God damn, the acephobia is real in the Chili's tonight.

Anyways, the ending did feel very rushed, I would've liked to have seen them on dates and figuring out what they're both okay with and not so okay with. But outside of that this has been a very fun series, that suddenly likes to hit you right in the feels with oddly real comments, i.e. "I want to love myself first" from chapter 1.

hello yes why didn't this story i supposedly enjoyed abandon everything it's built to end exactly like every other romance story idgi

Because the point is that ace deserve the same happy ending as everyone else?

i think (hope?) they are being sarcastic and mocking other posters lol

Perhaps that would have been better phrased as "ace deserve the same happiness as everyone else"?

I certainly didn't mean to imply that ace should be just like everyone else to achieve happiness. More that, while I get where @justforthis is coming from in feeling that the ending was formulaic, perhaps that recognizable formula was exactly what the author was shooting for. That "ending just like every other romance story" helps the reader to realize that they have found happiness even though their relationship is a bit different from that of other romance couples.

last edited at Dec 9, 2022 1:17PM

I think this ending is good. I don't even really think it's that abrupt, honestly.

I am personally into reading these stories for Yuri romance. However, I found a lot of parts of the story (self-loathing, having to wear a mask, having to disappoint parents, having a fragile friendship on the verge of being more) very relatable despite not being ace.

If the story was a lot shallower, I don't think I would have been as charitable about the ending, but that wasn't the case.

Honestly, if you just ignore the speech bubbles for the last few pages then you already have an ending that beats several other Yuri romances (because some end after first kiss and a couple end even before that).

I’m so pleased we have an ace tag now! I hope we will see some more content falling under that tag in the future, and hopefully some other works that deal with ace themes with nuance AND some good ol’ SFW fluff.

In my headcanon, these two go on to live together and go on dates to their favorite places (I feel like Asahi would geek out at the zoo or the aquarium). They cook each other meals and watch movies together and support each other when they’re feeling down. And maybe the mom comes to visit more often and even starts fussing over Asahi now and then? That’s my self-indulgent fluffy continuation of this story.

Just posting to thank everyone who explained the ending better and what ace means. :)
Have to say I missed it being ace, perhaps re-reading will help me catch hints. Have to say my first ace would be Lilies, Voice, Wear Wind. I was expecting Yuri in that one too but didn't get it. That one though did have a better pacing and preparations though for one character already knows her being ace. So was waiting to see if in the end converting to Yuri. Crescent Moon and Donuts ending though felt rushed and kind of didn't go further past what potentially being in an ace relationship would be like. Stopped like most manga at just the confession part T~T Maybe there would be an Epilogue in the future?

last edited at Dec 10, 2022 2:17AM

This was a really fine story with lovely characters.
Their journey together is just beginning and it ends?
Why oh why must you do this to us Yuri authors ( and most probably Yuri editors).
Talk about a mike drop.

last edited at Dec 10, 2022 2:50AM

Have to say I missed it being ace, perhaps re-reading will help me catch hints.

There's definitely lots of hints about being ace, even as early as the second chapter. The problem is that coming to identify as ace and coming to identify as a non-ace lesbian when the person only has experience with men is something that looks very similar at first.

After all, when you have only had sexual experiences with men but aren't attracted to them (and didn't realize this yourself), it is easy to be unsure of your interest in sex at all. Some people on that path will discover they are ace, and some will discover that they just weren't dating people they were really attracted to. (And neither outcome is wrong or bad, obviously!)

It doesn't help that past experience has generally taught Yuri readers that if characters have a story arc like this, 98% of the time the outcome in manga is "repressed-but-sexual lesbian". The asexual outcome for this type of arc in stories (particularly Eastern stories) is very rare (which isn't fair).

So it was hard to see which direction the ending would go, by I don't think the author did anything wrong here. Not going ridiculously out of the way to signal this outcome is breaking trends within their genre, but they were trends that deserved to get broken. So even if this wasn't the outcome I selfishly wished for, I can be happy that a group that is often forgotten is not forgotten this time.

last edited at Dec 11, 2022 4:20AM

me and my fellow asexual meow meows

for me I didn't really feel like the ending was rushed. Would I have wanted more of their goofy shenanigans? Of course, and I feel like that's their only major sin for the manga. But I actually feel like the ending made sense.

Have to say I missed it being ace...

