BL Library - Romance

Manhua Review | Kitty Boy by Yi Wan Zhou

Title: Kitty Boy

Author(s): Yi Wan Zhou

Artist(s): Ghost

Eva Qiao is a senior in college. To finish out her final year, she moves into the first floor of a home near the campus. Upon moving in, she discovers something inhabiting the basement. To her surprise, it turns out to be a man, but not just any man. It is a man with cat ears, fangs, claws, and a cat tail, and he is desperately searching for his master.

Eva initially wants nothing to do with the mysterious cat man, who refers to himself as 51 and plans to throw him out. However, memories of her time in a science institution where she encountered a young boy like the cat-man soften her heart, and she decides to adopt him, dubbing him Rusty Qiao. Rusty and Eva now must navigate the world together as Eva does her best to live an ordinary life when she is anything but ordinary, while Rusty longs for nothing more to grow closer to his new master.

Title: The Missing Piece

Author(s): 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?

Title: Yagi the Bookshop Goat

Author(s): Fumi Furukawa

Artist(s): Fumi Furukawa

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.

Title: Kiss Him, Not Me

Author(s): Junko

Artist(s): 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)?

Title: Sweet Caress

Author(s): Keimjae

Artist(s): Keimjae

Woojin is a shy man. He has a gloomy look, with dark black hair covering his eyes and dark, deep bags under his eyes. As a result, people often avoid him. However, what he lacks in social skills with humans, he has in spades with animals. All creatures are inexplicably drawn to him, and he is drawn to them, but in a world full of humans, Woojin is forced to interact. He wears a wig and sunglasses out and about to make it a bit easier.

On the flip side, Sangyoon, with the looks of an angel, is incapable of forming relationships with any animal, though he desperately wants to. What is worse is that he owns and operates his own dog cafe and even has a cat room in the upstairs apartment for the cat he longs to own one day.

During a misunderstanding, Woojin and Sangyoon end up meeting each other. When Sangyoon realizes Woojin can draw in animals of all kinds, he hires him to work at the cafe. There, he helps Woojin overcome his inability to communicate with others; all the while, Woojin falls head over heels for Sangyoon.

Title: A Tender Heart: The Story of How I Became a Duke's Maid

Author(s): Aloha

Artist(s): Aloha

Liandro is a young boy in a novel, fated to live his life with a painful curse that has destined him to a life of misery, loneliness, and pain. However, the novel's entire plot is turned upside down when an avid reader, Liandro-stan, ends up waking up as a character in the story. Unfortunately, though, her role is relatively insignificant as one of the many maids caring for Liandro's household. This particular maid, Evelina, knows something everyone else in her world doesn't: she knows how the novel plays out and is determined to fight against fate.

Easier said than done, though, as she must break through the cold exterior young Liandro has been forced to put up with as his parents abandoned him, the maids in the house fear him, and he is in unending pain from a curse no one understands. Evelina is up for the challenge, though. Even if she can't save Liandro from his fate, she is determined to give him all the love he has missed out on and make his life as happy as possible. However, as the years go by and Liandro grows closer to Evelina, what would make him happier than anything is to keep her by his side. Is such a thing possible for a lowly maid when Liandro could be destined for bigger and better things?

Title: The Crown's Shadow

Author(s): Haewi

Artist(s): Chanok

A random boy from Korea finds himself in another world. While traversing this foreign land, he comes face-to-face with someone who looks and sounds identical to him, like his otherworldly doppelganger. It turns out that this person is Daniel, prince of Rowen. Rowen makes the other-worlder an offer: I'll take care of you if you become my shadow.

Having nowhere else to go, the boy accepts and is given the name Rael. Rael and Daniel trade places constantly, playing the prince's role and sharing the burden all of that entails. This goes on for years, with no one catching on, including Daniel's closest family. Things start to go awry, though, when the kingdom's emperor comes for a visit.

The emperor is immediately entranced by Rael, who is playing Daniel, and becomes obsessed with him. When Rael and Daniel switch back, the emperor notices immediately but only becomes more intrigued. Finally, on the day the emperor is set to leave Rowen, he goes to Daniel's father and asks him for a single night with his son, and in exchange, he will give him trade routes and mines. It is an offer the kingdom of Rowen cannot refuse. Daniel, of course, does not want to do this, so Rael, thankful for all that Daniel has done for him, offers to go in his stead.

Rael goes and ends up spending three nights with the emperor before they part ways, and even Rael has to admit that he fell for the emperor, but he admits they may never meet again and moves on. However, he is thrust back into the emperor's lap when Rowen is suddenly overcome by a noble uprising, and Daniel is murdered. Forced to take the role of Daniel permanently, Rael rushes to the only person he thinks can help him: emperor Lionhart.

Unfortunately, Rael doesn't know that while the emperor is happy to open his doors to Rael, he won't be so keen just to let him leave again.

Title: If You Give Me Flowers, I'll Give You Myself

Author(s): JO YuJin

Artist(s): Homil

Haewon has been diagnosed with a brain tumor, and with a prognosis of only six months, the possibilities for her future are severely limited. While she is working at a museum in Mongolia, a job she truly loves, her dream is out in the field. She longs to find a flower that no one has discovered and name it herself so she will always be remembered even after she has passed. As a final push to achieve her dream before she dies, she quits her job and sets out for the rural parts of Mongolia, donating all her funds after she purchases a Jeep to get across the rough terrain.

