Starting with a Kiss キスアリキ。(Kiss Ariki.)

NITTA Youka 新田祐克  has claimed in the past that she wouldn’t write an yakuza manga nor a manga with a main character with long shiny black hair (not that long) – but she does so in Starting with a Kiss キスアリキ。(Kiss Ariki.), published in English by SubLime (VIZ) and originally published by b-BOY HONEY (Libre Shuppan), b-Boy Kichiku (Libre Shuppan), and Be x Boy GOLD (Libre Shuppan).

BL and yakuza seem to be a good match in many stories and is one of the main sub-genre’s of BL.  However, Starting with a Kiss キスアリキ。(Kiss Ariki.) really has nothing much to add to the genre.  It’s not as dark, gritty nor has the depth of the Finder (View Finder) series by YAMANE Ayano やまねあやの or No Money お金がないっ(Okane ga Nai) by SHINOZAKI Hitoyo 篠崎一夜  & KOUSAKA Tohru 香坂透 , not as interesting as Twittering Birds Never Fly 囀る鳥は羽ばたかない (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai) by YONEDA Kou ヨネダコウ  or one-shot NightS ナイツ by YONEDA Kou ニトロ攻鉄, not as fun as Like the Beast ほんと野獣 (Honto Yajuu) by YAMAMOTO Kotetsuko 山本小鉄子, and the list of better yakuza stories goes on.  Still it’s a decent read full of plotting, incest, etc., though not exactly all that memorable.

Unfortunately, Sublime (VIZ) isn’t putting out the 3rd and final volume in a timely manner at all – it’s not expected until June 2015!  There were only 3 volumes and they could have been done in a few short months – not almost a year.  3 long months between volume 1 and 2 (too much) and then 7 months to wait to finish the series – are they really caring for their audience?  Will the audience even put up with it by buying the last volume?  I know that I forgot the plot and had to reread the 1st volume before continuing with the 2nd and it had been only 3 months! (I don’t usually have that problem with a series – so it’s just not so memorable for me.) 

Not sure if I’d want to go on with such a long wait – and there is no need as the series was finished before it started to be released in the US in English. VIZ should have released all the volumes within 3-6 months at most (or better yet, as a bunkobon), not the almost a year.  This doesn’t seem to happen with the shonen or seinen series – once again making women the second class citizens.  I also wonder why they’re releasing such a series, even if the author is very popular, as there are much better series that should be published and don’t even seem to be up for consideration.

NightS ナイツ

Looking for BL with some intrigue, or maybe a nice slice of life with a car dealership, or just some real story BL shorts.  You may want to try NightS ナイツ by YONEDA Kou ニトロ攻鉄 (more known for her doujinshi).  What the book is missing is NightS – Another Story, a prequel that should have been included.

This volume has  more of Reply than NightS in it and another one shot.  It’s not that usual for SubLime (VIZ) to release a book of one shots and super short series.  However, once again, this is worth the read.  The stories are NightS (with an extra at the end – A Night One Month Later), Emotional Spectrum, and a short series (why wasn’t the book titled after this) – Reply (parts I & II), Reply to Reply, Reply Three Months Later – this short series takes up most of the book.