I'm ace, and I missed it being ace.

last edited at Dec 10, 2022 12:18PM

Both happy for the ace representation and sad because I really can't relate to ace stuff

HOLY SHIT THEY'RE ACE?!?!? WHY DIDN'T I FIGURE THIS OUT SOONER?

Have to say I missed it being ace...

I'm ace, and I missed it being ace.

I was freaking out within the first chapter, sending my friend screenshots. LOOK AT THIS! THIS IS TOO RELATABLE! I DID NOT SIGN UP TO READ YURI MANGA TO BE PERSONALLY CALLED OUT!

And then I really did not expect the author to make the ace stuff a major theme she would double down on. I think it’s interesting to have characters who never use any explicit labels for themselves. That’s a major contrast from Voice, Lilies, Wear Wind. It’s kind of nice, I think.

Have to say I missed it being ace...

I'm ace, and I missed it being ace.

I was freaking out within the first chapter, sending my friend screenshots. LOOK AT THIS! THIS IS TOO RELATABLE! I DID NOT SIGN UP TO READ YURI MANGA TO BE PERSONALLY CALLED OUT!

And then I really did not expect the author to make the ace stuff a major theme she would double down on. I think it’s interesting to have characters who never use any explicit labels for themselves. That’s a major contrast from Voice, Lilies, Wear Wind. It’s kind of nice, I think.

Label usage is incredibly rare in Eastern stories in general. The amount of Yuri stories where the word 'lesbian' is used is likely under 20%.

Voice, Lillies, Wear Wind was very abnormal in actually using the label.

Have to say I missed it being ace...

I'm ace, and I missed it being ace.

I was freaking out within the first chapter, sending my friend screenshots. LOOK AT THIS! THIS IS TOO RELATABLE! I DID NOT SIGN UP TO READ YURI MANGA TO BE PERSONALLY CALLED OUT!

And then I really did not expect the author to make the ace stuff a major theme she would double down on. I think it’s interesting to have characters who never use any explicit labels for themselves. That’s a major contrast from Voice, Lilies, Wear Wind. It’s kind of nice, I think.

Label usage is incredibly rare in Eastern stories in general. The amount of Yuri stories where the word 'lesbian' is used is likely under 20%.

Voice, Lillies, Wear Wind was very abnormal in actually using the label.

I liked Voice, Lilies fairly well overall, but that labels section felt like an “Aroace 101” infodump (a bit intrusive, but probably needed).

That’s why I called this series “kind of a breakthrough” for treating its ace characters as just a variant on the wlw yuri narrative. Like at least some other readers, I picked up on the ace signals early on, but for much of the series I thought the probability was pretty high that it was going to be a slow-burn to a “sexuality epiphany.” But as the ending neared, it became increasingly clear that the story was heading elsewhere, or maybe more precisely, it was staying the course it had established.

It will be interesting to see if other authors explore this new-ish territory, and how they might go about doing it.

last edited at Feb 6, 2023 3:25PM

I really liked the end, definitely one of my favorite yuri works. The emotional connection through the development of the characters was maybe rushed the last volume, but nevertheless sweet and in point with how I understood the Asahi and Hinako in this years of lecture c:

I was actually hoping someone could clarify asexuality for me as I am a sexual person,

The prefix 'a-' can mean "on, in, at", "in such state or condition", "in the manner of", or "not or without" depending on conext. Therefore, the word asexual can mean to be without or to not have sex or to be in the state or condition of sex. Asexuality can be no sex and can be having sex.

However, if one derives some form of fulfillment from sex, isn't that just being sexual regardless of importance and or prevalence or rate of occurrence?

I would have to assume that asexuality is ultimately defined by a state of absence of sex that is sustained without any desire for sex and any derived fulfillment from sex. Rather, an asexual person may have sex, but they won't miss or desire sex after a time of not having it and or when never having had sex?

Asexuality is a spectrum.

Basically, asexuality means not being sexually attracted to others.

However, there's romantic asexuals, who have relationships, but not sex. There's aromantic asexuals, who have no desire for relationships. There's grey asexuals who do feel sexual attraction, under very specific conditions only. There's demi-asexuals, who feel sexual attraction only after getting to know someone and creating a bond with them. And others.

I just say "I'm just me."

For examples in webcomics, there's Erin in Girls with Slingshots.
Vincent in How to Be a Werewolf who's demisexual.
Fiona in Supernormal Step.
Hannelore in Questionable Content.
Shades of A, the protagonist is ace.
Dina in Dumbing of Age is grey-ace.

