July 2014 Awards

**aarinfantasy** · 08-02-2014, 03:17 AM

Congrats to winners of the month!~

----------- -----------

Custom Profile of the Month

Winner(s) of Profile of the Month: buhbibutterfly

----------- -----------

Signature of the Month

Theme: "Buff Male" or "Mask"

Winner of Signature of the Month: TechaTina

----------- -----------

Manga Review(s) of the Month

Winner(s) of Manga Review of the Month: ShadowYinYang and KadajChan

Review #1 by KadajChan and Review #2 by ShadowYinYang

Review #1

Manga title: Cherry Blossom Harvest (Sakura Gari )
Manga artist: Watase Yuu
Manga cover picture:
link: http://i57.tinypic.com/34pg8j4.jpg
Review:

“They say it’s because of that Western Doll and his pretty face.Isn’t he like an angel of death…”
Crimson, Crimson and more Crimson. Crimson lips, Crimson eyes and Crimson blood.
With that said; Sakura Gari is one of the best yaoi manga I have ever read. It is defiantly a masterpiece but not for the faint-hearted. It contains rape, obsessive and painful love and sad childhoods. The story is deep and touching with a very special surprise to those who usually don’t like females in a yaoi manga.
The story revolves around the young master of Saiki household and Tagami Masataka who is attempting for prep school; in Taishou era. Certainly a beauty but cursed by it, Souma had a frightening childhood, feelings of abuse locked in his heart. He is fragile both in feelings and looks and when Tagami enters his life, he becomes a total different person.
The plot sure is different and the sorrow will completely consume one’s heart if it is read and grabbed on properly. Don’t get me wrong, it has its own joyful moments but beware of tears that you may shed at the ending. Art is beautiful yet simple so it makes the reader to concentrate on the emotional part more.
Yuu Watase is not your average yaoi mangaka, so such a powerful work from her is deeply touching. The plot is totally like an acid on one’s soul when the possible reality of such situations and endings hits the reader full force.
So many twist and turns in the relationship of Souma and Masataka, obsessive sibling love and a complete neat story makes it a highly recommended manga for readers who are after realistic and angsty drama stories.
Give it a go and this three volume completed manga will surprise you.

Review #2:

Manga title: LIVE FOR LOVE
Manga artist: Jun Mayama
Manga cover picture:

This is a cute one-shot. The dilemma isn’t anything new (family duty/need to marry), though the job isn’t something I see as common (struggling detective agency).

We get to see our two leads at a struggling detective agency: Yasuie own the agency and is the more expressive one. He’s cheerful and often hits on his partner (who sees it as a joke and calls it sexual harassment). Yoshiyuki is the introverted and serious one who was hired by Yasuie. Despite struggling to get by and the annoyance from said-harassment, Yoshiyuki stayed for 7 years. The plot required Yoshiyuki to leave for family reasons and the news wasn’t received well by Yasuie. My biggest critique is the non-con scene that happened right after. This is due to the fact that it felt very ooc for Yoshiyuki based on everything before AND AFTER this scene.

The non-con sex felt too much like “I need a sex scene…*forces one into the plot*” There could be so many other ways to go about this. I won’t spoil but it genuinely felt like, from the storytelling perspective, there were other options I KNEW could’ve been used instead because I’ve seen it.

That aside, I felt it’s a decent one shot. The set up is simple and the characters were really easy and quick to understand based on their interactions and reactions to other characters and problems to deal with. It also helped that the characters were really contrasting. This made it easy for a conflict to rise and take immediate effect without feeling TOO rushed.

I felt this effectively showed these characters, and their relationship, go from point A to B. Simplicity isn’t necessarily bad, especially when these characters are a bit more 3dimensional than characters in other BL/Yaoi one-shots that tend to go extravagant with little character growth, if at all. I appreciated the straightforwardness, the distinct differences between the leads, and the fluff.

----------- -----------

Donor Random Card of the Month

Lucky pick: Sreaky

----------- -----------

**lynixe** · 08-02-2014, 03:59 AM

congratz all winners

a double for MROTM?

**KadajChan** · 08-02-2014, 05:10 AM

congratz to all winners! ^^

I should say this MROM voting was beyond breathtaking

I Thank every one who voted for me and also congratulations to @ShadowYinYang; for her wonderful review and winning

**bronakopdin** · 08-02-2014, 10:45 AM

congrats to all of you @buhbibutterfly; @TechaTina; @ShadowYinYang; @KadajChan; and @Sreaky; (you know from your first ever donation, you lucky girl

)