Yuri Manga: Hana & Hina After School, Volume 3 (English)

January 4th, 2018

In Volume 3 of Hana & Hina After School, Hana and Hina face a growing distance between them manufactured out of their mutual desire to avoid their feelings for one another. Nonetheless, we’re probably not all that concerned about it, and the story just sort of coasts along from small crisis to confrontation to confession and finally conclusion.

Because we’re not really concerned at whether the principals will get together – it’s pretty much assumed that they will – it’s more or less how they’ll get there that is what we’re reading.

In my review of the Japanese volume, I noted that it’s extraordinary for a Morinaga Milk Yuri manga story to address any real-life issues. I wrote:

“In Kisses, Sighs and Cherry Blossoms Pink, Hitomi merely fantasizes about a future in which she and Nana are adults and can be together. In GIRL FRIENDS (Volume 1 and Volume 2) Morinaga-sensei took a step outside the isolation of a “couple in love” and gave Akiko and Mari friends…friends who accepted them and their relationship. In the very end, Mari even gave some thought to the issues of coming out to parents and what school and work might think…in the future.”

And that’s about all we get. In this volume we touch briefly on the concept of same-sex marriage at the very end and, in a roundabout way we see the possible awakening of same-sex interest in classmate Takagi, although it’s somewhat disappeared by the translation. My memory of the original has her saying something like, “I think I’m like that, too…” rather than “I want to do that, too.” Of course I could be wrong – and I could have been wrong originally, as well. I’m not motivated to go find Volume 3 to find out. ^_^ The rest of the technicals are top notch, as always. I just remember this particular scene as bing a “whoa!”moment for Hina’s classmate.

So brief touches on the realities of a life after getting together is all we’ve gotten and all we’re likely to get, but I still hope that one day, Morinaga-sensei writes something that goes beyond Story A. (Wouldn’t it be nice if in a future girl-meets-girl manga, we see a grown up Nana and Hitomi (or Hina and Hana they are mostly interchangable, so it hardly matters) who are there to help the main characters through their first-love-crisis-du-jour? I kinda think it might. 

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Service – 6 
Yuri – 8 

Overall – 8 

3 volumes was just the right length for this series. I think Morinaga-sensei is at her best when she has time to work through the “zOMG we’re in love” crisis, without having to rush it or drag it out. 

Posted in English Manga, Morinaga Milk, Yuri Manga | 3 Comments »


Yuri Doujinshi: Kitao Taki and Yorita Miyuki Short Story Collections

January 3rd, 2018

A million years ago, back in November, I was wandering around Comitia throwing money at Yuri doujinshi artists. In the hurlyburly of buying many things, I managed to pick up two collections that I wanted to tell you about.

The first, 2013-2015短編集 (BQ) 北尾タキ is a collection by Kitao Taki-sensei, an artist whose work I have been following for many, many years. 

This collection contains doujinshi by her from the last few years. There’s one short series, the rest of the stories are one-offs. A few of these are about schoolgirls, but many of them follow older, working, women.

The stories tend to feature a confident, (sometimes seductive) character and one overwhelmed by the overt display of lust shown by that character. “Overwhelmed” is something Kitao-sensei is both good at and clearly enjoys. She draws “flailing” with panache.

It’s amazing how many different ways “staying over my place after a night out” can be developed into a fun story, and [BQ] Short Story Collection explores them all. ^_^

This collection is available to folks with Japanese Kindle accounts or at doujinshi shows at which circle [BQ] is participating. You can also grab her 2016-2017 collection on JP Kindle or check out her Pixiv account.

Another doujinshi collection I nabbed at Comitia was by Yorita Miyuki-sensei. And I wanted to make sure I told you about it because you can get it on American Kindle (in Japanese)  under the name kanojonokuchizuke kansensururibido sosyuhen1! The individual chapters are also available on Kindle, as well and on Amazon JP in print as 彼女のくちづけ感染するリビドー総集編１.

This collection is a short series that follows two young women who meet in a hospital. One is cool and aloof, the other, interested but dishonest about her feelings. As they get closer, their health issues get in the way, but love conquers all and they end up with a lovely, dreamy happily-ever-after, removed from reality. 

The art for this series is professional-looking shoujo style art. Nothing happens here that will wow you, but for a solid story and a happy ending, this collection is very satisfying. 

Ratings: 

Kitao Taki [BQ] Short Story Collection – 8

Yorita Miyuki Kanoujo no Kuchizuke Kansensuru Libido – 8

It’s true that you can (and should) get work by talented Yuri artists online, but I still get tremendous pleasure from being able to walk up to an table and hand money over directly to these hard-working, unsung artists..and I hope I’ll be seeing them in future pages of Galette or other Yuri anthologies.

