Kaketa Tsuki to Donuts, Volume 1 (欠けた月とドーナッツ)

April 13th, 2020

Uuno Hinako always looks good. Her dress and makeup are always spot on, her hair is always done. She’s always got a smile on her face at work, just the thing to attract a nice man. She goes out to lunch she can’t afford to be with friends, rather than eat alone. That’s what’s expected of her. That’s what is “normal.” So why is she so miserable? In Usui Shio’s Kaketa Tsuki to Donuts, Volume 1 (欠けた月とドーナッツ), she’s about to figure out why.

Satou Asahi doesn’t seem to care for any of these things. She eats lunch by herself, speaks up when she’s offended and doesn’t seem to care what people think. Hinako is fascinated in a way she can’t express. When Satou comes to her rescue with a cute, animal shaped donut, they begins a friendship that confuses Hinako. Why does she find Asahi’s lifestyle so empowering?

Asahi is encouraged by her younger sister Subaru to become closer to Hinako, as she can see that they need each other. As the volume comes to a close, Hinako takes a step to reject what is seen as “normal” and move towards a path she might actually want to go down.

Although Hinako’s clinging to what is expected of her is, predictably, a little annoying, and she is a mope throughout much of the volume, it’s easy to see that this is not a short journey for her, but a long, arduous one. And we can’t but help root for her. Subaru egging Asahi to push past her own guard is very cute. Not at all despite myself, I find this series to be exactly the kind of Jousei Yuri I want more of from Comic Yuri Hime magazine!

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 6
Service – 0 Not so much as a bath scene. What a pleasure

Overall – 8

While it is true that what society and family “expects”is still a struggle, I rejoice in the fact that for so many of us, life is more about enjoying the moon and donuts. I look forward to Hinako being one of us.

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I Am Not Okay With This

April 12th, 2020

Netflix’s series I am Not Okay With This, an adaptation of Charles Forsman’s graphic novel of the same name, is…interesting. Good interesting, but interesting rather than entertaining, for me.

It begins with a young woman in a white shift, covered in blood, running from what sounds like police sirens. The voice over starts, “Dear Diary….Go…Fuck Yourself.” And from that point on, I did, indeed, binge-watch this story of Sydney, a young woman whose entire already crappy life is turned upside down by even more circumstances beyond her control than usual. At fifteen, Sydney is angry and frustrated by life, and as a result she’s an asshole to people who are probably only actually a little annoying.

Sydney’s got problems, as most people do. She’s hauling around a lot of anger at a father who killed himself, and she’s secretly in love with her best friend, something she comes to understand as the story plays out. But her friend is not in love with her. Instead her best friend is going out with a star of the football team who kind of tries to not be a jerk, honestly.

Unfortunately for Sydney, she’s also beginning to manifest powers of manipulation….powers driven by her anger, mostly. Explosively violent powers. And so, as the season ends, we come full circle to the beginning, with Sydney, running away from sirens in the background.

Sydney’s sexuality is part of the story and it takes her a longer while than it takes us to figure out where her interest lies. But whether it will ultimately be a good thing is still way up in the air as the season ends.

The biggest hurdle in the story is not the horror of it all, or even the tedium of school life, which is thoroughly explored, but that Sydney herself is just not a particularly nice or interesting person. Her “good” column is mostly filled up with Sydney’s genuine affection for her little brother. That said, Sydney is fantastically acted by Sophia Lillis, who captures every single annoying, awkward, self-absorbed quality of queer adolescence competently. The rest of the cast is likewise excellent, with special shout out to Wyeth Oleff as Stanley Barber, Sydney’s confidant and would-be boyfriend.

Ratings:

Acting – 10
Story – 9
Characters – 8 Exceptionally well portrayed
LGBTQ – 4 Sydney figuring it out is a thing
Service – 2 a little dress up

Overall – 8

If you’re looking for a happy teen drama-comedy, this is not the teen drama you’re looking for. If you’re looking for a queer lead paranormal/horror story, a lesbian Stranger Things or had a fondness for the teen drama of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, I Am Not Okay With This will probably scratch your itch. Whether a Season 2 will happen we don’t know, but it does appear that it’s being considered, if not actively made yet. The comic ends with finality, so if there is a S2, it will be going in a different direction.

