparently Tenso will only tell me what it actually costs after I commit to DHL shipping. So I chose JP Post to USPS – this was before the current administration’s open interference with the US Post Office – and was told right up front that it would take 8-12 weeks to ship. I have a package sitting in a warehouse in Kawasaki since July for, as far as I can tell, no reason whatsoever, except to make using a public service unappealing and shifting us to much more expensive shipping by private company, making what was already a huge barrier to overseas purchases practically insurmountable for normal humans.

As a result of this utterly malicious fuckery on both sides of the Pacific, I find myself unable to purchase the physical copies of Galette magazine. I’m saddened, but I upped my backer level, so I get a PDF copy of each volume when it’s released. Yay digital!

So here we are at No. 14, my first digital-only copy. I’ve linked to the Global Bookwalker version, which I also bought, because I wanted to see how it read. Honestly…I love it on Bookwalker. I use Bookwalker on a tablet, and it’s almost the same size as the magazine. I love being able to read the page on a large screen and page through it as I might in a physical copy. When I get the PDF, it reads on a browser as vertical, but I’m going to see if the Bookwalker reader will handle the PDF. It ought to. For those of you in Japan, it is also available on JP Kindle.

All the continuing stories are still continuing, which means ongoing works by Morinaga Milk, Morishima Akiko, Hakamada Mera, Hamano Ringo, Yatosaki Haru, Uno Jinia and Kitto Izumi and Momono Moto;  some of which are doing surprising and sometimes really interesting things. Morinaga Milk’s characters Rena and Yuna have moved into a larger home and are about to embark upon building a life together. This isn’t just “let’s live together,” this is “we’re a couple and this is us figuring out our lives together.” Kitto and Monomo’s “Liberty” has taken a dark turn and I really don’t know at all where it’s going.

But the winner this issue was definitely Hakamada Mera’s “Sekai ga Owarau sono mae ni.” It was just a really good chapter, probably some of the best work I’ve ever seen from her.

There was a fun take on Cinderella by Ei Imura, and the usual compliment of photography and art. All of which make Galette a satisfying read, that I look forward to every issue.

Ratings:

Overall – 9

Volume 15 is available as PDF and physically by mail to backers on Fantia at Gold level or higher, on Amazon JP Kindle and, kind of weirdly, in Japanese on US Kindle, but not yet on Bookwalker.

Posted in Galette, Magazines, Yuri Manga | 6 Comments »


No YNN Report Today

August 22nd, 2020

It’s been 8 months straight for the weekly Yuri Network News report and today, I’m taking a day off. ^_^ We’re working hard on a new video for Yuri Studio right this very moment…stay tuned! If you’ve enjoyed our Yuri News Reports, anime, manga, film, books and VN reviews, and hope to see more, please consider supporting us on the Okazu Patreon.We’re hoping to get 3 new patrons by the end of the month to stay on track for 2020.

Okazu Patrons get recognition on the front page of Okazu, a nifty hand-crafted digital badge, behind-the-scenes access and sneak peaks on new projects, polls to drive the direction of our work. Patrons can ask questions used in our Yuri panels and which we’ll address in upcoming videos! Sometimes, Patrons get access to contests or little gifts of thanks, because we can. ^_^

Every dollar makes a direct impact on what we can pay writers, and technical staff…as well as keeping us in the center of a thriving Yuri ecosystem. $5/month moves us a big step forward. Thank you to our current Okazu patrons, your support is greatly appreciated.

I’ll see you again next week here on the YNN Report!

 

Posted in Miscellaneous | 2 Comments »


Anata to Watashi no Shuuhassuu (あなたと私の周波数)

August 20th, 2020

Readers of Comic Yuri Hime monthly, might remember most of the stories in this volume, Anata to Watashi no Shuuhassuu (あなたと私の周波数) by Kuwabara Tamostsu. Each short takes a look at a frustration in life and finds a unique way of addressing it.

