Yamila AbrahamBesprekingen

Almost as funny as it was erotic!

1.5

I always complain about having little time for all the great books I really want to read, and yet when I get this vaguely self-destructive urge to read things like Hyde’s Dungeon, I can’t resist.

Cover art above average for a sci-fi erotica,writing not so much.Slightly unbelieveable. Read the preview..and pretty sure me paying and reading it wont happen.

I loved this book! It left my cheeks red and my heart happy. It managed to keep me confined in the super intense prison bubble. Unlike other prison romances where they often divert the readers attention to goings on outside the walls, Unprison maintained the feeling of isolation throughout the book.

I had ‘Annie’s Song’ by John Denver running through my head while reading this. Unprison ‘fill(ed) up my senses...’.

Absolutely horrible :(

It says "This is the first part of the wildly popular erotic novel, Incubus Master" but it felt like a middle of a book. I checked and double checked and it certainly does say "Part 1" in what looks like independent series, but I am fairly certain there is at least a couple of books that came before "Incubus". I couldn't understand what was going on and why and was very confused by the end. Poor editing certainly didn't help.

The writing didn't impress me at all. This is no-go author for me even if the series were lined up perfectly.

There was also an insane amount of sex, for which I simply did not care.

UPDATE
I read more reviews. Apparently, this is not a stand alone series (or a book) *rolls eyes* You need to read Winter Demon and Dark Prince first, though I am not sure in which order.

If it wasn't for editing! Ugh... Still, 4 stars :D
So much delicious fun with a twins puzzle and a murder to figure out :) Adorable!

Good luck following the book. It makes no sense whatsoever.

Skip it, don't waste your time.

Originally posted here; reviews both parts of Royal Pain for convenience's sake.

Note: The following review contains discussion of rape and dubious consent during sex.

Alchemy and science in the Middle Ages? Jackpot, baby. It’s like a more realistic yaoi version of Full Metal Alchemist, in which science is beheld as a marvel bordering on magic, and is both respected and feared. Just reading the description of Moors’ lightning machine in action is thrilling and illustrative of how such things would amaze the common minds of Middle Ages – and I guess it makes the story AU, given electricity was invented far after this era in time. To be fair, given the amazing scientific discoveries going on in the Middle East, it isn’t that much of a mindtwist to imagine a medieval times with that kind of power – kind of like part of the natural progression into the steampunk era, where dirigibles travel freely in Victorian England.

As for the story itself, it is on the most basic levels not really a new idea: king hires young man to do work for him; falls in love with him. Moors is a fireball of a character, cranky and unpredictable and unbendable. He also is prone to temper tantrums, which constantly put him at ends with King Jareth. And that’s when the entire thing falls apart. Jareth cannot stop thinking of Moors in the most lewd physical ways, despite initially valuing the young man for his cleverness and brains. In fact, the entire alchemy sub-plot is quickly shoved aside for the main course: Jareth having his way with Moors. Multiple times in multiple ways – and twice it can be legally deemed raped, even in that era. Moors hates Jareth for this – not only for the raping, but for the fact that this is not the first time a king has taken advantage of him. He constantly fights against Jareth’s advances, only to be told over and over that he is meant to serve only the king and deserves his punishment. He . . . deserves being raped? I’m sorry, what the hell. Just because a lot of original Japanese language yaoi loves to pull the rape card in the name of love doesn’t mean their OEL counterparts should do the same – and there seems to be nothing in the actual story that goes against said thinking or makes Moors seem like he’s in the right as he struggles to push away Jareth’s molesting.

Jareth is constantly molesting and paddling and even raping Moors and Moors keeps fighting him – until the end. In which (yes, I am spoiling this for you, I don’t care) Jareth makes ‘gentle’ love to Moors (no, Jareth, still rape) and by the end of their nightly session, Moors is enjoying it. And then Jareth proposes to him – and Moors says yes. He plans on marrying his rapist, his only qualm about it being that they are both men, looking forward to their “fairy tale romance”. Hmm, I must have not read any of the fairy tales in which the prince rapes the princess and she falls in love with him.

I’m sorry. I cannot, in good conscience, recommend to readers something that glorifies molestation and rape and abuse of power. Nothing in the story suggests that King Jareth will even receive repercussions for his actions, or that Moors will ever deal with the emotional aftermath of his own abuses at the hands of both his kings but will treat everything as a happy ending, being married to his rapist. So long, independent belligerent alchemist Moors, hello stereotypical doormat Moors. Naturally, no one bats an eye at the abuse, because everyone in the Middle Ages is fine with male-on-male rape – hey, Moors was totally asking for it, making Jareth so mad while being so attractive, why should we expect Jareth to control his lust and not force himself on Moors? Next you’ll tell me that ending the story with the rapist engaged to his happy blissful fiancee isn’t problematic at all ‘cause they’re in love and it’s hot.