Note, the A in LBGTIA2S+ stands for asexual, NOT ally.
https://www.asexuality.org/

Thank you for a reasonable reply. Still a little interesting in "some asexual have sexual attraction" as even people who define as sexual are not interested in sex in every condition and wait until the relationship is at a certain step. I just find it a curious overlap, but ClevelandClinic defines Demi as asexual due to lower than average sexual interest. I'll leave it at that and won't bind the comments, but thanks again.

The more overlap understood the less discrimination there is.

Anyway, cute series. I'm glad they ended up together and have the time and space to figure things out for themselves.

last edited at Dec 14, 2022 1:35AM

it's nice to see another Ace characters
we need more representation like this

last edited at Dec 16, 2022 10:24PM

Titular summary of the whole story:
https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/crescent_moon_and_doughnuts_ch01#23

Thanks to all who made this possible

Titular summary of the whole story:
https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/crescent_moon_and_doughnuts_ch01#23

Thanks to all who made this possible

Yeah, in retrospect, the title really should have been a clue. The Crescent Moon and Doughnuts are both things that are what they are because they have something absent. The hole is what makes the doughnut a donut. It isn't something the doughnut is missing, and the doughnut isn't defective because the hole is there. Same thing with the crescent moon. It's the absence of the fully lit face of the moon that makes it a crescent moon, but it isn't diminished because of it.

The point of the story is about how not having something most people have doesn't make you lesser, it just makes you different, and there's not anything wrong with being different.

Yessssss asexual tag!!!

Titular summary of the whole story:
https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/crescent_moon_and_doughnuts_ch01#23

Thanks to all who made this possible

Yeah, in retrospect, the title really should have been a clue. The Crescent Moon and Doughnuts are both things that are what they are because they have something absent. The hole is what makes the doughnut a donut. It isn't something the doughnut is missing, and the doughnut isn't defective because the hole is there. Same thing with the crescent moon. It's the absence of the fully lit face of the moon that makes it a crescent moon, but it isn't diminished because of it.

The point of the story is about how not having something most people have doesn't make you lesser, it just makes you different, and there's not anything wrong with being different.

The only thing missing is another 100 chapters of them living and indulging in their donut domestic bliss.

A ritual I'm fond of is to supply, at the end of a story that's accompanied your life and thoughts for quite a while, accounts of your acquaintance with it, the tale of your tale-reading. Here's mine.

Everyone has that one story that's come to texture their relationship with a genre, or perhaps art and life itself, that one experience that leaps past its screens and pages to wrap itself about your mind, trailing shadows and echoes over passing routines, reading you in days and dreams. It might not be your first tale, or even your favorite, but it bears within the annals and avenues of your memory a certain radiance, a quiet and haunting light not unlike the lunar glow that accompanies Hinako and Asahi down many a night. You find yourself returning to it by coincidence or design, or even in the turn of a musing upon rainy days, recalling with wistful smiles not simply the work itself, but the very experience of reading it, the time in your life that coursed about it, and that distant version of yourself who did the reading, a stranger bound to you across selves by the pulse of a turning page. The tale becomes, in this ebb and flow of recollections, almost the spiral that binds an inkless journal, a diary of influences and impacts, of the craters of feeling that painted upon you, in those days, old faces as mark the moon. The images sink into you, the paper curls, like oh-so-many sighs and laughs, about the voice of your heart, and the line between reader and text, chapter and season, title and memory melts and flows into the crevices of your yesterdays, trellising tomorrows. So it went with Moon and I, across innumerable todays.