In the titular short, a woman who is unsatisfied with her life and her job, admires a colleague’s positive outlook. When she finds an old walkie-talkie in a storeroom, she’s shocked to hear that colleague engaged in a rant on the bandwdth. Unaware that her colleague is listening, Arata-san keeps her cool by letting off steam into this partnerless – she thinks – walkie-talkie.

A woman asks her ex-lover to help bury the corpse of her former life.

A track star finds her love of running renewed when a transfer student is so effortlessly better than she is.

A young woman find love, lunch and family at the same shop, when her lately deceased father turns out to have an another family she had no idea about.

Going out drinking and sharing confidences with your peers is all fun and games until one of turns out to be in love with you, too.

I genuinely enjoyed Kuwabara’s art. The characters feel mostly real emotionally, as well.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Variable, averaging 8
Characters – Same
Yuri – 6 The stories are less about relationships than communication
Service – 1 on principle

Overall – 8

Overall, a satisfying collection of one-shots. I’ll hope to read more by this artist.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 2 Comments »


Bloom Into You Regarding Saeki Sayaka, Volume 2

August 17th, 2020

Saeki Sayaka would probably not, if you asked, consider herself nostalgic. Nor would she likely think of herself as capricious, I don’t think she’d go far as to say that she was any more logical than anyone else. I am confident, however, that she would agree that she is a thoughtful young lady, who considers her choices carefully…and considers the consequences of those choices very deeply.

In Bloom Into You Regarding Saeki Sayaka, Volume 2, we meet Sayaka after she has experienced love and loss in middle school and after she has fallen in love once again in high school. It’s a love that isn’t going to be realized, we know, but she’s in the middle of it. While she might have an inkling that she’s put herself in an untenable position, she’s allowing herself a kernel of something like hope, a promise to herself that if she should want to reach out and bridge the distance between her and Touko, she could…she just doesn’t want to.  It’s a pleasant little story, that becomes a lie in the beginning pages of the book and Sayaka knows it.

We can relax into this book because, of course, we already know happened, but we really should take a moment to appreciate how much work the writer, Hitoma Iruma, put into it. They could not relax at all, as the readers already know what happened. ^_^

There are number of nice touches in this volume too. Classmates Manaka and Midori are a lot of fun. I read an early passage in which Manaka said that joining a club would be useful, because “…if you exercise enough, you’ll be ready if something happens and you need to make a quick getaway.” I hope we all had a laugh remembering the friend in high school who said stuff like that. (Honestly, in my crowd, any one of us was likely to be “that guy.” ^_^)

Physically, this book was lovely, with extra flourishes by interior designer Clay Gardener – the original Japanese volume had undecorated pages. I thought this was a very nice touch. All the other technicals were likewise excellent. Translation and adaptation were spot on for the serious Sayaka we see in the anime.

I enjoyed this volume immensely – again. As I said in my review of the Japanese edition, “I am pleasantly surprised to have fully enjoyed a novel by Iruma Hitoma, in which the tone and feel of the character as we know her is captured well.” I look forward so much to the third volume in December, in which we see Sayaka exist apart from Touko, as she becomes the Sayaka she will bloom into.

Ratings:

Art – 10 Art by the series creator
Story – 8 A stronger sense of Sayaka’s feelings for and about Touko
Character – 10
Service – 1 Not really this time
Yuri – 7 This book is chock-full of Sayaka’s thoughts about being attracted to Touko for all the reasons.

Overall – 9

My impression of the third volume in Japanese, was that I grinned throughout. I hope you do too!

Thank you to Seven Seas for the review copy. As a result of their generosity, I have an extra copy to give away!  Enter by putting a funny story about a friend in high school saying something goofy and you’ll be entered. Use an email you check regularly. I’ll pick a winner by Sunday, August 23. (The winner has been contacted!) Here’s my story:

In high school I was sitting with some friends in the cafeteria and one of them had decided that she was head over heel in love with some senior boy. She asked us all to say what liked best about him and my future sister-in-law said, “His absence.” I absolutely lost it and haven’t stopped laughing about it since. ^_^

Posted in Bloom Into You / Yagate Kimi ni Naru, English Manga, Light Novel, Nakatani Nio | 3 Comments »