Latest chapter was completely bonkers, Sayaka and Sumika's relationship (imagined or not) is quickly becoming my favorite part of the manga.

Also, I thought Sayaka's ノット海外 rant in English Ch5 now being French was a nice touch.

I think maybe the paywall might feel a bit steep for those reading a lot of series (especially compared to services like that MangaPlanet thing that licensed a bunch of works recently), but keep in mind it's exactly the same model as Taiyaki's Japanese FANBOX (with extra risk to recoup translation costs on her end). She's been updating almost weekly (skipping the first week of the month); this wasn't a "scanlation was far behind the raws" situation, many times it was up here or MD before I could even get around to reading the Japanese version.

So I think it's best to think of it more as "getting to read the chapters early", since as mentioned it appears you'll be able to buy the collected chapters at Booth later, and if it's anything like the new digital chapters on Japanese Amazon, they should be pretty inexpensive.

last edited at Dec 13, 2020 7:25PM

So I looked up 尊い and it seems it sounds like "tōtoi" (toh-oh-toy) and means "precious" just like the tlr said.

But I have never heard anyone say toh-oh-toy in any anime or tv drama I watched. "Moe" sure, all the time, but toh-oh-toy never.
Gotta be a really niche thing, like fujoshi speak for cool boys and BL? Either that or it's way unusual in everyday talk. I wonder if it's more common in manga? Like that one chapter of Yuru Oyako where Yuuki explains "precious" to Sayaka and then Sayaka calls Yuuki precious, I wonder if it was 尊い they were talking about?

As far as I know, it's recent-ish otaku slang (I especially see it a lot among BL/yuri fans), so you'll probably see it more in manga (at least for now). The term was what the Yuru Oyako chapter was about - Sayaka didn't understand it because it's a young people term and imagined a Buddha statue because of its standard meaning's "noble" connotations, when it's actually something like feelings of "this is too adorable" crossed with that "I want to protect it" meme. 尊死 is also fairly common, which is something like "it's so 尊い that I died" or simply "death by preciousness".

last edited at Dec 9, 2020 11:07PM

She's great, and also super nice

I forgot to mention, because there was a lot of interest, the anthology will have a bigger release at Comitia 135, which is currently (COVID willing) scheduled for Feb 21. She's also working on setting up a fansite in English and trying to get more of her work officially translated.

She had been talking about an anthology for a while (among other things, I remember her joking a few months ago, after reading some post by Inui Ayu, about doing a "virgin birth anthology" because "the hardest part is figuring out how to get rid of the dad"), so it's been really neat to see the idea take off.

last edited at Nov 28, 2020 1:23PM

Yes, she did up to Chapter 9.3? (with the notable exception of Chapter 8) through a translation service, here's the Twitter thread with the first set. She also posted a short English guide on how to sign up to her Fanbox. It seems that the particular service she used (Mantra) is mostly directed toward larger commercial users, but if there's enough overseas people on Fanbox she'll think about what to do. She's in the unique position of having a big fanbase abroad but zero publisher support, so it makes a lot of sense to try new things out.

last edited at Oct 31, 2020 4:36PM

Information about the anthology has been released. It appears the era of 親子百合 has finally arrived, but Taiyaki mentioned that since it's just a word to describe a relationship, the interpretations of each author vary. Expected release is late Jan-Feb of next year, mostly digitally distributed with a small self-published print run. All links are to Dynasty profiles (unless I couldn't find one, then their Twitter).

Lineup:
Taiyaki (obviously)
Inui Ayu (Teiji ni Agaretara)
Tamamusi (Bright and Cheery Amnesia)
Kasuga Sunao
Kurogane Ken (Hoshikawa Ginza District 4, etc)
Torii Sumi
tMnR (My Unrequited Love)
Namaniku (I Want You to Only Love My Body)
Nega
Hirao Auri (Oshibudo)
Misaki Tenmu
Yoshimura Kana (Murcielago)
Reon

last edited at Feb 28, 2021 10:05PM

Who is sayaka talking to?