I had the privilege of reading the first chapter upon release, almost three years ago now, a moment I still fondly recall. On a cold winter morning, I'd been scrolling sleepily down a manga forum shortly before I dragged myself to university, not entirely sure what I wanted from it, of what I'd hoped to find, if anything at all in that drowsy exercise of habit, not unlike flipping through a morning paper half-warm from the presses, half-cold from the bicycle ride. I'd hit the twilight of my anime phase, having sailed over the past few years across vibrant carnivals of passion that had begun to feel like white noise, across sagas of battle and bustle now each indistinguishable from the last, across explorations of spirit, purpose and storytelling itself that now seemed trite in their bugles against long-departed gods, and yes, across romances once charming in their earnestness that now felt like dreary, oversexed, normative exercises in contrivance, not half as heterogenous as they were heterosexual, and as devoid of organic, human sexuality as they were packed with voyeurisms of archetype. And yet I'd grown used to these worlds, these patterns and frameworks of art, which had been to me as bulwarks in uncertain days and remained for all their cramping and clumsiness a sort of pillow fort I still didn't wish to leave, still didn't know how to escape. It was in such a phase, in the liminality that accompanies the awareness of hesitation, in the longing for changes that change oneself, and in the glow of skies lent nascent blushes by suns behind horizons that still defer to a phantom moon, that I chanced upon a tale with a striking title, not much-discussed, and took a chance between spoonfuls of a forgotten breakfast, in the stretch of meagre minutes before I'd have to trot out the door.

Something about the first page caught my breath, made me forget, in that routine skim between pages, to take with me that customary apathy that mantles a longtime reader, insulating one from deep emotion and reducing all relations of art to cliches about cliché, to easy pedantry and dull irony, to soulless condensation into tawdry blurbs- Oh, a yuri? Depressed girl x stoic girl. Office cubicles. Art seems nice. I'd parsed series this way before, seen stories bundled up in that fashion dozens of times, and perhaps still occasionally do so now in deference to efficiency, to the law of conservation of investment. But something about Moon stuck, knocked me off balance, and filled me with a odd sense of melancholy, equal parts yearning and relief, as if I'd not read, voyeur-consumer-scanner aloof in my position at the end of the line, but been seen in seeing, experienced some manner of strange connection to which I couldn't yet lend a name. It wasn't the genre, per se- I'd encountered yuri before, and it played a large role in my acquaintance with queerness, in helping me trace the contours of my strangeness, to grow familiar with idiosyncrasy, but those days were distant yet, for I didn't know myself well enough for identification, to know fully of identity. And yet there was something about that tired woman gazing out on the first page, holding uncomfortably about herself the layers and fritters of a daunting culture, wondering what combination of these parts might make a whole, and settle her on the right side of an equation to normalcy. There was something in the way she sadly smiled at foreign futures, longing to feel anything at all, hoping to discover a moment, a sensation, in the reflection of which she'd experience herself, know she'd existed in retrospect, desperate to be normal, even and especially unto herself.

I didn't understand why I felt so deeply about Moon, why this quiet, gentle tale moved me so much more than anything had in recent memory, errant observations in thought bubbles taking up long residence in my mind, crests of ink in tears and smiles burnished within my daydreams. I read those early chapters time and time again, breathlessly waiting for new releases, filled with an anticipation of a different kind than when I'd burned to know the outcomes of cliffhangers and the fallout of twists, eager now not for thrills, shock and astonishment, but for mundanity, for the endurance of warm moments, for an idyllic everyday not devoid of conflict or dread or pain, but capable with a tender touch of guiding these characters I'd come to resonate with so dearly through all the tumult, of giving them- and me- a place of respite, not distant and romantic and faraway, but in that most rare and glorious of spaces, in a mind at peace with itself. Moon became for me not merely a story to return to, but a story to begin from, a story to live through, a host of stations across which I could trace the meanders and mysteries of my own growth.

Passions turn as seasons and stars, and so did my feelings for Moon. I loved it always, but in different ways as well, and all as fulfilling in their own time as the flavors of loyal doughnuts, adored because they're always there and yet never quite the same. At times I'd let it slip into memory's backwaters, lingering at the peripheries of my mind, sparked into prominence at turns in conversations or glimpses of other stories, refreshing my fond acquaintance with those hopeful old girls unwinding in selenic sugartime, encountered blissfully in happy crossings of paths. At times, I'd be overcome with a need to catch up, to arrive at some sort of conclusion, and rush to read the series again, only to groan at a daunting gap between the last release and today, and yet feel also a strange sliver of relief, for the series wasn't and would never really be gone anymore than the moon in the sky, and lit my way through life still, shining in gloomy nights with illumination so gentle I hardly knew it was there, and would yet perhaps be lost without. Moon wasn't just a story at this point, but a presence, a will o' the wisp, a part of me, feeling across what I still struggle to believe were just twenty chapters like a natural phenomenon that'd always hang about. And yet here I stand, at the end of an epic that perhaps wasn't so epoch-spanning at all, half-feeling like I've arrived at the end of an era, and the other half as I always do about Moon- fond, cheerful and largely content.