 

Posted in Kitao Taki, Yuri Doujinshi | 2 Comments »


Yuri Manga: 2DK, G Pen, Mezamshitokei, Volume 6 (2DK、Gペン、目覚まし時計。6)

January 2nd, 2018

In Ohsawa Yayoi’s 2DK, G Pen, Mezamshitokei, Volume 6 (2DK、Gペン、目覚まし時計。6), we get something we haven’t seen before – Kaede’s perspective.

Nanami, having come to a conclusion for herself, confessed her feelings to Kaede at the end of Volume 5. At the beginning of Volume 6, we see, in a single panel, Kaede’s true feelings. Overwhelmed, unsure and a little horrified at the idea that both the important women in her life have confessed to liking her, we see Kaede with an expression we’ve never seen before. It’s a great expression.

And then, Kaede gets back to work. Koyuki comes over to help and takes the opportunity to berate Nanami for being clueless about her feelings for Kaede, only to find out that Nanami’s also confessed. They have a tremendously satisfying scene where they argue about each other’s relative importance to Kaede and self-deprecatingly agree to keep taking care of Kaede.

When Koyuki isn’t available to help Kaede, Nanami finds herself intruding on the other woman’s bailiwick. Unsure of herself, Nanami asks Kaede about her history with Aoi. And, finally, we get a story from Kaede’s point of view.  (I still don’t like Aoi, but it’s nice to spend a moment inside Kaede’s head for a second, even if it’s just to find out that she really is a golden retriever puppy of a human.)

The volume wraps up with a look at Nanami from her coworkers’ perspectives and an invitation in the mail. The extra chapter is a silly “what if Nanami was a hard drinking pachinko playing layabout and Kaede was the responsible one”?  

This volume is everything I like about this series. It’s not rushing to pair the principals up. It’s taking it’s time with the main conflict of most Yuri manga – what the heck to do with all these feels.

The main “conflict” of Yuri manga is not the relationship itself, but where to put the feelings the characters feel. Most of us grow up surrounded by hetersexual expectations, role models, media, and discussions. From birth we’re handed a box labeled “Love” that’s filled to the brim with gender-associated behaviors and reactions and includes, at the bottom, an assumption of an opposite-sex partner. 

Those of us who, actively or passively, reject that box, are required to build a new box, often with scraps of media and fantasies. For those people who never wanted to or cared about rejecting that box, building the new one is even weirder. For Nanami, who came into this story with a fiancé and a presumption that the initial box was sufficient, this entire series has been about her recognizing that she may need to make a new box ,after all. And now, here at the end of Volume 6, she may just start to be able to think about doing that.

As I say this story is not rushing. And with this major step ahead in the main plot, it’s time for a digression. It’s the 5th digression so far, and at this point, I’m all curled up on the sofa with a glass of wine, ready to digress. Ohsawa-sensei, take me away!

Ratings: 

Art – 9 That one panel of Kaede was sublime.
Story – 8
Characters – 9
Yuri – 4
Service – 3

Overall – 9

The first volume of this series started with the message that life was messy, and it hasn’t changed a bit. I love it. Last review of 2017 and first of 2018! Bring it on!

Posted in Ohsawa Yayoi, Yuri Manga | 4 Comments »


Celebrate the New Year with Okazu Lucky Boxes! – Claimed!

January 1st, 2018

Happy 2018! It’s time to celebrate the dawning of a new year with our Okazu ritual sending of Lucky Boxes crammed with Yuri stuff to a few lucky folks! This year, the USPS has downsized the boxes a bit, so the prices have come down accordingly. We therefore have 4 boxes:

Box A – Large, $40.00 – Claimed

Box B – Large, Premium, $50.00 – Claimed 

Box C – Medium, $25 – Claimed 

Box D – Medium, $25 – Claimed

The boxes are all filled with manga, random Yuri and Yuriish goodies and each one includes a few items picked up in Japan. The candy this year is all Japanese, but the packaging is dull so you’ll have to take my word for it. ^_^; The Premium box has got a few special items in it (obviously, that’s why it’s premium, duh.)

EVERY box has more than the price’s worth of stuff. I can 100% guarantee it’s absolute pure crap, with no guarantees of any other kind. As always, I’m spending the last few moment before packing fitting more stuff in the box.

***

How to be eligible to buy a Lucky Box: Follow these instructions carefully.

1- You must live in the Continental USA (contiguous 48) only, no APO/FPOs – sorry about that, really.

2 – You must be over 18, I am not policing which books you get.  

