BL Library - Entertainment Industry

Manhwa Review | Siren’s Song by Clarju

Title: Siren's Song

Author(s): Clarju

Artist(s): Clarju

Yul has lived his entire life hopelessly strung along by others. “Lived” is a generous term. With his life never fully in his control, he has always been forced to follow the whims and commands of those around him. Even as an adult, that hasn’t changed. He currently lives in an apartment owned by his adopted brother, who has an unhealthy obsession with him that goes beyond a sibling relationship. In that home, alone and unable to leave, Yul spends his day under surveillance and composing music that is presented to the world under his brother’s name. His only solace is out on the apartment balcony, where he can sing and smoke to his heart’s content.

Yul’s small world is rocked, though, when one evening on the balcony, his singing is overheard by a neighbor on the balcony above. The neighbor Luan is immediately drawn to Yul for an inexplicable reason. However, Yul allows Luan to begin his plan for revenge against everyone who made his life hell, even if he has to destroy Yul in the process. Luan doesn’t expect that as he grows closer to Yul and begins to uncover the history behind his existence, Luan not only wants revenge for himself but for Yul as well. But what he fears more than anything now is losing or hurting Yul amid his vengeful warpath.

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Manhwa Review | Lack of Love by Okdongi

Title: Lack of Love

Author(s): Okdongi

Artist(s): Seoil

Hajin Park is trying his best to start his online fashion store, but it’s a lot more complicated than he realized. His sister, a dentist with her own business, offers to help him out and set up his store online, but only if he does her a huge favor. She is a huge stan for the idol group 89, and while she has a ticket to one of their meet and greets, she’s unable to attend due to work. So, she asks Hajin to go instead to get all of the members’ autographs. While Hajin isn’t looking forward to it, he agrees.

As Hajin is the only man there, he draws a lot of unwanted attention, including from the members of 89. To escape some of the crowds, he goes to the bathroom. While trying to find an open stall, he runs into Hangyum, the hottest member of 89, in quite a compromising position. After escaping the awkward encounter and the meet and greet, Hajin is all set to put all this idol business behind him when he is pulled aside by the manager of 89. The manager noticed how put together Hajin is and wants Hajin to become the personal stylist for the 89 members because their style is seriously bad.

Hajin is hesitant at first, but after discussing it with his roommate and sister and finding that it would eventually help his online business, Hajin calls back the manager’s number. The manager is not the one who answers, though. Instead, Hangyum picks up and ends up personally striking a deal with Hajin. As a result, Hajin becomes Hangyum’s stylist while also assisting the other members from time to time. But Hangyum doesn’t intend for Hajin to just help him with styling. Hangyum and Hajin have a past, and Hangyum intends to heal the wounds they share.

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Manhwa Review | Dirty ♥ Vibration by Fujoking

Title: Dirty ♥ Vibration (Tapas) | Sexventure♥App (Lezhin)

Author(s): Fujoking

Artist(s): Fujoking

Nohae and Yeong have been friends since high school. Their friendship isn’t the friendliest, but it doesn’t have to be. They’re best buds and share everything. They’ve only been forced to grow even closer as Nohae joins the entertainment industry and forces Yeong to become his manager. Not only do they work together, though. Yeong also lives with Nohae. This results in them spending almost every second of every day together.

Yeong is ready to cut the cord. He wants to become more independent and starts seeking another job, but Nohae isn’t a fan of this. Unfortunately, there isn’t much Nohae can do about it… until he downloads an app on Yeong’s phone. Supposedly, it is a cursed app that rewards the user with a great fortune but also punishes the user with even greater misfortune if they cannot complete the app’s commands. It doesn’t sound too bad, though, right? All Yeong has to do is follow the app’s orders. It can’t request anything too wild… right?

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Manhwa Review | @puppy_love by Hamnya

Title: @puppy_love

Author(s): Hamnya

Artist(s): Eumnya

Seoyun is an online influencer. After a picture of him cross-dressing went viral and was passed around his school, Seoyun had to quit school, leave his family, and go into hiding on his own. Thankfully, with the image going viral, he was able to rebound into an online career under the moniker Mr. Puppy. With his whole world revolving around the internet, Mr. Puppy doesn’t have to leave his home for much, which he is fine with. Yet, as the days go on, Mr. Puppy’s loneliness also grows.

