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Manga Review | Pink Heart Jam by Shikke

Title: Pink Heart Jam

Shikke

Shikke

Tags: Eve's Faves
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Haiga is experiencing many firsts. It is his first time in college, it is his first time living in the city away from his rural home, and it is his first time faced with his sexuality. While touring his campus for the first time, Haiga sees Kanae, a beautiful man and Haiga’s upperclassman. Haiga is immediately attracted to him, but he isn’t sure if he simply admires Kanae or if he really is attracted to him as a man. Without any real reason to find out, Haiga is left on his own to wonder.

That is until his peers give him money to visit a box spa after a night of drinking. However, this particular box spa is located in the gay district, which Haiga uses to his advantage to help answer the question: does he like men or not? Of course, Haiga doesn’t expect that the person servicing him is none other than Kanae. So, this is a chance for Haiga to discover his sexuality and determine if his feelings for Kanae are more than simple admiration for his upperclassman. While he is figuring that out, another question lingers in the back of Haiga’s mind: how does Kanae feel about him?

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Novel Review | Salad Days by Jing Shuibian

Title: Salad Days

Jing Shuibian

Tags: Eve's Faves
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Jiang Shen is a poor boy in a rural village. He spends his days playing with friends out in the rice paddy fields, helping his father work the fields, chasing wild chickens, and fishing. The most time he ever spends in the city is when his mother takes the vegetable harvest to sell. While his mother is busy in the city, Jiang Shen usually spends his time exploring the Children’s Center, where he stumbles upon a ballet class. The teacher catches him looking and invites him in, where she discovers he may have an innate talent for ballet. It isn’t long before Jiang Shen’s focus goes from his idyllic village days to something much larger and grander.

On the other end of the spectrum is Bai Jinyi. He comes from a filthy rich family and wants for nothing. He spends his days training at the Children’s Center in boxing, with his goal being to go international and win the gold belt. However, while attending training one day, an unusual sight catches his eye: a little boy among a gaggle of girls in a ballet class. Inexplicably, Bai Jinyi becomes drawn to this little boy, and for once in his life, Jiang Shen is the one thing he wants, even more than boxing.

They say the rich never box and the poor never dance. Yet, Jiang Shen and Bai Jinyi are set to defy those odds. As the two grow and change and their dreams grow more and more focused, the one thing that keeps them tethered together is their growing feelings for each other. So, can these happy days continue for two boys whose paths would never have crossed otherwise? And can they grasp their dreams while holding onto each other?

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Novel Review | Yes, No, or Maybe? by Michi Ichiho

Title: Yes, No, or Maybe?

Michi Ichiho

Lala Takemiya

Kunieda Kei lives two different lives. Externally, he is the prince of the evening news – hardworking, kind, and humble. He is the ideal man and is adored for it. Internally, though, he is a rude, conniving, and spiteful person. He plays both roles so effectively that even Kunieda isn’t sure which is the real him. However, his worlds collide when he runs into Tsuzuki, an animator who specializes in stop motion. During his day job (which takes place in the evening most of the time since he works for the evening news), Kunieda has to interview Tsuzuki.

Tsuzuki is a chill guy and immediately rubs Kunieda the wrong way. Even so, Kunieda can’t let it show, so he puts on the charm, and the interview goes well. After work, Kunieda becomes his other inner self. From the clean-cut, dapper Kunieda, he turns into the sweatsuit, mask, and glasses-wearing Kunieda, who eats junk food and curses like a sailor. Unfortunately, during his nightly ritual to go get junk food, Kunieda ends up causing a bicyclist to wreck. As it turns out, the rider is Tsuzuki. Kunieda does his best to escape, but Tsuzuki demands that Kunieda pay him back by helping him with his next animation. In order to avoid Tsuzuki discovering who he is, Kunieda goes by Owari.

As Kunieda spends more time with Tsuzuki as both straight-laced Kunieda and trouble-maker Owari, he grows closer to him. But could Tsuzuki accept both sides of Kunieda? Which even is the real Kunieda?