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Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – April 11, 2020

April 11th, 2020

Print schedules are in the air, but digital editions are still headed our way! Before you knee-jerk comment “I like print better”, consider…if you’re reading scanlations or online comics, you don’t like print better, you value print more. Take a moment to consider what you are saying about the effort of writing, editing, drawing, lettering, proofreading, laying out content for you to enjoy. If you happily read digital content for free, you’re saying that that is worth less to you than the paper being used to make a book. I’m NOT saying you can’t like a book. Obviously not. I love books. What I’m saying is life is going to irrevocably change during this pandemic and you might want to re-evaluate the value you place on the work and the content over the physical container.

Because I cannot get my physical copies of Comic Yuri Hime, and I was on Bookwalker Global, I picked up the May issue digitally. You can subscribe to the magazine through Bookwalker Global and never need a place to put giant cartons of magazines you can’t get rid of! ^_^

BOOKWALKER Global is doing a sale for 60% coin back on selected English manga and light novel titles right now. I picked up Ghost in the Shell Standalone Complex Volume 1 for $1.06. If you’re following me on Twitter, you know I’m doing a massive rewatch of all the Ghost in the Shell properties in the order they were made. I’ll be doing a post on my thoughts after the new Ghost in the Shell SAC 2045 launches later this month on Netflix. I’ll do the same for the manga, and see if I can get a hold of the new manga when/if that comes out in the fall.

What you can find on Bookwalker is a wide variety of English and Japanese manga from many publishers on – and here’s the part that I think is the best thing – any device, since their reader is usable on iOS and Android devices, as well as on desktop and other systems. Few regional limitations – this isn’t like Kindle, which insists one account= one country. In effect, Bookwalker is the store you all want, with titles from every major and many minor publishers, in English and Japanese. They have a Yuri category on their English and Japanese stores.

This has been an unsponsored, unprompted advert, but I gotta tell ya, last night I sat down to read that issue of Comic Yuri Hime and it was so *nice* to read on my tablet. So clear and easy to see, I might not go back. ^_^

 

Yuri Manga

I spent some time catching up on the big backlog of stuff for the Yuricon store:

Our Wonderful Days, Volume 3 is currently still slated for a July release. This volume wraps up Kei Hamuro’s sweet, quiet slice of country life Yuri romance out from Seven Seas.

In Tsukiatte Agetemo Iikana, Volume 4 (付き合ってあげてもいいかな) Saeko and Miwa are still trying to find their way. If you’re a fan, take a look at this doujinshi anthology for the series on Melonbooks! A couple of sample pages are available.

Comic Yuri Hime, May 2020 (コミック百合姫2020年5月号) is up on Amazon JP, but I’m not seeing any print issue after that…yet.

The Éclair series has put out a new one-shot collection, Éclair Special Kazuno Yuikawa Masterpiece Collection (エクレアSpecial 雑草譚 結川カズノ百合作品傑作選).

Yagate Kimi ni Naru Koushiki Comic Anthology, Volume 2 (やがて君になる 公式コミックアンソロジー_ is the second official Bloom Into You manga anthology. The first one was very good.

An adult woman falls in love with a cool, good looking woman, in this collected online comic Ikemen Onna to Hakoirimusume, Volume 1 (イケメン女と箱入り娘).

Galette No. 14 (ガレット) is taking pre-orders directly for folks who back the magazine at 500￥or more/month in Japan. Because all the events have been canceled, it looks like they are doing a limited print run.

Not gonna lie, I was really glad Tsuki to Suppin, Volume 2 (月とすっぴん)  arrived in my last shipment of books from Japan. I really like this adult odd couple daily life romance.

 

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Yuri Light Novel

Bloom Into You: Regarding Saeki Sayaka, Volume 2 is headed our way shortly in digital form! The print will be delayed. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to read this translation of Sayaka’s high school one-sided love. I enjoyed it in Japanese, for sure.

Otherside Picnic, Volume 3 is also on it’s way for the middle of April. Got my pre-order in for this creepy-cool adventure sort of Yuri-ish series. Thanks to Sean G and AV-chan for the date corrections.

 
Yuri Visual Novels

Aikasa Collective is taking pre-orders for their beautiful Chinese folklore0inspired Yuri Visual novel Mizuchi(白蛇心傳) with 33% off through the 13th.

J-List has the preorder for the third installment of Innocent Grey’s Flowers series, FLOWERS -Le volume sur automne- Limited Edition.

 

Yuri Doujinshi

Lilyka is starting to sell their catalog of Yuri doujinshi on Kindle and Nook, according to their official Twitter account.