Mr. Puppy isn’t lonely for long, though. One day, he receives an inappropriate DM from a medical student named Yeonwoo. Yeonwoo likes cute things, and Mr. Puppy fits the bill. Yeonwoo also fits Mr. Puppy’s preferences, and they start an online relationship with Yeonwoo as a master and Mr. Puppy as his pet. While this satisfies for a time, it isn’t long before they crave more. Can their relationship survive the transition from an online fling to a physical one? And can love grow from a master-pet relationship?

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Novel Review | Lip and Sword by Jin Shisi Chai

Title: Lip and Sword

Author(s): Jin Shisi Chai

Xing Ming is the host of Pearl Line, a news analysis show for the station Pearl TV Station News Center. He’s attractive, talented, and truly cares about the news he puts out. As a result, during the end-of-the-year banquet for the station, Xing Ming is awarded the Top Ten News Centers of the Year award. However, not everyone feels he is deserving of it. Director Chen Linan, who actually recruited Xing Ming initially and put him in the position of hosting Pearl Line, now no longer feels he is worthy of his accolades or role on the show. This is all because Zhuang Lei, rumored to be Chen Linan’s niece or lover, was the host of Pearl Line before she went on maternity leave, which allowed Xing Ming to be her replacement. Even though she has recovered and is ready to return, Xing Ming refuses to give up his spot.

Due to his frustration and drunkness, Chen Linan confronts Xing Ming at the party. At first, Xing Ming isn’t worried over the drunken Chen Linan’s pestering… until Chen Linan brings up Xing Ming’s dead father, a convicted rapist. In a blind rage, Xing Ming beats Chen Linan over the head with a wine bottle in front of everyone at the party. In a panic, knowing his job is on the line, Xing Ming reaches out to the station chairman, Yu Zhongye, and offers himself up in exchange for leniency regarding his punishment. While Yu Zhongye does take him up on his offer, and they spend a night together, the director and chairman are set to fire him the following day. Once more, in a fit of rage, Xing Ming fights off the security guards and poses an offer to the chairman: let me create my own show with my own team from scratch. If he doesn’t get decent ratings during a six-month period, he will leave on his own.

Yu Zhongye agrees, but as Xing Ming faces setback after setback, he constantly has to return to Yu Zhongye for favors. As he gives himself over to the chairman repeatedly, Xing Ming begins to question if this is all worth it and what his sexuality is. However, more than anything, Xing Ming wonders if what he feels for Yu Zhongye is truly admiration or if it is something deeper? And is Yu Zhongye capable of loving anyone for more than their body?

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Manhwa Review | See You Again by Pppallet

Title: See You Again

Author(s): Pppallet

Artist(s): Pppallet

Shiwoo is an actor constantly surrounded by adoring fans and admirers, some more welcome than others. Even with all this love around him, though, he’s only ever had one special person, Yujin. However, the day Shiwoo graduated high school, Yujin confessed that he loved Shiwoo as more than a friend, upperclassman, or even brother figure. Unfortunately, Shiwoo could not reciprocate Yujin’s feelings. Yujin, of course, was heartbroken, and Shiwoo did what he thought was best and disappeared from Yujin’s life.

Eight years have passed, and Shiwoo, now in the dregs of the entertainment industry, is on the market for a new manager and a new partner. When he hears his manager is a girl, he hopes that she might be able to fill both roles. Thankfully, she is exactly his type, and he spares no time trying to woo her. While out to drink, Shiwoo gets blackout drunk and embarrassingly propositions his manager. While the manager isn’t necessarily pleased, she doesn’t say no. When Shiwoo regains his senses, though, it turns out the pretty girl manager is a pretty boy manager… a boy that he happens to know very well.

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Manhwa Review | Love on My Terms by GYEUL

Title: Love on My Terms

Author(s): GYEUL

Artist(s): GYEUL

Mogyum is a former child star trying to make a comeback as an adult. However, the unfortunate accident that led him to drop out of the limelight haunts him, hindering his acting. However, what makes acting that much harder is Mogyum’s co-star, Chamin, who seems oddly fixated on Mogyum. Chamin is an established A-lister who acted with Mogyum when they were kids on the same set where the traumatic accident occurred. What Mogyum doesn’t know about Chamin is that Chamin can read minds, which is part of the reason he has become such a great actor.