3 -Email me at anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com with the subject “Lucky Box”. Use an email you check regularly. *****Please include your name, age, mailing address.  Tell me which box you want.*****

4- 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 like a dead animal. Thanks in advance. 

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

Let’s start the New Year off with some luck and Yuri!

 

Posted in Contests, Miscellaneous | 1 Comment »


The Okazu Top Ten Yuri of 2017

December 31st, 2017

Well, my dear friends. Here we are at the end of another year together. We’ve lost some important people, and had some hard times, so we should definitely take a moment and give each other a pat on the back and a hug, because we made it through this year, together. Good job, us.

2017 was a banner year for queer media generally and an especially strong year for Yuri, so we have a lot to celebrate! Get settled in while we look over Okazu’s list of top Yuri people, companies and series of the year. As always, comments are open for you to add suggestions, so lets have ’em!

 

10. Publishers of Yuri

Over the years, I have often taken time to thank the various publishers of Yuri in Japan and America. This year the list of Japanese publishers is so long it would become unwieldy, but it’s worth calling out Shinshokan, Ichijinsha, and East Press for their continuing commitment to Yuri and LGBTQ manga. We’ve had more lesbians in our manga in 2017 than ever before.

This is true in the west as well, with Seven Seas. Yen Press and Viz all putting out beautifully adapted Yuri – marketed as Yuri. This is such a huge step forward that it has to be noted.

Yuri bookshelves in manga stores, Yuri manga – and lesbian manga – on those shelves. Thank you publishers of Yuri for all your efforts in promoting and publishing good Yuri!

 

 

9. Comic Yuri Hime (コミック百合姫)

Several Yuri magazines have come and gone in the past decade and new anthologies have filled some of the gaps, but it’s really heartening to recognize that not only has Comic Yuri Hime survived since it’s launch in 2005, it’s been successful enough to go monthly this year and has sustained that for a whole year. Even though I don’t always agree with their editorial direction (and especially loathe their choices for series to adapt to anime,) that’s a fantastic benchmark for the Yuri market. 

Here’s to another year of good Yuri, bad Yuri and wtf is that!? Yuri from the folks at Comic Yuri Hime. For staying power, and for being a cornerstone of the Yuri market, Comic Yuri Hime makes the list at #9.

 

 

 

8. Kiss and White Lily For My Dearest Girl / Sweet Blue Flowers 

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again – I love work that understands and revels in its literary roots and creators who recognize the tropes they are playing with, but who refuse to let those tropes limit them. I love work with one foot in the early 20th century and the other foot and an arm clutching a cel phone in the 21st.  This year we have two great examples of this, Canno’s Kiss and White Lily For My Dearest Girl and Takako Shimura’s Sweet Blue Flowers, both available in Japanese and English.

These series are getting editions that not only “get” the content but also “get” the art and the references and the way the whole package is meant to work. It’s not just melodrama for melodrama’s sake, it’s melodrama that is supposed to evoke the heartfelt and passionate magazine letters of girls in the 1930s…with the understanding that all of this is not limited to school crushes anymore.

These stories are the fusions of old and new Yuri and, as a result, resonate with readers all over the world. 

 

 

7. Yuri With Adult Women

I will always want more Yuri about adults. I will *always* want more. High school and coming out and painful awkwardness in regards to my sexuality are many years behind me. And so, this year, I’m having a little party inside my head for series like Yuhta Nishio’s  After Hours, Yoshimurakana’s MURCIÉLAGO  and Ohsawa Yayoi’s 2DK, GPen Mezamshitokei.  (Of these, only  2DK, GPen Mezamshitokei isn’t available in English, which means that we need to pester Seven Seas to license it. ^_^)

I love that none of these series are even remotely similar. Schoolgirl Yuri might have to regurgitate the same stereotypes, but once we graduate, all bets are off. Murder, music raves, or living a life as a successful career women are all on the plate. ^_^ (Oh god, I just realized that Yuri has only *just* made it to Mary Tyler Moore territory. ^_^;) I just wanted to wallow in the fact that for this moment time, it’s not just all school girls all the time. Yay! 

More Yuri about adults please!

 

 

6. LGTBQ manga (and comics and cartoons and scifi and…)  

Shimanami Tasogare, The Bad Lesbian and the Seven Wives, My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness, My Brother’s Husband, Bingo Love, Red as Blue, Always Human, Steven Universe, Legend of Korra…the list here on Okazu of manga and comics by creators who are queer women of color, queer creators with disabilities, out queer manga artists is longer than it has ever been. This year has been a gold rush of amazing queer work from queer creators. I am practically beside myself with joy at the spectrum of diversity in my reading these days.

