LGBTQ+/GSRM Book Club! Currently Reading: はなものがたり 10/14-11/18!

Nominations are CLOSED

Please check out the POLL created for this round of nominations:

To limit the amount of nominations to a an amount that doesn’t overwhelm, each nomination has a sponsor. There are some many good manga out there we are swimming in recommendations…

Current Nominations:
@DIO-Berry

Given/ギブン

given
Love of music unites the four members of the band Given: hotheaded guitarist Uenoyama, playboy drummer Akihiko, gentle bassist Haruki, and Mafuyu, a singer gifted with great talent and burdened by past tragedy. Their struggles and conflicts may drive them apart, but their bond to the music—and to one another—always brings them back together again.

Ritsuka Uenoyama is bored with it all—with school, with his basketball club, and even with his one true passion: playing guitar. That is, until the day he finds his favorite hidden napping spot occupied by a strange boy cradling a broken-stringed guitar. At first, Uenoyama is nonplussed by Mafuyu Sato and his slightly odd behavior, but when, on a whim, he asks Mafuyu to sing, the power of that song pierces him to the core.

@Clovie1 (I chose this one for you because it got so much love in the poll but let me know if you want to switch it.)

わたしは壁になりたい

kabe
“I can’t like people, I’ve never been.” Yuriko, an A-sexual, decides to go on a date due to pressure from her parents.
Her partner is a gay man named Takerota, who has a crush on her childhood friend.

Yuriko (Fujoshi) who wants to become a wall and watch over people’s love affairs, and Rota Take, “I love my childhood friend (:male_sign:) and I can’t help but love him, but I have to get married due to family circumstances.”
“I thought I would live alone forever.”
A married life where the demand and supply of such two people match.

@Korinoshikkan

はなものがたり

hana

Highly acclaimed by bookstore staff all over the country!
A manga about a grandmother who woke up to beauty that became a hot topic on Twitter!!

Hanayo, who lost her husband of many years.
Yoshiko is single and runs a cosmetics store.
Two people who have walked completely different lives meet, are attracted to each other, and get to know each other because of her grandmother’s present.

@NicoleIsEnough @omk3

Boys Run The Riot

boys
High schooler Ryo knows he’s transgender, but he doesn’t have anyone to confide in about the confusion he feels. He can’t tell his best friend, who he’s secretly got a crush on, and he can’t tell his mom, who’s constantly asking why Ryo “dresses like a boy.” He certainly can’t tell Jin, the new transfer student who looks like just another bully… The only time Ryo feels at ease is when he’s wearing his favorite clothes. Then, and only then, the world melts away, and he can be his true self. One day, while out shopping, Ryo sees someone he didn’t expect: Jin. The kid who looked so tough in class has the same taste in fashion as him! At last, Ryo has someone he can open up to—and the journey ahead might finally give him a way to express himself to the world.

@snowwater

気になってる人が男じゃなかった

kininatte
CDショップで働いているミステリアスな「おにーさん」が気になってしょうがない女子高生・あや。しかし「おにーさん」の正体は、話したこともない、クラスメイトの目立たない女子・みつきだった――。
Twitterで最高に注目を集める女同士の「愛情」を巡る物語、待望の書籍化。
みつきの過去をめぐる、描き下ろしストーリーを収録。

@shuly

僕らの食卓

bokura
Yutaka, a salary man, is not good at eating with others due to an incident in his childhood. He always eats alone, and his menu consists of homemade bomb-size rice balls and supermarket side dishes. One day, as usual, when he’s about to eat lunch at the park, a kid, Tane, asks for Yutaka’s rice ball, so he gives it to him. The next day, Tane and his older brother - Minoru came to apologize, but due to Tane said that Yutaka’s rice balls were too delicious, Minoru asked Yutaka to teach him how to make rice balls. Although his mind was disconcerted, Yutaka still paid a visit to their house. The 3 are making rice balls and eating together.

@amagi

うちの息子はたぶんゲイ

musuko
My husband is (単身赴任) Tanshin Funin, meaning he lives and works in another city, so I usually live alone with our two sons. Maybe we’re idiots, but we have two really good kids.

I sometimes wonder if my oldest son, Hiroki, likes another boy. I think he tries to hide it, but sometimes it’s pretty obvious. I haven’t talked to him about it yet, but all I can think is, my son is honest and so cute, and he’s probably gay.

