otakulys's manga / #supernatural(99)

Strange and sad little story regarding the worth we put on people based on their appearance and what they can do for us. I like the message, but I wish this sort of story could last longer. It sucks that girls like this, either monstrous in appearance or just outside of typical beauty, can really only exist in some sort of moral tale to highlight the fact that we care too much about looks.

Very sad, some more than others. I think this anthology showed strengths and weaknesses among the mangaka involved. Short stories can be challenging, writing something satisfying that fills in the blanks and makes sense in such a limited amount of space. The first story broke my heart into a million pieces. I was ugly crying and my cat came and forced me to hold him, which made me cry harder, so there's that. I was super bummed to see that mangaka has yet to produce anything else. I hope that just means she's new and we'll see a lot more from her in the future. Several stories were a little brief and rushed, but the ones that hit you hit you hard. Definitely a sweet but very heartbreaking anthology. Obviously, haha. But it was a good kind of sad. It felt real and emotional. The stronger stories, at least.

I really loved Demon Flower, which has a bittersweet ending itself, and I know this mangaka's style is to kill everyone as much as possible, especially sweet and innocent characters that stumble into the frame (I've never read a shoujo manga with so much graphic murder and torture of children), but the ending petered out so oddly. I've owned all four manga since they came out when I was in high school, but I only now read it on here, and I have to wonder if she'd meant to continue this but then it didn't work out, because even compared to her other abrupt endings, this was like she walked off a cliff mid-sentence. Plus, I hate it so much when a character is like, "You're all I care about! I don't have anyone else!" when friends of theirs are literally dying all around them to protect them. Seriously, bitch? You have no one else? The ending was a miss for me. It could have been more powerful, but in the confusion it just fell flat. 2.5 stars overall. EDIT: Apparently there's a follow up out there that she wrote in 2007. I had, in my delirious, sleep-deprived state, thought it was a continuation for Demon Flowers, though I'm not sure how that would have worked, and I got super excited. Now I'm a little sad, but I'm hoping it gets translated eventually, because this ending is so random. We need a follow up.

I seriously spent years agonizing over the fact that the publisher went under before releasing the final, translated volume. I thought I'd never read the ending. Then I discovered it had been scanlated about two years ago, and I was so freaking happy. It took them a while to get to it, so I'd lost hope. Thank you so much to the scanlation team! This manga is so sad and screwed up, typical of the mangaka, but at least the ending isn't as depressing as it is in some of her other stuff. Still sad, but it could be worse. I just saw that she wrote a follow up to the series in 2007, though, and I wonder if anyone will ever pick that up. It's been a long time, though, and it seems like her work is less popular in general, so I have no idea if it'll ever be translated. I miss how active scanlations used to be. EDIT: Damn it, I was deliriously tired when I saw the continuation thing, and it isn't for this at all. It's for the other one, The Demon Ororon. I should have read more carefully. But that one should be translated, because that story had such an abrupt ending.

Cute so far, and I love her art, of course. Four stars for now, just cause it's abrupt, and I don't know how I'll feel about the story. I'd like to know why he was suddenly like, yeah, cool, suck my blood--but that probably can be chalked up to yaoi logic. Still, I'm looking forward to more. ^^

Lmao, so random. I've noticed that's really common in eastern horror comics, the shorts in particular. Often, the snapshot itself seems acceptable as a complete story, but it's a little jarring on this end. Even so, there are plenty like that that are great little scenes. This one had potential to be a lot better. Oh well.

I really like the concept, but I'm iffy on this one. I want it to focus more on the political climate and the bigotry toward spes. Honestly, I hate that uke devotion thing, like he just wants to help no matter what. I hope it get better, though. The nightmares are intriguing.

Pretty art. It's an interesting little oneshot. I like the concept, even though it makes me slightly uncomfortable, just because I see them as such dear friends. But Ian McKellen did say he thinks they were banging on the low at one point, haha.

I was eagerly buying these up back in the day, as they were being released. Nostalgia! I miss the thrill of walking into the bookstore to see what was new, leaving with an armful of manga. Nothing since has ever quite been like that feeling. But I can't give it the full five stars, just because it always bothered me that she had to change writers, and the story obviously took a completely different turn than what had been planned. I feel like it was supposed to be way more shounen ai, too, but the new writer took it in a more lighthearted direction. It's a shame, but I still have all of the volumes from those years ago, and it is something I look back on fondly.

This is rather similar to a story I wrote when I was seventeen, haha. I like how pretty the uke is, and I like that you can actually see his penis. That's so rare, I was kind of surprised when it wasn't a weird, glowing orb. I'm sad that my biggest kink (purely fictional) isn't explored more in BL. I hate it in het. You'd think there'd be more stories where the seme is forced to watch the uke be harmed in some way. But maybe other people aren't quite as deranged as myself, lol. EDIT: Holy crap, I thought this was a oneshot! It was marked as complete at the time that I read it, at least. This was amazing! You NEVER see yaoi like this. And yes, this artist is messed up and depressing much of the time, but this was a very interesting story. Man, I wish more yaoi had supernatural action and factions fighting one another and stuff. Mooooooore. I want to read more set in this universe, damn it. All of the creepy things in the storage room, man... There's a lot of material there. It's still marked as incomplete, so maybe we'll get some extras? I'm just bummed that we don't get more of this world. I liked this story SO MUCH MORE than her other full length, Feeding Lamb, which was just disturbing as fuck. I mean, well-written, but mostly just unpleasant given the nature of it. I much prefer her supernatural horror to her serial killer/gore horror.