To add some context, the Twitter caption for that one was "I want to clear up misunderstandings". The original picture was very popular on Twitter, so I think Taiyaki wanted to clarify their relationship for those people.

edit: Oops, didn't see the new page!

last edited at Oct 17, 2020 4:41PM

Sayaka is 36, her character profile's at the end of the Staying at Home chapter. Taiyaki tends to write them for even minor characters, they're just difficult to find at times (either from being volume extras for 1 1/2, or in this case because most of the extras are posted separately on Twitter and folded in with the most recently released chapter here).

This would be really nice.

Between her publisher meeting reports about 1 1/2, the whole saga with her parents' restaurant, and her undying love for Yozora Kasumi, Taiyaki really has the best Twitter of any mangaka I've ever come across.

I vaguely recall that, once upon a time, Sayaka was indignant at the idea that she would eventually give in to Yuuki's whims if pushed hard enough.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

Huh, I forgot that Sayaka was originally introduced as the "level-headed" foil for Ayako.

While Sayaka "Ayakoized" pretty quickly, Yuuki picking up on any hint of immaturity to treat her as more as a peer than a parent has consistently been hilarious. It reminds me of Asuka and Ayako's back and forth in the second? chapter of 1 1/2 - if I remember right from the redraw notes, Taiyaki mentioned that Ayako was originally supposed to have a very "direct" personality (closer to how Sayaka is in this), which is why she seems so out of character there.

Aaaa I'm so happy to see this up, I really love her work, but Booth is dead for R-18 books overseas. Thank you for the upload and the translation!

She ran a poll on Twitter the other day gauging interest in an anthology (you can probably guess the theme), and it looks like there was enough that she's moving forward. It'll be interesting to see who participates, Tamamusi did a little Twitter comic along similar lines the other day.

I don't think Akira even has a medical license, she's just a pharma HR manager/exec with a penchant for suddenly embracing pharmacy staff who want to call her onee-sama. Which is a very inappropriate thing to do to people in real life (who aren't me), by the way. Strange how that works!

@T0D13

It's not even over yet, lmao. The author just decided to do a re-do before continuing the story further.

Does that mean that we have to experience that Senpai flashback hell again? shudders

I don't hate the Miyuki arc, but I'd be surprised if it wasn't one of the more radical changes she makes to the story when she said she's focusing more on Asuka/Ayako for the re-edit. It's still important to the plot and Taiyaki loves her siscon characters, but it's weird to read the earlier volumes and not have it brought up much, aside from leading Ayako to think Asuka had a history with Jun.

last edited at Sep 4, 2020 5:20PM

Yes, she's been really transparent about the work she's been doing on the redraw (she's moving very quickly on the drafts) and writing a lot about the changes that were made. I think maybe there's a desire to prove that the work is technically good enough to be published, but I don't think she has any illusions that that would happen. When she brought it in to publishers in February, it seems like it was already well received, but the blanket prohibition on the theme made it impossible. I think it's closer to "if I'm going to stay self-published, and if I'm going to continue the story from here, I'm going to make the foundation of the work consistent in quality before building on it further", and while you can argue whether or not that could be demotivating/is too much work, make it feel too polished, etc, it seems like a pretty well-reasoned decision to me.

I'm honestly kind of curious - would a Vol 10 that just wraps everything up neatly have been preferable? I guess that's kind of a false choice, but I always got the impression that that was Taiyaki's original plan before this, and I was worried that there really wasn't enough space to give any satisfying conclusion. When she announced the redraw, she explained how it's not just a "yuri work", but even if that was all it was, I'm always a little disappointed when series end without really exploring the new relationship and its dynamic, and I can't imagine it would do much justice to this story.

last edited at Aug 16, 2020 12:48PM

I did end up sending Taiyaki a message with some of the sentiments here, namely that while there were worries about the particularities of her work being lost and the momentum going into the next volume, above all it was felt that (while it might be expected from the fan perspective) her existing technical skill is excellent, her passion makes it stand out, and we support her and her hard work. So if you're anxious about something, know that at least she probably has it in mind. I don't know how much she'd want me to share, so the summary is she really appreciates all the overseas fans and wishes it was easier to communicate, and she may be doing something in the future that'd be helpful in that respect.

