Could've been better if this was just a tiny bit longer. The first volume was amazingly written. The second is good, but not as good. The flow & pacing don't feel as natural, the glasses x tomboy pairing is rather detached from the main story, & the resolution to Fiona & Amy's story could've been handled better & less abrupt (couple of sentences for reconciliation & time-skip happy ending after all the hanging drama, rlly? I prefer sad ending, instead... better fit with the idea of growing out of your past). Still a really nice coming of age story & one of the best read I had all year. Really appreciate the visual imageries used in this series. Very emotionally gripping.

The title font of the cover makes it feels all cutesy and romantic, which isn't really the right tone, imo. ALSO, the title on the spine (and the spine itself) is fucking pink (on white) af. Seeing it placed in the bookshelves, Bloom into You looks like the pinkest, most shoujo-romance-looking title.

This really makes me wonder if they even read the manga yet. YagaKimi is anything but cutesy Shoujo romance. Looking at 7 Seas other manga covers, they did a good job being faithful to the original Jap covers or, at least, to the overall feel of the manga. But this cover (& the ones to come) is a complete disaster. It's a shame, really, since YagaKimi has beautiful cover illustrations. (I hope new readers will not ignore it because of the cover desgins)

Oh well, I ordered the Jap volumes already. They'll be my family treasure for generations to come. The English ones will be for casual reading.

NEED MOAR BLOOM

I hope I added enough Bloom for you

1/10 no grandma topping lil' wolf

Based solely on Nakatani's brilliant visual storytelling (or my brilliant delusional overthinking), I think Yuu is already starting to feel jealousy in this chapter. First of all, when Sayaka is assigned lover role & Yuu's trying to go along with Doujima's justification of the roles, we get the panel of Maki in his silent observant moment (holding a stack of paper to cover his mouth) in page 8. Then, when Touko asks if Yuu is bothered by the role assignment & she again plays along & says "not at all," we get a bubble visual break (pg.13), which is the same visual break seen in page 15, where Yuu reconsiders her words as she tries to hold back her true feelings from spilling out. It's safe to say that those visual breaks signify Yuu holding back her true feelings. I see them as the slight aching in Yuu's heart, which is why I think Yuu is already starting to feel jealous.

What a great father senpai has LOL

Guys, Touko's sister wore plaid before she died. She's safely homo in yuri heaven.

last edited at Dec 30, 2016 4:51PM

The guy is probably Touko's sister's friend. I doubt he'll stir any stupid drama.

Anyway, this chapter though ; _ ; Poor Yuu having to hold all her thoughts & feelings back. Can't even call Touko by her name no more...

It is canon & no one can convince me otherwise.

Just gonna share this dumb interpretation that I have regarding their relationship based on the show's context. This is the only way I can wrap my mind around why they would go full Breaking Dawn with these two. But I see Cocona x Papika as the Mimi x Papika that Mimi never had. IMO, Cocona is the part of Mimi that desires a different life growing up. One where she's able to be gay with Papika (& not het with Salt) & enjoy the vast freedom & possibilities (aka adventures) in life that the life & relationship she had chosen did not offer.

last edited at Dec 29, 2016 3:34PM

Uhmm yes, hair-porn. & I even have straight, long, black hair fetish. So yes, this is my fav oneshot from Eclair so far~

How did I manage to miss out on this till now? & I was following Eclair so faithfully, too...

This gives me life. Excuse me as I go cry tears of joy in the corner.

& just when I thought that this manga was losing its touch, the bear story happens & I can't feel my sides XD

last edited at Dec 22, 2016 4:14AM

Favorite story from the entire anthology. I like complex metaphorical stories & especially ones that deal with the question of identity & how it affects one's life, existence, & relationship with others. This one does it & I can't help but love it.

About the ending, while her old timid antisocial self dies while her more outgoing self takes over & presumably leads a better life, there is this sense of bittersweetness since the old self really does not fully embrace her other ego in the end, but is killed by her. I read it along the line of how she is now having a better life, but it's not even truly her who's living it anymore. It's debatable. This story (like the other ones in the anthology) kind of leaves it open for interpretation—as to whether the death of the original B-Ko is actually a good thing or not. I've come to love these sorts of ambiguous endings nowadays... Grey areas are interesting.

Edit: Somehow I wish that original B-Ko committed suicide in the end instead of getting killed by clone B-Ko... I guess it would make more sense that way since the clones couldn't do it themselves when she asked them to at first. It'd have probably been more thematically satisfying that way as well.

last edited at Dec 22, 2016 4:47AM

Oh wow, Yurine & Ayaka have so many more chapters dedicated to them than Moe & Mizuki... & yet somehow, they still manage to be the most forgettable couple while the latter is a legend... What a shame :(

^ Yes, it is a crime.

