Yuriko is asexual. Gakuroura is gay. Naturally this means that they’ve just gotten married to camouflage their true natures behind the norms of society. Even with this marriage, however, they’ve got a lot to learn about one another and there’s still more than a little prejudice out there… The Beard: Gakurouta and Yuriko are mutual beards to one another, as Gakurouta isn't attracted to women while Yuriko isn't attracted to anyone. In a cute realization, Yuriko comments that “They say ‘like marries like’?”. I love this scene because the story allows Yuriko and Gaku time to see each other as similar through their mutual desire to care for one another without expectations beyond that. This idea of many ways to care is supported through Yuriko’s self-discovery story. Shirono explores Yuriko’s ace identity in a complex way that reminds allosexual and alloromantic folks that there are many ways to want to be around and care for people.

Just as there are a plethora of different sexual orientations, there are also variety of different relationship dynamics that people can experience throughout their lives. Society very much establishes how certain relationships are supposed to have their importance informed, such as how marriage is seen to signify a union between partners that are romantically and physically committed to each other. Obviously that is not always the case, but I wasn't expecting to come across a book that would show how marriage itself doesn't define the strength of a relationship, rather it's in the specific pleasure that two people can foster between each other. This is a story about an asexual/aromantic person being married to a gay man yet finding complete satisfaction in that arrangement; in fact, it's probably one of the healthiest marriages I have seen in manga. There is no sexual or even romantic tension between our two leads, but there is a strong kinship that I would argue goes beyond what I think we typically expect from how friendship is portrayed in media. These two listen to each other's worries, try to do right by each other, and are very open about their doubts while trying to overcome them and do their absolute best to understand the hobbies of the other. I gave this 3.5 stars on LibraryThing. I started off rounding it up to 4 stars on GR, then rounding it down to 3 stars, and finally settling on 4 stars again. Its issues bugged me, but there were also quite a few scenes I loved enough to reread. Gakurouta is a gay man who has always been extremely close to his childhood friend, Sousuke. Ten years ago, he realized that he'd fallen in love with his friend...who was very popular with the ladies and gave no indication of any interest in men. He's since tried to fall out of love with Sousuke, but it didn't work, and he has now resigned himself to forever nursing a one-sided love. That’s the meat of the story, which has precious little to do with the marriage side of things, really, although once the jokes are out of the way, there’s some warmth to be found in the story of these two friends in a marriage of convenience learning to come together and be a little closer, even if not do much in the romantic sense.What's It About? Yuriko, an asexual woman, agrees to take a husband to satisfy her parents—which is how she finds herself tying the knot with Gakurouta, a gay man in love with his childhood friend with his own complicated family circumstances. And so begins the tale of their marriage of convenience. I am absolutely in love with this relationship! A pair of friends, an ace/aro woman who only enjoys the concept of sex and love in her BL (boys' love) books and a gay man in love with his straight childhood friend, have a marriage of convenience and they're SO GOOD to each other. I can see this going many ways with this plot setup, but this is a strong start. There's finally a respectful representation of ace/aro people in manga! However, she's a fujoshi and I can see how her love of yaoi might skirt into the "women fetishizing gay men" territory for some readers. It's not nearly as bad as others, like Wotakoi and Princess Jellyfish, and some might find her reasons for enjoying yaoi justified (she doesn't have to see women/herself represented). It really depends on the reader's comfort level. I personally enjoyed this; my demi heart felt very validated. I Want to be a Wall is fresh and fluffy and I'm looking forward to future volume(s)! Nov 24 Another Eden: The Cat Beyond Time and Space Releases an Update Featuring a New Episode 'The Cliffs of Wyrmrest (Wryz Saga I)' on November 24

Both Yuriko and Gakurouta are well-established in this. We are introduced to their circumstances, the reasons they both agreed to this arrangement, and how they are attempting to navigate the dynamic of being married to and coexisting with each other. (Unfortunately, neither can cook, so RIP to their kitchen and their stomach linings.) Gaku is pining for his (straight) childhood best friend, and Yuriko has been followed her whole adult life by people encouraging her to find a man... woman... anyone??? You can't really want to be alone forever, do you??? I felt like there was more depth and sensitivity to the way Yuriko was written than the way Gakurouta was written, and I wasn't entirely comfortable with the way Yuriko hovered around Sousuke and Gakurouta like she was witness to some kind of lovely BL tragedy. She genuinely felt for Gakurouta's sadness over his love being one-sided, but still...Gakurouta wasn't some fictional character in a story, he was a person, and it didn't always feel like Yuriko really understood that. Gee, it's almost as though being aspec is inherently queer and our struggles line up with other queer identities due to not fitting into established social narratives and that exclusionist movement that persisted for a couple years when I was a teen was full of shit and needed to shut up and actually listen to us about our experiences and no I'm not still haunted by that, it's not like I ran an aspec blog during the height of that bullshit and had to field terrible shit when I was sixteen, nope, not at all. The Mary Sue has a strict comment policythat forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—

Nov 20 From the U.S. to Japan, You Can Control the Life-Size Moving Gundam from the Comfort of Your Own Home Yuriko is the strongest element of the book, honestly, and the portrayal her aromantic nature seems about right, but what I think the book does especially well is portraying the ‘death by a thousand cuts’ nature of others talking to those identifying as ace, which I’m going to wager is still pretty prevalent. That said, I’m not entirely convinced at the strict heterosexuality of the other guy, given his incredibly rapid cycling of his girlfriends and some rather suggestive prose that crops up. It would be rather ironic if people who constantly get mislabeled accidentally did the same to him instead.

When I read the premise, I hoped the book would fall into a group of manga that I have come to adore. I call it “married couple, with a twist”. It’s where I categorize series like The Way of the Househusband and The Full Time Wife Escapist. And I’ve heard Spy x Family may fall into this too but I’ve not experienced that series yet.This manga left me feeling torn. On the one hand, Yuriko and Gakurouta were a sweet pair, and I enjoyed watching them try their hardest to make their marriage work despite not having a clue what a marriage that doesn't include sex or romance should look like. On the other hand, I felt like the manga started at the wrong point, leaving me with all kinds of questions. Also, I wasn't entirely comfortable with how Yuriko's interest in Gakurouta's one-sided love for Sousuke was written. I spent the entire volume wondering how Yuriko and Gakurouta had met, learned each other's secrets, and decided to get married. They clearly liked and wanted to support each other, but they also barely knew anything about each other - it read like an arranged marriage that had somehow worked out. Did they meet via some kind of LGBT+ matchmaking service? While this introductory volume makes sure that the audience understands that premise, Shirono doesn’t use it for gags or laughs. Instead, the characters and the volume just see it as the state of things. Moving from that starting point, this volume suggests that the series will be one filled with love and care. Even if our protagonists don’t fall for each other. Gaku’s first determined effort to be a perfect husband (according to the guidebook on it). Yuriko and Gakurouta know the sides of each other that won't allow them to fit in with regular society, but otherwise they know very little about each other. This first volume shows them gradually adjusting to their new married life and figuring out what that relationship means for them. As a very specific gender identity, asexuality feels like the one where people are most likely to offer the most useless advice from either well-meaning ignorance or regular old jerk ignorance. Yuriko has to deal with a lot of ‘you could land a man if you tried harder’ or ‘you haven’t met the right person yet’ that simply ignores her preferences in favour of trying to force her into a specific box.