There was a mild compulsion after I was done reading the final chapter to explore the series again, to go through it all one last time in a grand odyssey that would last for approximately an hour (all of this, and only in twenty chapters?!), but I ultimately decided against it. I'll read dear Moon again, of course, but only when I feel a Moon reading coming on, when the time's right, which it isn't now, which it might not be for a while, which is fine. Having experienced this series across three years, my memories of it are peppered with holes not unlike those of a doughnut, and are perhaps all the more precious for it. I do so despise writing reviews, of bundling together a host of notes about various vivisected categories- Characters, Plot, Pacing, Message all that rot- which do such a profound disservice to the subjectivity of a work, its numinous thisness, and especially to one so concerned with intangible treasures as this, so close to my heart precisely because I still can't quite turn it into an easy eyecatch or slogan, and so must ramble on forever about and mine myself to serenade. Moon to me is me, a host of mes like the faces in the night, a host of nights and days and gays, a host giving me a wondrous place to stay. It reflects a me who wondered about my identity and hoped for some kind of change on that winter morning long ago, a me who slowly learned the ways and means of reading and found this series all the more profound upon reunion, and a me who looked for solace and familiarity and comfort so few other works could provide as I made my way through the world.

In this final chapter, it also reflects a me who is very much ace and glad to see a tale that lets the promises of love, its declarations and dedications, its dear little moments and secret affections, its places and times so special in sharing, be afforded the same significance as those relationships that abound with designated signifiers, their kisses and bases and nights together all ranged in a hoary schedule that to some is order and purpose, but to others like myself mere suffocation. How often I've heard the cacophonous demand, especially in media, for a queerness only legitimate in production, a queerness pulped upon the millstone of Depiction to turn out yields for self-appointed arbitrators of legitimacy, who butcher in myopia many a tale of subtlety and intrigue and declare the maggots that turn in the corpse of stories misread mere bait, rendering themselves by this gross metaphor connoisseurs only of the conventional, consumers of their own consumption. But enough of them, for whether they wither or burst, we'll always have Moon and all the tales woven in its loving fashion, stories willing to give queerness its own pace and flow, to tell difference on its own terms and to not retrofit queer people to established narratives, scrabbling for ways to cram them into the Usual, but to sculpt and charm the form itself to articulate the tenor of our dreams and pleasures, to give our lives the vibrant care and creativity they deserve.

Usui Shio achieves this brilliantly across all their works, queering makeup and dresses and art and marriages, crafting them expertly to articulate a rapturous vision of love that accommodates in its willingness to give people all the time they need a cosmos of identities, always so clemently itself- it's no wonder that I'm a huge fan of everything they've made, and that Moon will enamour me forever. I pray for their success in all future endeavors, and hope that I'll continue find in their art that priceless old serenity for years to come.

These four simple pages of the extra gave me such a deeply satisfying feeling and deep contentment. I'm not too sure how or why really. I can definitely say that seeing that the two live together now and seem content gave me a good dose of fuzzy warmth. I want more of this, goddamnit.

...I didn't understand why I felt so deeply about Moon... characters I'd come to resonate with so dearly through all the tumult, of giving them- and me- a place of respite, not distant and romantic and faraway, but in that most rare and glorious of spaces, in a mind at peace with itself...

I'll be honest, my circuits are fried having read your comment, but this specific paragraph really stood out to me. Very early on, the series has become something incredibly special to me as well, and those feelings you describe gave me a very vivid memory of exactly how I felt. The part of the paragraph I outlined specifically was something that I wasn't necessarily aware of, but definitely resonates with me. This series has been this sort of special to me, 'Haru and Midori' was as well. 'A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow' way back when as well. There isn't really a point to my writing, I'm just sharing.

last edited at Dec 17, 2022 8:12AM

Yeah, didn’t really like the ending. And I’ll fully admit that it’s probably cuz I just don’t “get” ace stuff. Like, not because I hate ace people or something. Just cuz I’m a deeply sexual and affectionate person when it comes to relationships, so two people being in a romantic relationship without those kinds of things I see as “necessary” or “given” just seems so alien to me I guess. And they’d probably see my relationships the same way too lol

Enjoyed the characters and story a lot overall tho. Just kinda wished I knew it was gonna be ace by the end so I could wish em well but not bother spending so much time on something I ultimately would have no hope of ever understanding