Now that some of the redraw work is actually up, I think I can understand better the approach she's taking than when I read the first announcement. It's behind a (very small! so go support her on Fanbox!) paywall, but the first chapters were arguably the ones that needed the most radical work, and she's putting a lot of care and thought into each change. It's clearly still a ton of work, but it appears as if she wants to go much further with the story and with that in mind it makes more sense to do it now. The Vol 9 extras should be pretty enlightening.

last edited at Aug 11, 2020 3:00AM

I think Taiyaki should see these opinions. Maybe you two could write them on her twitter?

Also, she is planning to start re-writing right now and not in the future.

I'll definitely think about it, or at least asking her about some of this. We talk occasionally so I don't think it'd be weird, but she seems a bit shaken up recently so I'll give it some time.

Did I miss something in the post about the timeline? From the last update, I thought her whole goal for doing this was to spend the 6 months trying to gain the skills that would would be necessary to re-edit it in a realistic time frame in the first place with a team. I figured she'd spend the meantime finishing the last volume, and return once those skills were there: it's a small amount of extra work, but you have a completed draft to work off. If she's... starting re-editing when she doesn't know if she'll be able to re-edit yet.. eek. I completely understand the need to refocus the work eventually, but I can't think of a worse time.

Part of me sees statements like "イチトニブンノイチを親子百合界のやが君にする" and wants to be supportive, but the "works in a creative field" part of me sighs, because she's already made "百合界のイチトニブンノイチ", and I don't think she truly understands how big of a deal that is. When she was discussing how the reaction was split between fans that say "this is amazing" and the rest, I began to wonder if maybe recognizing an unrealistically uncritical fanbase might lead her to put more stock in professional criticism than might be constructive for the work.

Off topic, but if anyone knows how to contact someone about every post I make tripping the spam filter, please let me know.... I tried in the Rules thread and didn't get a response.

last edited at Jul 24, 2020 10:09PM

Re-editing it had been in her plans for a long time, and I think everyone assumed at least the first chapters would get redone somehow when that happened. I didn't expect her to redraw the entire thing.

My takeaway was that she received professional criticism that while it's a very engaging work, it's very convoluted at times. The kind of story she's trying to do is difficult to accomplish (lots of character threads simultaneously), and she's had the attitude that all the characters needed to be fleshed out as if they were main characters. Additionally, she came to recognize that it's "yuri manga" in a secondary way - she wants to write about human drama, the differences of romantic vs. maternal love, and so on, and was told that part wasn't coming through.

Since she feels uniquely blessed to have a readership that enjoys and appreciates the work despite the unevenness, she's trying to balance the two perspectives, and this is the solution that she came up with. It does appear it's going to be a significant rework and will focus more tightly on Ayako and Asuka, so some scenes will change but the essence will still be there.

There are some legitimate narrative criticisms: the Miyuki arc drags on quite a bit, characters like Jun/Rui (Akira less so) appear and then fade into the background once they prompt a realisation. There's a lot of jumping back and forth that's hard to follow, so it would benefit from the side-chapters being folded in. But I'm a little worried she's falling into the perfectionist-artist trap of realizing the end is in sight and suddenly being much harder on herself about the work as a whole than is healthy.

I think it's wonderful that she's receiving criticism at a professional level and that's the way to improve as a professional, but I feel that Taiyaki's work has a unique charm that may come from her being more of an outsider. I totally disagree that it doesn't express its themes effectively, and I'm concerned that focusing on Asuka/Ayako more may actually exacerbate some of the current issues. I hope this is a long term goal for after the series is finished, once she learns to manage an editing team effectively as she mentioned in the last update.

last edited at Jul 16, 2020 7:55PM

I thought that since she has books on Amazon, she had some small deal with some publisher or something like that, so everything is done just by her?

