yomi hirasaka's gender has been debated for ages. hence, this is something i can't confirm, but i can say for sure that their works have been quite queer-coded in the past.

I have to assume that a work starring an out lesbian protagonist can be considered more than queer-coded, no? Just queer maybe. If the story starts out like this, there can really be no recourse into avoiding the topic. In fact it seems to be the main focus.

I am not sure why Yomi Hirasaka's gender matters to how queer the story can be however. There are plenty of male artists and writers who have proven themselves.

This being a yuri manga I simply have to assume that it will eventually be revealed the author is at the very least bisexual and that her interest in cute girls is not platonic after all, but the dynamic, the motivations and the build up to that are very promising.

I've read that some of the big yuri artists, like Mira, Ayanero Taicho, and Morishima Akiko are actually straight women, interestingly enough. Mira apparently even has a husband and kids, too. If this is true and not just some made up rumour, what that shows is something that's been said for a long time, which is that the Yuri genre is that it really is one that kind of transcends gender and sexuality, for all to enjoy

Oh. I believe I am starting to see the issue here.
When I was refering to the "author" I was talking about the character in this story. The novelist Ayu will live with now. That is what happens when I do not bother using names... I think the initial deflection she made that made Ayu believe she is heterosexual was a red herring and she is actually bisexual at the very least.

On your topic though, naturally you do not need to be a lesbian to write about lesbian love (although I find it incredibly hard to believe Mira is heterosexual, no offense. She could be married to a man, but that does not exclude her from loving women). As I said in my reply above, even men have proven their worth to the genre, so there are no limitations in my opinion.

I think it should be safe to touch on the HS's sexuality without sexualizing the HSer, and I'm hopeful this manga explores that.

I think that "sexualizing" train has already left the station, what with the masturbating-to-her-new-boss-in-the-bathtub scene and all.

hey this looks pretty good

If this pulls some "But you have to forgive your parents because they're family" bs like 30 chapters down the line i will physically fight the author

Same tbh, really damaging bs narrative that children have to forgive/give a chance to their parents just because they're family as if they didn't just get done emotionally traumatizing their child

This seems like borrowing trouble; I can't even think of any manga here that have had "you have to forgive your parents".

This seems like borrowing trouble; I can't even think of any manga here that have had "you have to forgive your parents".

Yeah, it's almost always like "You shouldn't hate your parents but you don't have to forgive them unless they earned your forgiveness" and often the parent has to repent and realize what they did was wrong before they do get forgiveness

NuclearStudent posted:

Discrimination is certainly not cliche. I can hardly remember any yuri mangas which use the term lgbt. Some people are really offended if it's not a fairy tale world

The bullying part was rather ham but described something basically realistic

Outside of dedicating entire chapters or arcs to it, what would have made the bullying part less "ham"?

Ham is going to be subjective. I've cried at things which just look terrible to my eye years later, when my emotional vulnerabilities have changed.

I'd have to say what gets my "this is ham" response rather than "oh god I feel you" response is just little thing about the framing, like the Super Action Punch panel on page 13. Even has a little "has done karate for 10 years" detail which got a smile out of me. The hero stance of the punched guy on page 12 also amuses me.

Again, this stuff is subjective. Five years ago I might have felt emotional about it, and I certainly have no objections to someone feeling strongly about a work I don't have strong emotions about. I'm absolutely certain that this manga really hit home with someone with the Super Action Punch and the rejection of the idea of being pitied.

This seems like borrowing trouble; I can't even think of any manga here that have had "you have to forgive your parents".

Dunno if you've noticed but we sort of enjoy borrowing trouble around here.

NuclearStudent posted:

Discrimination is certainly not cliche. I can hardly remember any yuri mangas which use the term lgbt. Some people are really offended if it's not a fairy tale world

The bullying part was rather ham but described something basically realistic

Outside of dedicating entire chapters or arcs to it, what would have made the bullying part less "ham"?

Outside of multiple chapters a better way would've been as backstory, instead of the as the intro. For example, if the drama was completely cut from the beginning and moved to the end of the chapter, so she's having a flashback in the bathtub. This way the reader only learns at the end why she ran away, after being introduced to the cute characters.
Rushed exposition usually feels better as a flashback than as a proper part of the story. If it's part of the story then it's just a rushed or "ham-fisted" story, which is better done as multiple chapters. As a flashback, even 1 or 2 pages of textless panels showing the classmates and parents would do the job. Since by that point the reader would already know the teen is gay and repressed.