However, not long after leaving, she receives a letter from the hospital where she was first diagnosed. Her former coworker, Dr. Lee, intercepts the letter and discovers that she was misdiagnosed. He has no clue where she has gone, though. Even so, spurred by his love for her, he takes off after her, letter in hand.

Meanwhile, Haewon ends up with her Jeep and all her belongings stolen. Thankfully, she is rescued by the mysterious Eunseong, who has settled out in the deep fields of Mongolia for reasons unknown. Since she cannot continue on her quest without his help and feels sorry for her predicament, Eunseong hesitantly agrees to allow her to stay under the agreement that if she does locate the undiscovered flower, she will let him name it. While he isn't interested in this prize, it isn't long before he quickly takes an interest in her, and that interest soon blooms into love.

Title: Bloody Sweet

Author(s): Lee Narae

Artist(s): Lee Narae

Shin Naerim's life isn't going so great. She's being bullied at school because her mother is a moodang (Korean shaman), and her only solace is online, where she writes web novels and keeps up with a blog. Though she is bright and cheery online, she cannot even speak in real life because it would only entice the bullies further. So instead, she spends her days silently taking every comment and nickname (“wig,” being the main one, short for “witch girl”), waiting for her high school life to finally be over so she can move on with her life.

Unfortunately, there is still more high school life to contend with, and next on the docket for Naerim is an overnight school field trip. As if it isn't enough for her to deal with the name-calling and abuse during the school day, now she has to do it overnight. Even more unfortunate is that there is an abandoned church nearby where they are staying. It is the perfect backdrop for more bullying of the “witch girl.”

However, these school girls don't know that just because a place is abandoned doesn't mean it is empty. While forcing Naerim through the abandoned church, they encounter a closed wardrobe with talismans on the outside of it. They make Naerim open it to reveal a man hidden inside – presumably a dead man as he falls out of the wardrobe on top of Naerim without a word. Of course, everyone is shocked and runs off, leaving Naerim alone in the church with the dead body. As luck would have it, though, it isn't a dead body but a vampire, and he finds Naerim delicious.

After taking a few licks of Naerim's wounds, she kicks him off of her and takes off back to where the class is staying, but even as she escapes the church, she finds that a red thread now trails out from her wound, seemingly to nowhere and she is the only one who can see it. However, it's not clear what the thread is until the man appears on the balcony of the place Naerim is staying. She realizes that the man, named Vlad Fetechou, is a vampire and because he drank Naerim's blood, a witch, he has now become her servant with a collar and red string that ties them together. If Fetechou drinks enough of Naerim's blood, he will eventually become human, and their pact as servant and master will be broken, but will Naerim survive long enough to help Fetechou? Does she even want him to become human in the first place?

Title: Princess Jellyfish

Author(s): Akiko Higashimura

Artist(s): Akiko Higashimura

Tsukimi Kurashita is obsessed with jellyfish. Her obsession began when she was a child, and her mother took her to the aquarium. While there, her mother promised Tsukimi that she would make her a wedding dress that looked like a lace jellyfish. Not long after that promise, Tsukimi's mother passes away, leaving her with the memories of the lace jellyfish and her mother's unfulfilled promise.

Even as those childhood days grew further and further away, Tsukimi's love and obsession with jellyfish never faded. Instead, it fuels and drives her entire life as she resigns herself to single life at the Amamizukan – a retro building dubbed the “nunnery” where many other like-minded, home-bodied women have congregated to live out their single lives together, obsessing over their own passions (some of which include elderly men, trains, and kimonos, just to name a few). As a result of their obsessions, the women of Amamizukan are all very anti-men and those they dub “stylish” and find themselves unable to interact with the general population as a result.

However, one evening, Tsukimi notices two jellyfish being kept in an aquarium together, and these two species can't be housed together; otherwise, one of them will die. Tsukimi does her best to explain this to the store clerk, but because the clerk is a man and a stylish, Tsukimi struggles to communicate with him. A stylish woman comes by and helps Tsukimi rescue the jellyfish by chance. Though the woman is a stylish, she is allowed into the sacred nunnery because she isn't a man. Throughout the evening, Tsukimi realizes even though her new friend Kuranosuke Koibuchi is a stylish, she is still a good person and even finds herself drawn to her beauty because she looks like a princess – something Tsukimi herself feels she could never be.

The next day, though, it is revealed that Kuranosuke is actually a man who cross-dresses as a way to escape his family's political background. To protect her place in Amamizukan and maintain her new friendship, Tsukimi tells all of her fellow nuns that Kuranosuke is a woman. Even with her own position at Amamizukan protected, the entirety of the building and the neighborhood itself is under threat by large corporations seeking to buy out the land to build hotels and stores in its place. Having fallen in love with Amamizukan and the residents there, Kuranosuke enlists the help of all the women of Amamizukan to create a fashion line based on Tsukimi's jellyfish illustrations so they can make up the funds needed to buy up the building before it is sold.

Romance

Manhua Review | Kitty Boy by Yi Wan Zhou

Manga Review | Yagi the Bookshop Goat by Fumi Furukawa

Manga Review | Kiss Him, Not Me by Junko

Manhwa Review | Sweet Caress by Keimjae

Manhwa Review | Bloody Sweet by Lee Narae

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