More on the entry from yesterday

Yesterday I posted a link to Yaoi World after stumbling upon the site only to learn it was closing down, due to--well--craziness. I posted a link here on my blog so people could read the craziness for themselves. I feel I should have left some type of explanation because the entry itself can be very confusing unless you know the history of "Kira Takenouchi". And if you don't it'll take some time on google to unravel the whole thing. Below is a summary of who Kira Takenouchi is ganked from this website:

Kira Takenouchi is a controversial American yaoi author best known for her Ai no Kusabi-based doujinshi yaoi novel series, Taming Riki, which gained a worldwide following in the ever-growing underground yaoi movement when Takenouchi chose to sell her doujinshi series through the book publisher Yaoi Underground after seeking and receiving the approval of Ai no Kusabi copyright owner DMP/June. Despite receiving the green light to publish Taming Riki by DMP/June, Takenouchi has been denounced for selling the popular trilogy by critics who say she is profiting from another author's work. The book series is now being published by Yaoi House.

Takenouchi's books are extremely sexually graphic, depicting male/male (yaoi) sex, and have been banned in Singapore and Thailand.

The controversy continued in the spring of 2008 when Takenouchi, who suffers from severe bipolar disorder, abandoned her company Yaoi house while in a delusional mania state, leaving customers, investors, and authors to pick up the pieces. Takenouchi has since returned to the company and continues to generate censure for retaining the title of President, despite her now well-known mental condition.

This info, plus a bit more digging, helped make a lot of that crazy blog entry make sense. I mean, after searching the site it was quite obvious it wasn't a "yaoi" site, but one dedicated to Ai no Kusabi, which had me questioning it's motives before I moved onto the blog. The who debacle made me wonder if anyone actually took the site seriously. And, lol, wow, she interviewed herself and everything.

Anyway, tomorrow ends my daily updates. I want to apologize for some of the entries. Toward the end of my break I realized it would be a good idea to do my homework, so I wasn't able to devote too much time to each entry. I do have a bunch of ideas I'm slowly fleshing out and will hopefully see the light of day soon.

Ha-ha-ha--Wut?

This is a bunch of craziness.

The difference between yaoi and bl

I spent my morning blog surfing and happened upon the Yaoi Review. The webmaster restructured the way she does reviews on her site. There are four categories she grades: plot/readability, character development, illustrations, and sexual explicitness. The fact sexual explicitness is given its own section made me think about how many fans in the US think of sex when they think of BL. Why is this?

The majority of BL fans in the US didn't start out reading BL. Yaoi came first. With yaoi comes the expectation of sex. When fans move onto BL the expectation carries over. Because of this the line between Yaoi and BL has been muddled and mixed up to the point where the two words are used interchangeably. Or, in most cases, BL isn't used at all.

I don't have a problem with US fans calling BL yaoi. However, I think it is important for fans to know the difference between fan made works and professional ones. Yes, you can find BL manga where the whole purpose is to titillate, but this is also true of shoujo and shounen. Sex isn't tied to those genre's. Sex shouldn't be tied to BL.

Yaoi Prose: Incubus Master

Oh, god, this is hard. Okay. When I workshop a story I have to look for the good and bad when I write my critique. Good followed by bad, bad followed by good, there has to be a balance. But when someone expects you to pay money for a story written with the same care and expertise as a twelve year old who writes Inyuasha yaoi, the game changes. It's not about helping a writer improve anymore, but helping you make a wise choice about where to spend your money.

This morning I read the free 3 chapter preview of Incubus Master by Yamilia Abraham. The story opens in the midst of a battle, I think. I'm not really sure. Nothing's really clear. All you know is something is happening. This is one of the major flaws of Incubus, the author takes for granted her audience is familiar with the subject matter. I most certainly am unaware as to what a Succubus or Incubus is and I'm sure I'm not alone in this lack of knowledge. It is the author's responsibility to find a creative way to weave a description into the narrative, but that's another thing Incubus has little of: description. This is all forgivable in the land of fanfiction where the audience already knows what the world of Gurren Lagann looks like or a batarang is a weapon and not just some funny sounding word. But when a author chooses to forgo much needed detailing the writing comes off lazy.

So, yes, there's this thing going on and Jinady, our protagonist, is swept up by a demon. End scene. In the next scene we learn he has been held captive and used as a sex slave by the demons in a cave high in the mountains. We are made aware Jinady is a pretty, pretty man before we're plunged into a long sex scene with an incubus. If the focal point of a story is sex you better have the skills to write one good sex scene. Sadly this is another of Incubus' shortcomings. Although, for once there is detail, the description is very cut and dry. Insert slot A into slot B. What really spoiled the sex for me is how the gasps and moans were written into dialogue. Instead of being sexy it has the opposite affect and makes the scene more comical. Come on, think of any bad!fic you read in the past and I bet you can remember the "oooohs", and "ahhhhhs". You got a smile on your face right now, don't you. Because it was funny! It's funny because it's unnecessary.

As an English major, the over use of the word that in this piece kills me dead. Also the back and forth between present and past tense doesn't help the flow of this already choppy work. Even if a reader is able to overlook such breaches of the rules of writing, the absence of detail will undoubtedly turn them off. Which leaves me to question blogs such as Kuriousity which reviewed this and didn't find many, if any flaws. What I want to know is if the site owner would go out of her way to purchase these chapters if she wasn't receiving free digital copies. I doubt it. Because if she wanted to read bad writing there's this site called fanfiction.net where she could get her fill for free.

What saddens me more than the bad writing is after chapter 2 of Incubus Master there are the glimmerings of a great idea that could have flourished if written by a more skilled writer. Or, perhaps, if she just had someone edit the story. Even a couple of proof readers. Any help would have been beneficial. Incubus Master does not read like a finished work. It's a first draft in need of extensive reconstructive surgery.