Honorable Mention Nominations: (To be included in future polls…)

放浪息子

ko
A boy who wants to be a girl and a girl who wants to be a boy. A full and delicate, adolescent story. Shuichi Nitori, a shy boy who can’t control his desire to wear cute girls’ clothes, meets Yoshino Takatsuki, a tall and cool girl at the elementary school he transferred to. She was also a girl with a hidden desire to be a boy. An adolescent school love story that gently and transparently depicts modern boys and girls who are worried about their fragile and fragile hearts!

きみのせかいに恋はない

kiminosekai
“If I can fall in love with someone, will I be able to be like them?” Chika Hanai, a high school student. Kimijima, a classmate of hers who is on good terms with her, confessed to her and decided to go out with her. But I don’t know what “love feelings” are. Sometimes she feels like an alien who can’t understand what she’s thinking about Kimijima, who is cheerful and cheerful. “Is it absolutely necessary to have romantic feelings and sexual desires?” A story of a girl who sways between what everyone calls “normal”.

かけおちガール

gaaru
Momo Makimura, a graduate student, has someone she cannot forget. She is Midori-chan, a girl with a mysterious charm whom she dated when she was a high school girl. Her secret letter and nail polish of the same color… I thought our relationship would last forever, but on the day of my high school graduation, Midori-chan said, “Let’s compete to see who can get a boyfriend first!” Ta. Makimura is trapped in her lost love, but one day, he happens to meet Midori-chan again at her workplace…! ?

作りたい女と食べたい女

tabetai
■ Includes 7 pages of special short stories drawn by comics! ■

I live alone and don’t eat much, and I can’t eat what I make.
But I really want to make more!

Mr. Nomoto loves cooking.
I carelessly cook more rice than I can eat by myself.

At that time, I remembered Mr. Kasuga, who lives next door to her.
If you muster up the courage to invite him to dinner…?

欠けた月とドーナッツ

tsuki
Dressing up, putting on makeup, and falling in love… OL, Hinako Uno, admires that “ordinary” woman. However, due to her lack of self-confidence, she was unable to take the first step toward a “normal” relationship with a man. Caught between her fear of stepping into her romance and her anxiety about being alone, Hinako desperately asks for help on the street at night. The person who reached out to her was Satou Asahi, an upstanding senior from the same company who happened to be passing by…

4 Likes

technically my nomination came from someone else ( I was just pinged ) so someone sneakily got 2 of them in there :laughing:

1 Like

Amazon link
Bookwalker link

The title is in katakana: ボーイズ・ラン・ザ・ライオット

3 Likes

@shuly I thought it was really cute… so… I want to keep it… BUT you can still make another nomination and I can switch things around… Dio could sacrifice Given. etc.

@omk3 Ugh, I searched katakana! thank you!

1 Like

I don’t care either way I was just pointing out I am not really active in this book club :wink: haha
I also haven’t checked the original manga, not 100% sure it’s fully SFW (I don’t recall anything super scandalous, but then again there might be something) But if there was something it certainly wasn’t too bad or I would have remembered

given is a really good story too so leave them both why not

3 Likes

Not my place to say anything really, since I probably won’t be taking part in this club (I rarely read manga these days), but I’m not sure it’s necessarily a good idea to set a limit of one nomination per person. Some people may have lots of good ideas, and others none. I think there’s a limit of 20 options per poll, but I doubt anyone will nominate a dozen books all at once. Other clubs usually just stop taking nominations after all positions are filled, regardless of who’s making them. Another idea would be to set a limit per person like you’re doing, but not have it as restrictive - how about 3, or 5? Just a suggestion. :slight_smile:

4 Likes

EVERYONE else

Me hehe

2 Likes

If you want to fight for getting multiple yourself it would probably be very easy to convince me to give you 2 or 3 spots, like Shuly who is getting a nomination despite protesting that it wasn’t theirs anyway. So really it means Dio is getting two… And かけおちガール will probably be included due to previous interest even if it doesn’t get a nominator… so that’s technically 2 spots for Clovie1 and snowwater.

But, Since you are just speaking up for hypothetical people… we can cross that bridge if it’s raised by an actual protestor?

I probably wouldn’t include that “rule” next time off the bat, we just already have 8 good options already so if people are really gonna expand the poll too much more I’d want it to be something they are really excited about, such that they are willing to set aside other options.

Personally. I’m crazy. Y’all can’t contain ALL my crazy, but you can complain and I’ll probably give in.