 

LGBTQ Cartoons
 

DC’s Harley Quinn cartoon is returning and will “explore” a relationship with Poison Ivy, reports Kat Calamia on Newarama.

 

Other News

Via YNN Correspondent Timeboxer, we have a beautifully written short scifi, Distant Stars by P.H. Lee. Lovely and sad.

Unrelated, I wrote a short story, recently. I like to think of it as a fanfic for the plague year. ^_^ Dodecahedron.

I’m going to end this week with a memorial note. LGBTQ rights pioneer Phyllis Lyon died this week at 91. She’s being remembered as the first person, along with her wife Del Martin, to have been married in California when gay marriage became legal, but she was so much more than that to LGBTQ history in America. She and Martin co-founded the first lesbian organization in the USA, the Daughters of Bilitis, and have been unceasingly on the front of LGBTQ civil rights. Lyon and Martin have a wikipedia page on their work together and as a tribute to this amazing woman, I’d like you to take a second and read it: Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon. You should know who they are and what they have done for you.

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 essential part of the team!

 

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Nettaigyo ha Yuki ni Kogareru, Volume 5 (熱帯魚は雪に焦がれる)

April 9th, 2020

Here we are at Nettaigyo ha Yuki ni Kogareru, Volume 5 (熱帯魚は雪に焦がれる) and Honami Koyuki is putting the brakes on her almost-not-even moving-life. Why would she do that? Well.

Koyuki has always been a model student, and the teachers have relied on her to do the right thing. But that was also used as a bludgeon by the teachers, who compared the other students to her, which meant that the other kids pulled away, even though they didn’t mean to.
The end result is that Honami Koyuki is horribly lonely – lonely enough that she finds it inconceivable to not be lonely. While Koyuki was stranded in this Saragossa Sea of emotion, Konatsu came into her life. And she’s still not entirely sure what to do about it. Especially as she’s planning on going to school very far away, in Tokyo.

Oddly, the person who breaks her free is not Konatsu, but Konatsu’s friend Kaede who can see the (kind of obvious) truth. Kaede has no skin in the game beyond seeing her friend happy, so she’s free to force Koyuki into admitting the burden she carries. Even as we’re finally thinking something might break for the better, Konatsu sees Kaede and Koyuki walking together… and, naturally(????) fears the worst.

This volume was pretty annoying, I’m not going to lie.I get that Koyuki is not a happy character and this is a very slow-moving romance, but holy heck, what was that last bit about? Folks. Let me assure you your lover smiling while being next to someone else does not mean automatically mean anything bad. Sheesh. Nonetheless, I feel like something has got to happen now, surely. ^_^ (No, I kid, nothing is going to happen now.)

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 1 on principle only, there really isn’t any
Yuri – 2

Overall – 7

I hope Volume 6 will move forward, but not moving forward is kind of this series’ thing.^_^; In the meantime Volume 3 in English is headed our way in May (with possible delays because of the pandemic.)

Posted in Yuri Manga | 1 Comment »


MURCIÉLAGO -ムルシエラゴ- BYPRODUCT -アラーニァ- Arania, Volume 2

April 8th, 2020

MURCIÉLAGO has been a favorite of mine since Volume 1 hit shelves in Japan in 2014. And I loved that we got a side story about crazy-eyed sniper Reiko in 2018. It kind of ended and I forgot about it. Imagine my surprise, then to find that not only had I fallen behind on the main MURCIÉLAGO manga, but that there were like 5 more volumes of Reiko’s adventures in the underworld!  D’oh!

So here we are at MURCIÉLAGO -ムルシエラゴ- BYPRODUCT -アラーニァ- Arania, Volume 2 and Reiko is still corpse-deep in a Chinese mafia gang war. But, don’t worry, she’s cool. She is hired by one of the sides, which spell sdoom for the other side, and I wonder if you get shot like that, specifically, if your eyeball would hang out of your head like it does here. When I read this series, I end up wondering a lot of things like that, far more than I ever question the plot.

Reiko’s domestic idyll with her nice girlfriend is now permanently interrupted by the presence of a former Chinese mafia girl who likes to sleep naked and who fantasizes about Reiko.

Ratings:

Art – 7 Extra bloody and gutsy
Story – 7 Ditto
Characters – … … … What do you want me to say, really?
Service – 7
Yuri – 5

Overall – 7

I mean, who can blame her.

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