hontou ni Stripey Insists Sisters Cry Oniichan Now

Morinaga Milk's Girl Friends Vol.1 and 2

I'm not entirely sure why I suddenly decided that I had to have these two tankubon. But when I did, Amazon.jp (even Marketplace) was out of stock, Kinokuniya Singapore refused to accept my order - something about 'due to the content' and the vigilant eyes of the Customs officers of our glorious democratic people's island republic paradise (blood and gore and murder and mayhem in manga is ok but one page with a scene of girls kissing is not, go figure). So it is with great gratefulness that I thank Stripey for procuring this for me via his lolip0rn smuggling routes pure and honourable pathways. Well, I probably would have bought these two volumes sooner or later; I liked Morinaga's When The Ring Finger is Kissed so much that I bought it twice. orz

When The Ring Finger Is Kissed

Was prompted to buy Vol.2 of Yuri Hime (from Amazon.co.jp via the Yuricon shop) after reading Erica's review on Okazu, particularly because of Morinaga Milk's story "Kusuriyubi ni Kisushitara" (roughly translated as "When the ring finger is kissed"). The first of four gorgeous glossy colour pages of tastefully drawn Hitomi x Nana symmetrical docking starts off the story.

Hitomi and Nana were the first couple in the first story ("Even If We're Not Friends", Yuri Shimai Vol.1 scanlation by Lililicious) of Morinaga Milk's high school universe but it wasn't followed up on in the later volumes of Yuri Shimai (which was then rebranded as Yuri Hime). They did have a small cameo in "A Kiss, Love and a Prince" (Yuri Shimai Vol.2) when Nana invites Hitomi to see a school play together.

I was well chuffed that their story got further development mainly because I thought their story was the strongest. The title "Even if we're not friends" was quite fascinating because it's almost conventional to think of a lover as one's best friend but this story implies that friends only become lovers through transformative rather incremental change. A failed transformation often can ruin a friendship - thus the old cliché about the difficulty of confessing romantic feelings to a friend as, after the declaration, the friendship can never be quite the same again.