I'm pretty sure she handles at least the listings herself, she tried to list Kimi no Kimochi at one point and that didn't go well. That's been in continuous print, though, and Let's Meet Again Tomorrow is back as well. I don't know how the actual printing process works, but I get the impression the burden is mostly administrative, and a lot of it has to do with her wanting to do the future re-edited physical release rather than keep it web-only. However, when trying to find a publisher she said that discontinuing physical copies was her backup plan, so there must be some difficulty there.

Also, on the topic of the LINE stickers, the Japanese version can be bought in the US too. When they first came out, I talked to her because they were region-locked (I was concerned this might mean the English ones may accidentally get locked as well), and I don't know what magic button she pressed but she made it happen.

I didn't get if she would try to do a release or two in that period.

I think she's going to try to get back on a normal pace, but even with her tenacity, while she's doing this I'm not really sure if it's realistic. Hopefully I'm wrong, but even with the cliffhanger, I'd be happy to see more shorter works like we've been getting.

last edited at Jul 11, 2020 1:55AM

uhhh... so is it bad that i now want AyakoAsukaAkira ot3

Of course not, so does Akira!

This is fucking amazing. This is breaking new ground. I love it.

Just pointing out that in the raw the grandmother asks Sayaka to call her okaa-*sama*

Hah! Thanks for that detail.

Out of curiosity, in the same area, what is "Hyes" translated from? I mean, I know it's meant to be 'yes' but how is it written in Japanese?

ひゃい ("hyai")

Shinjuku Hanamuraya here is riffing on the famous real-life Shinjuku Nakamuraya, right? Hence Taiyaki going by 中村たいやき now as well.

edit: Oh, I totally forgot her being excited once because Nakamuraya's official account followed her on Twitter at some point, so that's definitely it.

last edited at Jun 23, 2020 4:01PM

Fanbox shows English natively for me when I checked so I always thought that's what English speakers were using, but if you use Fantia there's an auto-translate (in the top-right) that works okay. I had written a bit about how some of the more poorly-explained-in-English features work on Fantia but the board keeps flagging my replies (even those not about this subject) as spam... However, if anyone has questions about how it (beyond what's already been covered) or buying the manga overseas works, I'll try to answer them, because figuring it out myself was difficult.

last edited at Jun 12, 2020 3:39PM

She seems to be okay with fan works in general, and also seems to really like them. If I remember correctly, there's at least one person that writes fanfiction that she retweets occasionally. It's crossed my mind a few times to write something, but I felt Miyuki was the only side character that was distant enough from the main plot (there's still a lot of mystery behind Akira that feels like it could be very consequential, for example), but that also had enough presence that her motivations and character were clear enough to work off of, and I'm not that interested in her.

last edited at Jun 6, 2020 1:37AM

I still can't get over Yuuki's other parent in the diagram being cut off by both the frame and a line about her mom's precise job title, Taiyaki is the best

The title is 姉の娘と正しく在りたい世界の私, the Japanese store link is here. It looks interesting!

last edited at Apr 16, 2020 4:27PM

On that subject, if anyone's interested in buying the series, I was looking at the digital editions recently (note that there are no previous volumes on Fantia/Pixiv because of Amazon's seller TOS) and Amazon offered me half the first 4 books' price in points toward a future book purchase which should be usable on the next 4. So I thought that was a good way of picking the whole thing up and supporting her. I really hope she can find a publisher soon, her tenacity (self-publishing for years, meeting with a couple publishers but which fell through, now this situation) is super impressive.

edit: I should also mention that if you've ever added a US address, you have to switch your digital content region to Japan separately in "manage devices and content" for digital books to show up, otherwise they'll default to your home region and show as "Currently unavailable". This tripped me up because I had a Japanese address on file for other purchases, but the digital download region is a separate setting.

last edited at Apr 14, 2020 2:09PM