#mangaka: sakaomi yuzaki

[roguemaki]

bonus art card included with volume 4 of Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna (Melonbooks exclusive)

[rockislandadultreads]

Josei (Manga) Recommendations

Blank Canvas: My So-Called Artist's Journey by Akiko Higashimura

High schooler Akiko has big plans to become a popular mangaka before she even graduates, but she needs to get much better at drawing if she ever wants to reach her goal. Looking for an easy fix, she signs up for an art class, thinking all her problems will soon be solved. She's in for a surprise: her new instructor is a bamboo sword-wielding taskmaster who doesn't care about manga one bit. But maybe this unconventional art teacher is just what she needs to realize her dreams!

This is the first volume of the "Blank Canvas: My So-Called Artist's Journey" series.

My Clueless First Friend by Taku Kawamura

One lonely, gloomy fifth-grade girl is the target of her classmates' relentless bullying and teasing—that is, until a new kid arrives on the scene! Friendly Takada is as clueless as he is well-meaning, but somehow he possesses the magic ability to start drawing "Grim Reaper" Nishimura out of her shell. As the elementary schoolers experience all the fun of a childhood summer together—from going to the pool to picking sunflowers to watching fireworks—an unusual friendship blossoms!

This is the first volume of the "My Clueless First Friend" series.

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat by Sakaomi Yuzaki

Cooking is how Nomoto de-stresses, but one day, she finds herself making way more than she can eat by herself. And so, she invites her neighbor Kasuga, who also lives alone. What will come out of this impromptu dinner invitation...?

This is the first volume of the "She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat" series.

Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku by Fujita

Narumi and Hirotaka are, by all appearances, a power couple. They're young, good-looking professionals. But they have secrets from everyone but each other: They're serious geeks! Narumi is a fujoshi, and Hirotaka's a hardcore gamer. Their sweet, awkward love story started life as a webcomic before becoming a full-blown manga series by popular demand.

This is the first volume of the "Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku" series.

[katell-readikal]

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat

Synopsis: Cooking is how Nomoto de-stresses, but one day, she finds herself making way more than she can eat by herself. And so, she invites her neighbor Kasuga, who also lives alone. What will come out of this impromptu dinner invitation...?

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat is a manga serie by Sakaomi Yuzaki and it's a shojo-ai, aka a "girls' love" manga.

If you too are cursed with weebery like I am, you are probably used to the many pitfalls featured in mangas, and I am happy to report this manga has... None that I could find. The characters are ADULTS, there is no fanservice, it's very accessible to a Western audience, and regarding specifically mangas featuring homosexuals, it doesn't have that weirdo "I'm not gay but I'm attracted to that one specific woman/man! But I'm not gay! I will repeat that I'm not gay constantly!". At the very least Namoto (the shorty) is aware she is a lesbian, and coolio with it.

Another great point is that for a story centered around women and food, there is no diet talk (a brief mention of cholesterol, but it's more because they are adults lmao), no specific focus on Kasuga (the tall one) receiving negative comments on her eating habits, and it's overall just nice to see two ladies enjoying food. Food which is drawn in a sinfully tempting way, and the translation I have (which is the International edition, apparently?) has lovely little translator notes at the end expanding on the food and the recipes.

There are no important male characters (in fact I don't think there's a single named male character) and the focus is entirely on Namoto, Kasuga and their budding relationship, which is very lovely. They encounter real-life problems, like the occasional stupid comment from a coworker, periods, and the classic Complicated Relationship With Mother.

Overall I really really recommend it, it's very lovely, the second volume should be translated at some point this month, and I know there's a third one in Japan already.

Also bonus: I stumbled upon the information that the author is currently politically active in Japan and raising funds for pro-same sex marriage campaigns. I can't tell you if she is a lesbian herself or bisexual or whatever, as mangakas tend to be very private about their lives (bless them) but either way she is clearly doing some good in the world, so if I could convince you to buy the manga rather than find the scans online... yannow, I'm sure your bookshelves could use some more women in love ;) (source: there's never enough women in love on your bookshelves).

