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Black Fairy Tale
Warnings: Violence, Extreme Gore and Mutilation, Animal Torture, Death My Thoughts Black Fairy Tale is a bizarre story, full stop, it is the thought that kept circling my mind as I read the novel and especially when I finished. What made this story so enjoyable was precisely for that reason. It is an offbeat paranormal story about a girl that undergoes an eye transplant and finds that she can see the memories from her donor’s life. While it is a horror thriller, surprisingly this isn’t the horrific part of the story as would be predicted, and I liked that the novel toyed with my expectations. “Everyone in this town was…
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Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse
Warnings: Death, Descriptions of a decaying corpse My Thoughts Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse is perhaps one of the more experimental stories I’ve ever read. It is told from the point of view of Satsuki, a young girl who dies early on in the story, and the clumsy attempts of her childhood friends to hide her corpse. The writing style was good, the descriptions of the town paint a vivid picture of rural Japanese life. The sense of a hot, humid summer can be keenly felt as the characters struggle to get away with their crime. The story itself was pretty decent and honestly had me flying through pages wondering…
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Love Vibes
Warnings: Sex My Thoughts Cheating is disgusting, whether it be emotional or physical, it is the undoing of a relationship because it destroys the trust that relationships are built upon. I know that there is some debate on this, but I’m of the camp that fully believes that both the person cheating and the person they’re cheating with (that are aware that they’re the side piece) are equally unforgivable. “To me, it’s more about doing what makes me feel good than about being with a person of a certain gender.” With that in mind, it’s been documented that cheating is an issue in the gay and lesbian communities. This is…
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The Couple in the White Room
Warnings: Violence, Homophobia My Thoughts Widely considered to be the first yuri manga, The Couple in the White Room was a defining work that helped to usher in wider acceptance of lesbian romances in the 1970s and 1980s. This story can easily be surmised as a dramatic tragedy in the spirit of theater classics like Romeo and Juliet. “Once I have known her, I must die. For that shining smile that is so difficult to describe, I must die. For those light, delicate hands, I must die. For her, I must…” The story follows Resine, a soft and feminine girl dealing with the tragic loss of her parents, and Simone,…
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The Secret of Friendship
Also by this author: High School Debut, My Love Story!!, Sensei! My Thoughts Maintaining a friendship after entering a new relationship with a boyfriend or girlfriend is one of those tricky things to navigate, especially if your best friend is single. It is not uncommon in both manga and in reality for friends to slowly drift apart as more time is invested in the new relationship. The single best friend becomes a third wheel, and can sometimes end up feeling lonely or abandoned by their friend, it becomes something of an expectation in friendships. The Secret of Friendship, or Tomodachi no Hanashi, subverts that expectation and presents a strong female…