However, Chamin is so drawn to Mogyum in the first place because Mogyum is the only person whose thoughts Chamin can’t read. So, to learn why and to better their chemistry on screen, Chamin offers Mogyum a contract. A dating contract, which would allow Chamin and Mogyum to intimately act out their scenes together as if they were actually dating while the two live together at Chamin’s house. While Mogyum is hesitant at first, learning more about acting from an A-lister like Chamin is too good an opportunity to pass up.

Things start to get a little too real, though, and soon, the lines between characters and reality begin to blur. While Mogyum and Chamin are sorting out their feelings, the mystery of Mogyum’s accident looms in the background, threatening to destroy everything for them once more.

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

Title: Yes, No, or Maybe?

Author(s): Michi Ichiho

Artist(s): 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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Manhwa Review | Love is an Illusion! by Fargo

Title: Love is an Illusion!

Author(s): Fargo

Artist(s): Fargo

Hye-sung is an alpha. Er, or at least he thinks he is an alpha. However, that belief quickly goes down the drain while Hye-sung is working at a party and runs into the dominant alpha and musician, Dojin. After being exposed to Dojin’s pheromones, Hye-sung goes into heat. Dojin tries to take care of Hye-sung and save him from himself as the newly awakened omega tries to throw himself on a few alphas. Dojin whisks Hye-sung away to a hotel where Hye-sung rants and raves that there is no way he could be an omega. Finally, Dojin, flustered by Hye-sung’s pheromones and frustrated by Hye-sung’s delusional beliefs, proves to Hye-sung that he is indeed an omega… physically.

After the dirty deed, Dojin realizes that he actually enjoyed it even though he supposedly hates omegas because of the notion that omegas and alphas have to be together. Even more distressing is that Dojin follows up their encounter by writing a song that his peers say is his best work yet. Believing it is just a coincidence, he runs into Hye-sung again, and they have another steamy encounter that not only results in another great song but something neither of them expects: a baby.

Hye-sung wants to get rid of the baby while Dojin intends to keep it, but more importantly, he now desperately wants to hang on to Hye-sung. They make a deal together where Dojin will pay Hye-sung to carry the baby to term, and Dojin will assume full parental responsibilities. Hye-sung will finally be financially comfortable, and he won’t have to be a mother. Still, Dojin plans on doing anything he can to talk Hye-sung into raising their baby together. The problem is he only has the span of Hye-sung’s pregnancy to do it.

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Manhwa Review | The Makeup Remover by Lee Yeon

Title: The Makeup Remover

Author(s): Lee Yeon

Artist(s): Lee Yeon

Yeseul Kim finally started college. Her whole life has revolved around studying, but no one seems to care about her thoughts and instead focuses on her looks, which are extremely lacking to the standard of her peers and family. So, to make herself feel as beautiful as those around her expect her to be, she goes to a makeup artist and requests they make her look like rising social media star Heewon Ju. However, the makeup artist cannot achieve the look, which results in Yeseul looking worse.

After receiving less than optimal results, Yeseul ends up rushing to the bathroom, where she overhears her makeup artist disparaging her looks and blaming her for why the makeup didn’t look good. Of course, this breaks her heart. However, upon leaving the studio, she encounters one of the top makeup artists of all time: Yuseong Cheon. When he sees Yeseul, he claims she is the ideal model for him to enter an upcoming makeup competition show. Though she doesn’t believe she could ever be a model, they do end up partnering with Yeseul, hiding her identity under a rabbit costume and taking the competition by storm.

All the while, Yeseul deals with insecurities, a crush on her classmate, her goal of becoming a photographer, a competition, and the ever-growing relationship between her and Yuseong.

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Entertainment Industry

Manhwa Review | Dirty ♥ Vibration by Fujoking

Manhwa Review | See You Again by Pppallet

Manhwa Review | Love on My Terms by GYEUL

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

Manhwa Review | The Makeup Remover by Lee Yeon

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