[waitmyturtles]

UPDATES BELOW ON HOW TO SUPPORT THE FUNDRAISER: My heart. This ad was placed in a major newspaper in Japan, the Asahi Shimbun, to celebrate the release of the third volume of "She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat" by Yuzaki Sakaomi. The mangaka is raising funds for the Marriage for All Japan organization, which advocates for same-sex marriage. Here's the full uncut ad:

Yuzaki-sensei is selling merchandise to raise funds for Marriage for All Japan. MY HEART.

I cannot WAIIIIIIIIIIT until the dorama adaptation premieres later this month -- it looks like Japanese Twitter is stoked.

I actually bought the first translated volume of the manga to prep for the show -- short synopsis is that Nomoto loves to cook HUGE meals but she lives alone and has a small appetite. Her neighbor, Kasuga, has a HUGE appetite, and Nomoto gets pure joy out of feeding her. And things go from there...

I totally recommend reading the manga! I finished it in a flash -- it is so cute and well-done. Here's a link to buy the manga: https://a.co/d/hUJTgmk

A GL about food -- my holiday season is already MADE. 💖

EDITING TO ADD: It’s actually possible for Western audiences to buy the items related to this fundraising effort, as I just discovered! (I thought it was going to be a lot harder.)

There are three special packages of TsukuTabe items that were designed for the Marriage for All Japan fundraiser -- here’s the link to the store: https://store.kadokawa.co.jp/shop/e/ept00320/

I’ve used the Tenso warehouse forwarding service before to forward items to ship within Japan, and then ship overseas to me. Tenso has a partner company called Buyee, which allows to you use auction sites or Mercari to buy items. You can also download a Chrome extension to have Buyee buy items for you on Japanese websites.

So I just used the Buyee Chrome extension (make sure, when you first sign up for Buyee, that you save a credit card or link your PayPal account to have an active payment method) to buy one of the packages, and it was crazy easy! So now I own things from this manga without seeing the dorama first, woops, but I’m supporting the fundraiser, yay! 

[yurimother]

Celebrate Good Food and Good Company in Newly Licensed Yuri Manga 'She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat'

On March 25, Yen Press announced that it has licensed Sakaomi Yuzaki's Yuri slice of life series She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat (Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna). The first volume will be released in English in September 2022.

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat follows the growing relationship of two neighbors as they bond over food. Yen Press describes the first volume:

Cooking is how Nomoto de-stresses, but one day, she finds herself making way more than she can eat by herself. And so, she invites her neighbor Kasuga, who also lives alone. What will come out of this impromptu dinner invitation...?

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat is serialized digitally by ASCII Media Work's Josie magazine COMIC it on Pixiv, NicoNico Manga, and Comic Walker. ASCII Media Works publishes two volumes of the series in Japanese.

Sakaomi Yuzaki is a mangaka known for her BL works. One of her other series, Tuichiro Wants to be Special to Takaki is published in English by Renta!

Look forward to the release of She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat digitally and in paperback this September.

[waitmyturtles]

Wanted to quickly post on two ongoing shows that I am loving! She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat (Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna, or TsukuTabe) and Two Office Workers Who Are Too Poisonous For One’s Eyes (Me No Doku Sugiru Shokuba No Futari or MenoDoku):

1) FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY, TsukuTabe is out and it is FABULOUS! GAHHHHH, a GL WITH GORGEOUS SHOTS OF DELICIOUS FOOOOOOD, I NEED MOOORE OF THIS:

AAAHHHH, MINCED PORK STEW, NEED A RECIPE ASAP, AAAAHHHHH!!!

But, no, seriously, the story is wonderful, which I’ve covered before, but really quickly: Nomoto is a single woman who has a small appetite, but a desire to cook HUGE portions of food. Her neighbor, Kasuga, loves to eat a lot -- so they might be a perfect match for each other.

I’ve written about the following before in the context of NHK’s 2018 dorama, Life as a Girl, in that I really love when NHK — Japan’s biggest broadcaster — tackles edgier content, such as transgender rights (in the case of LAAG) and now here, in a GL in TsukuTabe. The mangaka behind TsukuTabe, Yuzaki Sakaomi, is publicly and prominently supporting the legalization of same-sex marriage in Japan, and NHK certainly can’t be turning a blind eye to that.