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Novel Review | The Missing Piece by Kun Yi Wei Lou

Title: The Missing Piece

Kun Yi Wei Lou

Shen Mo is an art school graduate. Unfortunately, by the time he graduated and earned a job in his field, he was abducted, and as a result of the trauma from that incident, he was unable to use his right hand to paint. However, he thankfully escaped the incident with his life thanks to Ji Mingxuan. To pay back Mingxuan’s help, Shen Mo is in a contracted relationship with him. All so that Mingxuan’s younger sister can marry Zhou Yang, her childhood friend, and Shen Mo’s ex, without worrying about Shen Mo and Zhou Yang getting back together. Three years passed as Shen Mo and Ji An’an, Mingxuan’s sister, left to study abroad together.

Though it is a fake relationship, the lines between fantasy and reality begin to blur, especially when Zhou Yang and Mingxuan’s sister come back from studying abroad together. Now, with Shen Mo right in front of him, Zhou Yang doesn’t try to hide the fact that he is still attracted to Shen Mo, even as his engagement with An’an is publicly announced. While Shen Mo is still attracted to Zhou Yang, even if only due to the memories before his traumatic experience, he grows closer to An’an, and Mingxuan’s affections become more and more real. Who and what Shen Mo wants for himself becomes more and more unclear. Will Shen Mo forsake Mingxuan and An’an to return to the familiar love he had with Zhou Yang, or will Shen Mo take the plunge and trade in his contractual relationship with Mingxuan for something real?

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Manga Review | Yagi the Bookshop Goat by Fumi Furukawa

Title: Yagi the Bookshop Goat

Fumi Furukawa

Fumi Furukawa

Tags: Eve's Faves
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In this world, herbivores and carnivores live amicably, though this is primarily because they live in separate zones – one catering to herbivores, the other to carnivores. However, even if you are an herbivore, it doesn’t mean you’ll be treated fairly in the section for herbivores. This is the unfortunate case for Yagi, a goat who wants nothing more than to work at a bookshop. However, like most goats, Yagi has the habit of eating paper, which doesn’t work out too well for his employers.

Unable to get a job at any herbivore bookshop, Yagi goes where he shouldn’t: a carnivore bookshop managed by a wolf named Ookami. Ookami gives Yagi a job, and while Yagi does eat a book on occasion, Ookami scolds him but lets him work there all the same. Yagi thinks it is simply because Ookami is kind, but there is something more behind the wolf’s good deeds. Not only does he have a complicated past, but he might see Yagi as more than just an employee.

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Manga Review | Kiss Him, Not Me by Junko

Title: Kiss Him, Not Me

Junko

Junko

Kae Serinuma is a BL fanatic (can relate). She spends all day and all night consuming all manner of BL content, and when she isn’t enjoying BL, she thinks about it, buys it, fantasizes about it, and even spends her time shipping the boys around her together. As a result, she isn’t the most popular girl around. She’s also a bit chubby, which doesn’t earn her any points with the pretty boys in school, but that doesn’t matter. She isn’t interested in boys unless they want to be with boys themselves!

However, one fateful day, Serinuma’s world is rocked when her favorite character, Shion, from her favorite anime, Mirage Saga, is unexpectedly killed. Unable to handle the loss, Serinuma holes herself up in her room for a week. She doesn’t go to school, she doesn’t eat, she doesn’t sleep, and even her mother and brother don’t see her for the entire week. Finally, her brother breaks her out of her stupor, but what emerges is not the lovable, chubby Serinuma. No, what comes out is a gorgeous lady that even Serinuma herself fails to recognize.

When she returns to school, everyone except history club president Asuma Mutsumi fails to recognize her, and once people realize who she is, they don’t believe it! But there is no denying that Kae Serinuma is this gorgeous creature. As a result, she draws the attention of some of the hottest boys in her school, including history club president and third-year Asuma Mutsumi, classmate and soccer club member Yusuke Igarashi, bad boy Shion-lookalike Nozomu Nanashima, and first-year student Hayato Shinomiya. They are immediately attracted to her new look and make it clear that they all plan on winning her heart. Things get even more complicated, though, when she also draws the attention of Shima Nishina, an androgynous girl who is also a BL fanatic and as equally drawn to Serinuma as all the boys.

While Serinuma enjoys her time with all her new friends, the pressure of their love causes plenty of trouble for all involved. What is worse is that she would rather the boys fall in love with each other rather than her! She promises to consider all of them as possible love interests and promises to give them all an answer in time, but how could she possibly choose? Why can’t they just love each other? Can a BL-fanatic actually fall in love with a boy (or girl)?

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