About the chapter, this is looking pretty cute. Hopefully the parents/classmates stay out of the picture for a while so we (I) can enjoy some whole repressed thirst yuri.

idk, i kinda feel this is gonna be like “useless princess” with a bunch of drama for the sake of drama…

This was a really good opening chapter and actually a legit reason on why the MC is going to try to hide that she is gay. A lot of mangas I get annoyed when there's the miscommunication which could easily get resolved by just talking, but here we have already seen a situation where the MC did talk about being LGBT in a area that she thought was safe from her friends being like "I don't see why people have issues with anyone LGBT" to then having her school life ruined the next day from discrimination and her parents being shitty

I'll be interested to see where this goes. I have a feeling the author girl is likely just pretending she is also not LGBT to make this girl feel comfortable (as she likely thought she was straight) and then it'll just go from there

two LGBT characters with twintails who ran away from a hostile family, and ended up working a wacky service job

(the other one is Mogumo from Futaboku)

last edited at Dec 4, 2021 9:49AM

doesn't anyone find it interesting on how much faith is put into a literal teenager to basically become this grown woman's babysitter or is it that what makes this dichotomy work?

doesn't anyone find it interesting on how much faith is put into a literal teenager to basically become this grown woman's babysitter or is it that what makes this dichotomy work?

She’s really tasked with being a live-in personal assistant. One of the functions of having the mangaka make a great meal is that it shows that she’s not actually personally useless—she’s just feckless. And since she works from home, the mangaka doesn’t seem to have a lot of things scheduled outside the home that Ayu would need to manage. So just helping Hikari keep things together while she’s working should be within Ayu’s capabilities.

It does seem likely that Hikari will pull various stunts to avoid working so that Ayu will have to figure out how to handle her, but she’s not the walking-disaster, hygiene-impaired hikikomori mangaka that we’ve seen in other stories either.

And there’s a second chapter up elsewhere that shows Ayu being quite capable, and the relationship between the two being pretty chill and wholesome—at least at the moment.

last edited at Dec 3, 2021 7:36AM

Come on, "Master" was a good idea and it makes Ayu horny, which is a plus, should have at least tried it for a full chapter before changing into something else.

page 15 "(though she has a big chest) TL/N: squint " I spat at my screen

One thing I like about the teen girl is that she definitely gives off that “teen who’s got too much hormonal bs going on” since she’s always just a little too ready to hop on the lewd train whether it be calling out master, asking if she’s really allowed to do lewd things when told it as a joke, mastrubating after seeing hot naked woman, very teenager energy

ayu looks better with her hair down honestly

I've read that some of the big yuri artists, like Mira, Ayanero Taicho, and Morishima Akiko are actually straight women, interestingly enough. Mira apparently even has a husband and kids, too. If this is true and not just some made up rumour, what that shows is something that's been said for a long time, which is that the Yuri genre really is one that kind of transcends gender and sexuality, for all to enjoy

Can I please get a source on this?

I've read that some of the big yuri artists, like Mira, Ayanero Taicho, and Morishima Akiko are actually straight women, interestingly enough. Mira apparently even has a husband and kids, too. If this is true and not just some made up rumour, what that shows is something that's been said for a long time, which is that the Yuri genre really is one that kind of transcends gender and sexuality, for all to enjoy

Can I please get a source on this?

I don’t know about other authors but isn’t there an autobiographical manga about Morishima Akiko and some fellow yuri mangakas going to a hostess club to ogle the women working there? That doesnt seem very straight to me.

just a simple love story

I hope so.

The opening of the 1st chapter was quite in-your-face with the bullying but I'm interested in the direction the story's taking. I'm not sure if this will actually end up with the age-gap romance but I do like how the dynamic is being played out so far with Kairou-sensei being very aware of Ayu being a kid and Ayu having all this sad and horny teenage energy. With the way the story is being told and Ayu's character design this manga has an interesting mix of retro and modern vibes.

this manga has a light novel as well , its 5 chapters in the manga and novel are still in the beginning but manga is a little behind

Where is this from (ie Anthology / manga serialisation)?
I instantly know that this manga will gonna be good. "I was in my second year of middle school when I realized that I like other women". This is more or less true, that is, no explaination needed. I also realized something was off when I was around that age. It took me 12 years later to finally figured out what was that off about.
Just like her, I think most people do not have the fairy tale experience that they thought they would have. Clearly in this manga, the MC thought that it cannot possiblhy go wrong by outting herself. Too many mainstream movie and media like the happily ever after ending, or the "Son, I love you anyway, as long as you are happy...etc". In this case, movies or TV shows are fantasies for wholesome ending.
The irony is, other than Taiwan, Japan has the strongest legal support for LGBT. Granted the certificate or partnership certification system is not a civil union, let alone a marriage; plus has no legal standing. The two certificate systems cover some important real life question, such as picking up children from school. But you know it is gonna be real because you are not allowed to have more than one legal or illegal spouse on the side, which means it "ban" polygamy and thus unofficially recognize same sex union. Also, Japan is now well on its way to legalize same sex union, or marriage, since denying same sex marriage is ruled as unconstituitional. It is just a matter of waiting for the older people to die out so that the only opposition also will die out.
Hence having the certification system is a very good sign. It is even better that individual prefactures start to exchange and recognize each other's certificates, because this means that older people would be completely powerless in terms of final votes.

last edited at Dec 3, 2021 2:21PM

That "Can we!?" was surely one of the greatest moments in manga history. :D