This mini review is on the first 3 chapters. Maybe I've piqued you're interest and you want to check it out yourself. But I cannot recommend anyone pay for this in good conscious. I advise you guys to put your money to better use and treat yourselves to a coke or a candy bar instead.

A Spotlight on Epic by E. K. Weaver Part 1

If you go to ygallery, no doubt you've clicked the Today's Tops tab and seen E. K. Weaver's characters TJ and Amal a few times. If you watched her, you learned more and more about her characters through her sketches, comics, and illustrations. Her goal is to print the story of these two boys, but for now she's made them available to us through her website

So far there is about 57 pages of The Less Than Epic Adventures of TJ and Amal up. I had wanted to wait until there was at least 100 pages before giving a small review, but currently there are a couple of things in Epic I find both interesting and problematic that I wanted to highlight here.

Today I'm going to focus on the two main characters and tomorrow I'll write about my thoughts on the art, layout, a dialogue. Beware, there are small spoilers ahead.

Epic opens with Amal (pictured above) storming out of a house followed by a woman. They talk, but Amal can't be consoled. He enters his car and drives around aimlessly before ending up at a bar where he gets plastered. I want to note this whole scene has no dialogue. While it does work stylistically, I feel we miss out on getting to know Amal. This detachment might have been done purposefully since Amal himself has become detached. She sets up a void between the reader and Amal that will slowly fill as the story develops. It can possibly work, but I won't know until there's more meat to this story.

Amal's character may be a skeleton that needs some fleshing out but TJ (above) will make you fall in love. He approaches Amal at the bar after over hearing a conversation he has with his sister where he declares he will drive cross-country to go see her. Obviously too drunk to drive, TJ escorts Amal home where the next day he updates him on a plan they had hashed out whilst he was drunk. TJ wants to tag along on Amal's cross-country drive, he even offers to cover all travel expenses. Why does TJ want to join Amal and why is he willing to pay for all expenses is a mystery Weaver sets up beautifully. TJ is a paradox. He seems very open and honest, yet he's shrouded in mystery. He's very charismatic, so as a reader you warm up to him instantly and you want to learn more about him. But can you trust him? Should Amal trust him? There are situations that transpire that makes TJ out to be a trustworthy individual, however, Weaver keeps throwing in these little tidbits that make you question TJ.

What we've had so far, up until chapter 7, is basically two people who share the same space but have no real interaction. When TJ speaks Amal hears him, but he's so far gone in his own little world he doesn't listen. I like this concept, but certain aspects of it can further alienate the readers. I believe the dialogue is working well, but there are places where the layout widens that gulf.

And I shall leave it there and pick up with layout tomorrow. See ya then!

Here, have some fanart

I had originally planned on posting a review of the webcomic The Less Than Epic Adventures of TJ and Amal but today has been especially busy. Lots of running around. I'll have it up tomorrow and hopefully other stuff if errands don't get sprung on me again. Until then, here's a WIP of a fanart I've been working on. See ya guys tomorrow!

The Winds of Change

I had a different outlook for this blog when I started it a little over a year ago. My number one prerogative was to improve my writing. I had a professor who glorified review writing because of his belief in how it strengthened writing abilities. So I wanted to do reviews and reports on what was going on with the BL industry.

As time passed I realized the entries I really enjoyed writing were the ones where I focused more on the fannish things such as slash/yaoi or games. Then I remembered the reason I've been into this genre for as long as I have was because of the community. Even if BL ceased to exist there will always be a fan writing fanfics of Kirk and Spock having hot sex.

Even more than slash/yaoi I enjoy the original BL webcomics such as Starfighter or Honeydew Syndrome. I think my previous entries on what I wasn't buying should clue people into how I feel about the BL industry in America. What I like about these webcomics is how they're able to get their product to the fans without having to go to some big cooperation. I know any artist's dream is to get picked up by a comic company, either for money or exposure, but I like to think the internet is making it that anyone with an idea and audience doesn't need the industry anymore. And I think we might be seeing the beginnings of this in the BL world.

The direction of this blog will change to mirror my interest. There will be scanlations, doujinshi, fanart, and webcomics. I'll occasionally write about mainstream American releases, but this will not be the focus. I also want to try my hand at translating and maybe starting my own comic. I'll make news updates, but only on information I find interesting and want to comment on. If you're looking for something tapped into the mainstream world, try the The Yaoi Review. This blog will focus on the part of the genre I like the most: you guys.

That there's a smexy face

Arigatomina released the DBZ doujinshi Animal Clock yesterday. It's Goku/Vegeta, and I must admit, I prefer Vegeta topping. This is probably because I haven't seen anyone really keep a seme Goku in character. He falls victim to the seme/uke dynamic and becomes rough and mean. That's not who Goku is. Why can't Goku be a seme and remain super sweet and adorable? I'd love to see that. Sadly, Animal Clock did not fulfill that desire. However, the artist knows how to draw one darn good Goku sex face. This doujinshi is all about the sex and what makes these scenes great are Goku's expressions. I just wanted to share a few of my favorite ones below.

Oh, half-lidded Goku, how can anyone resist you?

You can read this doujinshi online here. In order to access it you must know the username and password. If you don't know it, search the site.

Spring Break Marathon

Spring Break is finally here. My plan is to update everyday until my return to campus Monday the 15th. Dedication! This has been a hard thing for me to do in the past. To keep me from slacking I will begin operation: No update, free pic. If I miss a day, the first person to comment on this post starting midnight the next day can request any yaoilicious pic from me. Basically this post is just a place holder for something that will never happen. EVER. You don't believe me? We shall see, my friends, we shall see.