But, as well, this show is loaded with commentary about gender equity and equality. It pisses Nomoto off, for instance, that her male colleagues equate her love for cooking with an assumption that she’ll be a great mother and wife. It pisses her off so much that she cooks way too much food to blow off steam — and invites Kasuga over to eat up. At the same time, Kasuga experiences discrimination by way of being served too little food at a restaurant, so she’s ready for Nomoto’s big dinner.

All of this is to say that there’s a LOT going on in each utterly darling 15-minute episode (gotta say, NHK, it is criminal that these episodes aren’t longer, but I know we have a way to go with GL in Japan), and I cannot wait to see where this goes. I really highly recommend reading the manga before diving in — it’s a fast and fabulous read!

2) I wrote about MenoDoku previously, and I’m just here to say that if you want to watch multiple office fujoshis be COMPLETELY over the top in their obsession of two guys in their office (all while the two fujoshis telepathically communicate to each other), PLEASE WATCH THIS SHOW. I am breathless, it’s total insanity. 

Basically, the show is about Oto and Shizuku, two gals who work in the same office, who discover that they both fantasize about Chief Hongou and his subordinate, Daichi, being in a relationship. The shipping is NON-STOP. Episode 13 shows the two lads having fallen asleep in the office, which is like earthquake-level for the two girls:

And later in the episode, the ladies realize that Chief Hongou had intentionally asked Daichi to drive with him to a training to help him through a rough patch in the office:

Legit, all they do is communicate telepathically and flip the F out -- it is HILARIOUS.

Each episode is only five minutes, but I hope this show goes on forever, because the shipping is perfect. I might have perhaps smelled a potential small attraction between Oto (ponytail) and Chief Hongou in another episode, but I can’t do that to Daichi, so I’ll leave it alone for now. 

Anyway, I am totally stanning these shows (kind of nice to have a touch of a breather after the Cherry Magic volcano of emosh last month), and I start Utsukushii Kare tonight, along with finishing Wakako Zake/season 5, which I will write a WHOLE THING ABOUT, because I love shows where people eat alone. And my khao man gai post will come soon, too, yay!

[yurimother]

Multiple Yuri Titles Nominated in 'Next Manga Awards'; Voting Open Worldwide Until July 11

There are currently multiple Yuri manga series nominated for DAVINCI and niconico's 8th "Next Manga Awards" (Tsugi ni Kuru Manga Taishou). From June 24 to July 11, readers worldwide can vote for three series from each printed and web manga category. The final winners will be announced at the end of August.

Readers submitted four thousand seven hundred eighty-seven non-18+ series with fewer than five volumes for consideration in May. In late June, the Next Manga Awards opened voting worldwide for 100 total final nominees. Yuri titles nominated include:

Print Manga Category:

Odoriba ni Skirt ga Naru (The skirt rings at the landing) by Yuu Utatane

The Summer You Were There (Kimi to Tsuzuru Utakata) by Yuama - Licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment

Tsumugu Otome to Taishou no Tsuki (A Drift Girl and a Noble Moon) by Chiune

Futari Escape by Shouichi Taguchi - Licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment - Futari Escape won 19th place in the 7th “Next Manga Awards”

I’m in Love with the Villainess by Aonoshimo, Inori, and Hanagata - Licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment - I’m in Love with the Villainess won 17th place in the 7th “Next Manga Awards”

Web Manga Category:

Amayo no Tsuki (The Moon on a Rainy Night) by Kuzushiro

Egao no Taenai Shokuba desu (A Mangaka’s Weirdly Wonderful Workplace) by Kuzushiro

Kamiina Botan, Yoeru Sugata wa Yuri no Hana (Kamiina Botan, the Drunk Appearance is a Lily Flower) by Hey

She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat (Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna) by Sakaomi Yuzaki - Licensed by Yen Press - She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat won 12th place in the 7th “Next Manga Awards”

Yuri ni hasamaru otoko wa shinebaii!? (The Man who Gets Caught in a Yuri Should Die) by Yomogimochi

There’s No Freaking Way I’ll be Your Lover! Unless ( Watashi ga Koibito ni Nareru Wakenaijan, Muri Muri! (*Muri Janakatta!?)) by Musshu, Teren Mikami, and Eku Takeshima - Licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment

Vote for your favorite series here until 11:00 JST on July 11 (19:00 PT on July 10).