6 Likes

I’m not taken down your nomination (despite protests) {secretly} [mostly] because I want it to win the most…

(but we probably should read a story with a female protag after しまなみ.)

@omk3 I just have a lot of feelings!

to the “others none”: That’s why I included the unclaimed option because if so and so posts 2 awesome things and the second caught your attention, you could step up to fight for it, which takes care of the people that have no ideas, while focusing the people that have tons of ideas to pick one or two to campaign for. To me it’s a good balance. But I get it feels confining maybe?

2 Likes

Wait does that mean you were suggesting fluff for a degen book club?!??

Personally, I own vol 1 of Given already, so I’m inclined to stick with it

2 Likes

haha wait doesn’t degen bookclub stay in degen bookclub? I’m still new and don’t know all the rules :slight_smile:
And, you picked the vol already for that bc anyway which should ship today hopefully (might have it monday - hopefully). I also have every vol of given but haven’t read all of them. [IIRC - the lack of furigana in the beginning was too tough but now it would be ok] I really enjoy that story, all the animated and the live action too.

I suggested several other series for degen bc, but I haven’t started those so not sure if any are fluffy or more hard core compared to a series that you said you hated which recently released a new vol which is totally certainly completely absolutely SFW (not at all adult material :face_with_peeking_eye:) :rofl:

1 Like

I won’t complain about getting 2 spots :smiley: also if anyone who doesn’t have ideas wants to ‘claim’ my suggestions please do!!

5 Likes

now that I have a moment to think, dug out the manga and flipped through it, and it doesn’t seem have anything that would be bad to read in public probably SFW ( I look in detail at every page but should be fine )

and since I have the manga, I took some pics of the beginning of it if you want to move them, copy them to the voting/rec thread - maybe it’s a few too many but will give you a better idea of the overall material and difficulty. Honestly this would even be a good book for the BBC, though maybe some people still freak out that there are actually gay people in the world :rofl:






7 Likes

another one that people might want to consider it’s also older but if you haven’t read it 弟の夫 (my brothers husband) apologies if someone had it in the past somewhere haven’t scrolled back through all the threads, there are 4 vols to make a complete set

plot taken from wiki

Yaichi, a stay-at-home single father, lives with his daughter Kana in suburban Tokyo. They are visited by Mike Flanagan, the widower of Yaichi’s estranged twin brother Ryōji, who has traveled from his native Canada for three weeks to learn about Ryōji’s past. Kana is fascinated by Mike and is immediately accepting of him, though Yaichi is hesitant to accept Mike as family.

While Yaichi is not overtly homophobic, Mike suggests that his tacit discomfort over his brother’s sexuality drove a wedge between them that led to their estrangement. Mike’s interactions with the family and neighborhood over the subsequent three weeks prompt Yaichi to confront his own prejudices around sex and sexuality, as his growing tolerance and eventual acceptance of Mike parallel his overcoming of his own homophobia.

It’s an interesting story at least I enjoyed it. Partly because of the artist and how he draws the characters (I’m definitely biased towards Tagame’s art style) but this is SFW material and not too hard to read.

The beginning doesn’t have too much text but here are a few to get an idea of TOC and artwork style a bit. Defintely Tagame-san :smiley: but still SFW




alrighty time to turn in

6 Likes

Oooh My brother’s husband, it’s been a while! I really enjoyed it when this one came out, would definitely reread

5 Likes

Well now I’m curious.

1 Like

I own 弟の夫 so happy to read it sometime. I put it on the back burner and never got to it.

I don’t know why I never thought about this.
musuko

うちの息子はたぶんゲイ

Summary

My husband is (単身赴任) Tanshin Funin, meaning he lives and works in another city, so I usually live alone with our two sons. Maybe we’re idiots, but we have two really good kids.

I sometimes wonder if my oldest son, Hiroki, likes another boy. I think he tries to hide it, but sometimes it’s pretty obvious. I haven’t talked to him about it yet, but all I can think is, my son is honest and so cute, and he’s probably gay.

7 Likes

this one is really sweet :smiling_face:

1 Like

I know right, I loved it in english forgot to go back and read it in Japanese.

1 Like

Degen stays in degen unless it’s protec logo it seems. I can delete any mention if you’d prefer? Or we can just move forward with degen book club has vegas rules? Just 2 people isn’t much of a club though.

1 Like