The sex scenes were hot. They were well written. But they were, for the most part, non-consensual. To be asked through narration to excuse these actions because it’s a male/male romance and it has a supposed happy ending is deplorable and I won’t do it. I just won’t. I can’t. I kept hoping and hoping that Moors would overcome Jareth’s advances and the King would finally see how much of a terrible person he is. No dice. Oh, I’m sorry, is it because Lord Jareth falls in love with Moors over the course of the story? Am I supposed to think kindly of their relationship after this? I must be dense in the head because I don’t want to believe someone who consciously write these kind of things in their stories and frame the whole thing as romantic. If you enjoy these kinds of stories in which dub-con and non-con love saves the day, you will love Royal Pain. As for the rest of the fujoshi fanbase . . . just don’t.

A love story involving a succubus and a social outcast in feudal Japan? This could be interesting. A courtship started by the “shag or die” trope applied to a sexy succubus? It’s not terribly original, but it is intriguing. Here in The Incubus and the Woodcutter, as soon as Figaru awakens from his grief-induced hibernation, things really start happening. It’s a shame that his back story is quickly shelved in favor of the main pairing that is Figaru and Ichiro, but somehow it can be forgiven. After all, when readers come for hot man-on-man feudal sex, they don’t want to be constantly depressed by a main character’s sad history.

The research done into feudal Japan is quite evident from the moment the incubus Figaru lays eyes on his future lover, Ichiro. Through the narrative and story we can see the history of creatures such as the incubus as well as the caste system in Japan’s past. It adds a layer of knowledge to the story that without it would seem lacking in historical depth. I want to enjoy the story itself more than I do as I enjoyed greatly when it appeared at the end of Winter Demon, but to put it bluntly, the writing is pedestrian at best and relies on telling without showing and exposition in an attempt to make characters seem more interesting and give their actions deeper motives. Everything is told in simplest terms with no real detail so a reader may feel more detached from this fictional world that they might with others. Even the sex scenes seem semi-mechanical, lacking passion in the characters’ most physical intimate actions. The main problem with Miss Abraham’s writing is that it needs a visual filter to really bring out the story in its fullest form – in other words, it needs to be adapted to sequential art form, not to just stay in flat prose form. It was originally a graphic novel; perhaps it should have just stayed as one.

As soon as the story begins, both characters step into their assigned roles: Figaru is the dominating seme and Ichiro the wide-eyed weepy uke. I personally can’t stand the uke/seme dynamics that seem to dominate the yaoi genre these days, but fans of it will relish the main relationship of this story, especially if they like their yaoi stories from the perspective of said dominating seme, who is currently experiencing the succubus equivalent of pon farr (although I would most certainly not go as far as to call Ichiro the equivalent of Captain Kirk, not by a long shot). Even when their relationship develops into something deeper, the dynamics stay the same. Figaru is on top, Ichiro is on bottom.

I’m sure if you read my review of Royal Pain, a work by the same author of The Incubus and the Woodcutter, you may be wondering: is there a consent issue? And there is, especially given the fact that the very premise is about a creature who needs to have sex or he will die, so seduces and screws the first male human body he finds. And Ichiro does say “no” several times, which Ichiro ignores as he continues to seduce him, rub on his body, eventually engage in sexual intercourse with him as Ichiro fights him. But at least with this story, I know what I’m getting into based on the synopsis alone, when Royal Pain’s synopses for both parts did not hint at the rape of its main character. This e-book at least is not a surprise for readers when it comes to the sex aspect of it. Is it supposed to be okay since Ichiro is an outcast and Figaru is a demon acting on life-saving impulses? I’m not sure. But then Figaru tells Ichiro he deserves to be loved, and it becomes clear that this is not another Royal Pain, thank goodness. Even as a succubus, Figaru genuinely cares for Ichiro’s well-being, and that is a welcome thing to read indeed. And he teaches the guy about kissing on the mouth, which is both cute and kinda odd – and Figaru is actually gentle and careful about making love to Ichiro, which seems uncommon in a demon but not off putting.

All in all, The Incubus and the Woodcutter is not a bad story. Fans of the manga it originally appeared in will certainly like it, as will any fan of supernatural pairings in which humans are seduced by unhuman creatures with devious intent. It’s a quick read and it won’t hurt to shell out the money to get it, but I’m not sure if readers will be revisiting this story afterward.