What the future will bring us is still unknown, but I think this is a genie that will not be put back in the bottle. I expect that we’ll see more great queer media from folks all over the world as 2018 develops.

May our tribe forever increase!

 

 

5. The Okazu Community

You, my dear readers, always have a place on this list. And for good reason. You read, you comment, your create Guest Reviews, you become Patrons. You contribute to and support the Okazu community with your time, engagement and your monetary support. 

You correct my mistakes, you make me think differently about series, you send me news items, you are the reason Okazu celebrated 15 years this year! And it’s for you that I try to get to as many events and see as much as I do, just so I can tell you all about it. ^_^ It is my very sincere pleasure to have you all as an important part of the Okazu family.

You are always one of best things about Yuri every year.

 

If you enjoy these end-of-year lists, and all the reviews, news and interviews we write on Okazu, please subscribe! Even a dollar a month helps us pay Guest Reviewers, cover events and buy the content we review. 


 

We’re just about at our final countdown and if you know me at all, you had to know what I’m going to squeeze in here. ^_^ 25 and 20 years old respectively. Wow. And not only not dead and forgotten, still alive and thriving. 

Both these stories were vital in the creation of the western Yuri fandom and with luck, will continue to be so for many years to come. These two series always have a place at any Yuri table I set. 

 

 

4. Sailor Moon 

Sailor Moon will always be the series that launched a thousand Yuri artists, writers and fans and this year got the definitive edition anime we’d been waiting for for decades AND the anime the creator had always wanted.  

Sailor Moon anime finally was picked up by a western company that wasn’t embarrassed by Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune, and Sailor Moon Crystal‘s important third season was given emotional depth by a talented female director, Kon Chiaki.  We pretty much got everything we’ve ever asked for from this series, including the personal approval of both anime and manga by Takeuchi Naoko, who had not had that chance when the series first launched and went on to change the world.

I feel replete with Sailor Moon this year and cannot wait to see what the 25th anniversary brings us!

 

 

3. Revolutionary Girl Utena

Revolutionary Girl Utena is turning 20 with a magnificent new chapter of the story unfolding before our eyes. Saitou Chiho’s art has leveled up in 20 years and she’s really gone all out to show us the kind of sensuality, the kind of intimacy, and the kind of surreal mystery and magic we expect from Utena. 

The anime has gotten a remastered release on DVD from Nozomi/RightStuf, with a even more definitive edition on Blu-Ray to come.  

This is a series that delights and confuses and concerns fans still, two decades after it landed. And I expect it will for another 20 years.  Here’s to another chapter of Utena to come (and to seeing Juri 20 years later!) ^_^ 

 

 

 

2. Asagao to Kase-san /Kase-san and Morning Glories

Yes, first love between two girls in school has been done. It’s been done cutely many times over, in fact. But there’s just…something… especially charming about Yamada, the girl with low self-esteem, who falls for the school track star and the way they keep redefining their boundaries and building their relationship with each other, that rings wholly true for me.

The Kase-san manga series is available in Japanese (Volume 1 | Volume 2 | Volume 3 | Volume 4) and English (Volume 1 | Volume 2 | Volume 3 | Volume 4).

The animation clip, Kimi no Hikari, is available on Youtube. The commercial for the upcoming OVA looks adorable and more manga is on the way!  I look forward to seeing Kase-san and Yamada come to life. This series is a winner in every direction and has been on this list every year since it first was published. It might have been number one but for the standout hit for Yuri this year.

 

The Top Yuri anything of 2017 is…

 

1. Galette

This perfect storm of crowdfunding, distribution, audience, market and creative pool was destined to be the number one most/best Yuri thing of 2017 the moment it launched. 

Galette‘s creative line-up is amazing. Some of the best pro and semi-pro Yuri artists contributing to a creator-owned and run quarterly Yuri manga magazine. What’s not to like?

And even more than it just being Yuri by Yuri creators for Yuri fans, it’s designed with an adult (read: mature) readership in mind. The design elements are elegant and the color scheme is subtle and artistic. Combine the stylish look with solid art and storytelling by creators like Monomo Mono, Takemiya Jin, Morinaga Milk, Otomo Megane, Morishima Akiko, with photos, stories and artwork by other talented creators and you have a hit.

Support Galette on Enty. Buy it in Japanese on Kindle (US or Japan) or buy the print book on Amazon JP, on another online store or at a show, it’s Yuri worth investing in

Galette Yuri magazine is the #1 Top Yuri of 2017!

 

From everyone at Okazu, we wish you a very happy, healthy and prosperous 2018! 

Posted in Top Yuri Lists | No Comments »