Book 12: Tim and Pete by James Robert Baker

Title: Tim and Pete
Author: James Robert Baker
Number of Pages: 256 pages
Book Number/Goal: 12/30 for 2010
My Rating: 5/5

A year after they broke up, Tim still isn't over his ex-boyfriend Pete. When a date goes wrong and he's left stranded in Laguna Beach with nothing but his swim trunks, sandals, and sunglasses, Tim uses that as an opportunity to look Pete up, hoping that if he can beg a ride home, maybe it will lead to something more. And it does, but not exactly in the way Tim had hoped.

I loved this so much! gloss recommended it to me ages ago, but my library doesn't have it and it never showed up on BookMooch, so it took me a while to finally get my hands on a copy (found someone selling it through Amazon Fulfillment, so I could get my free shipping and use my Amazon credit). I'm really glad I finally had a chance to read it, though, and I will definitely be reading more of his books.

Although this is a story about a relationship, it's not a romance and is about as far from "original slash" type gay fiction as you can get. This is about being gay in the early '90s, about the toll AIDS had taken/was taking on the gay community, about rage and despair and sometimes being able to find happiness despite all that.

It is a book about white gay guys, though, and as you would expect from that, there's quite a bit of racism, misogyny, and transphobia. The racism is the worst, if only because there are more people of color in the story than there are trans people or women.

Manga: Datte Suki Nan Da Mon & Ultra Maniac by Yoshizumi Wataru

Title: Datte Suki Nan Da Mon
Author: Yoshizumi Wataru
Number of Volumes: 2
My Rating: 3/5

When Moka sees Yoshii, it's love at first sight, but soon she finds out that he only dates girls who already have boyfriends. Of course this turns out to be due to his ~trauma~ at the fact that his brother is dating the girl he had a crush on forever, and so he doesn't really want to get too close to anyone.

The plot was kind of silly in that shoujo manga way, but overall it was enjoyable. Even with cliched plots, I always enjoy Yoshizumi's stuff.

There's no official English release for this, but it looks like it has been fully scanlated.

Title: Ultra Maniac
Author: Yoshizumi Wataru
Number of Volumes: 5
My Rating: 4/5

When Ayu does a favor for Nina, Nina decides to repay her by telling her her secret: she's really a witch from another world called Magic Kingdom. She wants to help Ayu out by doing some spells for her, but unfortunately the reason she's at Ayu's school is because she was flunking out of her magic school, so nothing she does quite goes as planned.

I wasn't that thrilled with the plot of this because I'm not that big a fan of magical stories, but the magic is really in the background here. Mostly this is the story of Ayu and Nina's friendship and their respective romances, and by the end I found I was enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would.

I was surprised to find this was actually released in English, so the Amazon link goes to the English version.

Daily Happiness

1. I don't have to go out anywhere today! I'm looking forward to that. Lots of running around yesterday and Friday.

2. I made split-pea soup and it smells so delicious! I think I'll go have a bowl now.

3. I didn't get as much done as I wanted yesterday (nowhere near as much), but I did get several things done, so yay.

Daily Happysong:

Magnapop - Open the Door
I haven't heard anything else by them, but I really like this song.