I can't decide whether Tamamusi's "indirect bra-ing" or this chapter's "indirect toilet" is better. Hmmmm.

Also, bombing finals so that you and your gf can have a romantic all-night playthrough of a yuri eroge is probably the most romantic thing I've ever seen lol

That was absolutely adorable. I was not that fond of this couple at first. But, they are up there with Moe and Mizuki now :D

Aaaannnd, that's a wrap for this couple.

Can we go back to Ayaka x Yurine now?

lol who are they again? :P

last edited at Dec 21, 2016 5:33PM

Ah~ a dose of diabetes is exactly what I need to carry out the day. Thank you, Itou Hachi.

IDK yo, I'm also a big fan of Nakatani Nio's.

If Nakatani's has been just as long as Hachi's, I think there wouldn't have been much competition.

Looking at her pic, I'd never expect her to be such a big anime & game nerd lol

Actually, she looks to me like she'd have a wicked sense of humour. Check out that subtle smirk.

I think the subtle smirk is her thinking: "These fools don't know that I'm here to infiltrate this shounen magazine publication and turn it into a yuri publication. Ehehehe." Bless Nakatani for contributing to yuri world conquest.

Joking aside, I can rlly see why Canno describes her as "a cool onee-san" now.

Asakura is my fav character out of this entire cast. What a cool guy. He doesn't deserve to get tangled up in this love polygon mess.

Still not quite sold on this series yet. I like that they try to develop an entire cast & their bonds through multiple perspectives. But, so far, everything is still going in circle & the tonal difference really bugs me for how much it is shoved into the reader's face. Every chap is like: "Oh hey look! See how happy they are as friends, laughing and hanging out with each other!? Well, here's a dose of angst-of-the-chapter to remind you that this happy relationship is only on the surface level LOL"

last edited at Dec 21, 2016 12:57PM

Looking at her pic, I'd never expect her to be such a big anime & game nerd lol

Certainly, men can write great yuri, but the problem is that they usually... don't. I was so excited for Valkyrie Drive at first. I mean, Soul Eater with lesbians? COUNT ME IN! Yeah, it was made by the people behind Senran Kagura, so I wasn't expecting much... but, it turned out to be pretty much borderline porn. There is so much that can be done with a concept like that and it was completely ruined...

But, yeah, all of Mujieda Fuyabi's (that's how I tried to spell it at first, anyway, but it's really Fujieda Miyabi) works are awesome, Prism and Sasameki Koto are great (as you mentioned), Hoshikawa Ginza District was great (though I think that blackmail strip photo thing which was completely ignored afterward is a pretty glaring sign that a dude wrote it...)... hmm, I'm sure there's more, but that's all I can think of now.

Yeah, I hear ya. Was not a big fan of VD either...

Not everyone is going to agree, but I love Kunihiko Ikuhara & much of his contribution to yuri, even YKA.

@minutoh I totally understand where you're coming from & I agree with your view to some extent. I, too, do tend to believe that women, in general, write more natural yuri since they know how to depict their own gender's emotions and experiences better. Tho I also think that some males can do great yuri, too, without turning it into mindless fanservice ^_^

The right one is indeed more readable. Maybe the glow effect should be reduced a bit though.

Thought the same about the glow, thank you :)

Nice art, deep and subtle writing, I'm really enjoying this so far. I just get the uneasy feeling that it might fall into drama at any point because I don't want that to happen. Guess I'm weird that way

Not that big on drama either, but I believe that this series will handle whatever drama it has in store well. Since it's Nakatani, there will not be random drama bombs thrown at us nor will any of it be painfully forced and dragged out, either.

I guess guys can write good yuri too. Such as Chatting at the Amber Teahouse and... well, this too.

As mentioned, Prism was pretty good. & I believe Sasameki Koto's author is male, too?

Nakatani was in some kind of music club is the thing i'm really curious about now

ah this probably also explains her enjoyment of hibike euphonium

Probs cus it had really homoerotic scenes too. If I recall, she answered hibike when asked about a yuri anime she was enjoying, and despite the responses she got about how it wasn't yuri, she was like lol it felt like yuri to me so it's fine
I'm sure she's following s2 right now, I was skimming her tweets yesterday and saw that around last week, she was tweeting about Kumiko lmfao.

I lurk her twitter everyday (not a stalker, I swear!), she basically tweets about Euphonium every single week, doing live reactions whenever new eps are out.