Temari Matsumoto

[2006-12-17] Yaoi manga, collection of short stories. Definitely in the plot what plot vein, and you could use it for a slash cliche drinking game. The first two stories about a ninja trainee and the ninja master also edge rather too far in the direction of "young" for my taste, as the trainee looks about ten to my eyes. It doesn't help that the second story has the ninja master developing an interest in schoolboy fantasies. Very pretty art for those who like the underfed waif look, but if you want plot or are easily squicked by apparently underage characters, look elsewhere.

http://julesjones.livejournal.com/110034.html… (més)

One three chapter story and two more shorts (actually three, but the last is only a handful of pages). In the first, a student has bad luck that goes away temporarily when the divination club advisor gives him “purifying” kisses. The student doesn't realize his feelings for the teacher till he gets an opportunity to feel jealous of someone, and then they confess. Subsequent chapters are spent dealing with various problems that arise in their relationship. The second story is about a reclusive toy-repairer who is given an android by his sister with the hopes that interaction with it will cure his people-phobia. The last is about a school nurse who has a school uniform fetish and likes one student because he looks particularly good in one.

With the possible exception of the android story, these stories read like someone took concepts from semi-creative porn videos and stretched them to fit a chapter of manga. Now, if there were actually more or better porn, that would be fine. But there isn't, so you'd expect them to try harder with the writing. Instead, there seems to be no attempt to make execution of the story interesting or the dialogue in any way original. The reasons for conflict in the latter chapters of the first story are, amazingly, even more contrived and unbelievable than the overall concept from the first chapter. In general the writing in the android story is just as bad, but it gets some charm points for sounding a little less like porn and being a little less mundane and a bit more original (no, not THAT original, but by comparison, a little. The toy-repair profession was a nice touch, at least.)

Even for someone less picky than me, I don't see much reason to pay money for this. I honestly feel the best thing about it was that the complete lack of effort to do anything beyond getting through the usual steps as simply as possible made it such a quick, breezy read that I didn't really have time to get irritated by it. I guess in a way, there's not much there, so there's not that much to not like, either.… (més)