This would have been a solid 4 Stars... and then the ending happened. Like, it just... ended. I wasn't expecting that AT ALL, especially since there were so many pages left. Unfortunately, they were all adverts for the author's other books.

The funniest thing I've ever read. Holy crap.
It's hilarious. haha

So much peni!

Makes me laugh just thinking about it.

In the fourth and final volume of the series, Fuyu and Hakuin realize that they are in love. Readers also continue the story on the new spring demon, Ryuuto, who was introduced at the end of volume 3. The fact that it is not fully completed is the only reason I deducted one start. Overall, this series of OEL yaoi has been very consistent, both in the art and the story-line. A very good conclusion to the story. Highly recommended!

If you're looking for drama, in-depth characters, and a gripping plot, this book is NOT for you. Much like the title and the cover, Happy Yaoi Yum Yum is fun yaoi crack that put me to mind of the 'Plot? What Plot?' stories in fanfiction. The only remotely dramatic story might be the last one, but it's hard to be dramatic when a book starts with gems like 'Jack and the Tentacle Stalk'. So if plotless yaoi eyecandy is your thing, consider adding this to your list. (And you have to respect a book with the warning, "If you're a straight guy who picked up this book because you think those are flat-chested girls on the front, put it back. They're dudes.")

I hate it when I see reviews of yaoi that say, “Don't judge this on the plot or characters! It's just about the smut!” Cause then if you actually read the book, sure enough the plot and characters are bad enough that the smut is the only redeeming factor, but on the other hand, there's only a handful of 3-page sex scenes in the entire 200 page volume. Sorry dears, but if a manga insists on spending that much time on its setup, characters, and plot, I WILL be judging it by those. And it will get a crappy, crappy judgment.

So now you know that, I'll say that this, conversely, is just about the smut. Really.

Whether it's the smut for you, though, still depends. Probably the first and foremost deterring factor is the art. With the somewhat-exception of one of them, it's very western style. For a lot of you that's probably a bad thing, for me it isn't necessarily, but not only is this western style, it's a fairly cartoony western style. Lines are thick, and proportions and perspective are variable and off. Now, on the positive side for the art, it's all very explicit, much more than anything that I've seen in Japanese yaoi that I can remember at the moment. Personally for me (since I was expecting this), I wasn't as disgusted as some by the shaky art, but I could barely find anything that happened sexy, what with it reminding me a little of a cheap Saturday morning cartoon. It's not cutesey, though, just a little off and inelegant, so the choice is yours.

As for the writing, the first two stories are a lot like something you'd see in a porno, with maybe a little more dialog. One with an art student and his teacher having sex in the classroom because of a disagreement over a grade, and the other with some BDSM in the locker room. Again, I was having difficulty finding them sexy because of the art, but I was also not finding them anywhere near as irritating as a lot of yaoi just because of the absence crappy attempts at plot and character.

The third story doesn't have any more plot than the first, but it does have a bit of attitude and mystery in the beginning, and a little sort of punch-line in the end that made me smile. It's a reminder that PWP doesn't necessarily mean no finesse or effort in anything but the sex. The art here also looks more practiced and has more of a stylized look to it. It's a semi-deformed sort and kind of weird for a porn scene, but it was at least interesting to see. One wonders what else this author/writer (this is the only story where those are one and the same) has done, and what besides porn, considering they did better at setting up an interesting background/world in the opening and closing pages of a sex scene than a lot of plot-focused mangaka do in entire chapters. I wouldn't bet my life they'd be great considering what little pages there are to go off of, but I am intrigued.

And then, well, there's the tentacle rape story. This is crack. Crack, crack, crack. Crack is hit or miss with me. I was thinking this was going to be miss, since it sounds like someone just took a silly idea (tentacle rape) and rather than really exploring the fun things you can do with the concept, just takes its surface novelty and runs around in circles shouting “Look at how funny tentacle rape is!!!” till we all get dizzy and tired. Of course, this isn't exactly a revelation in the field of tentacle rape stories, but still, Trach the smooth talking tentacle monster is bizarrely charming. I probably couldn't take this for too long, but for a little one-shot, it was actually very fun.

So the first two stories here are basically porno in comic form, the last two also just smut but with a little something else to make them more amusing. Besides the art difference and lack of plot/character stuff, they also have a sort of lack of focus on emotions that you usually see in yaoi, one of the things that make girls read it rather than outright gay porn I would guess, despite how much many of them yell for more smut. If you're thinking about trying this, I guess the main questions to ask are:

1.Do you like pure smut?
2.How much prowess in art are you willing to sacrifice for more explicit/longer sex scenes?
3.Do you have to have an emotional angle of some sort, or is porn still hot without (like non-yaoi porn)?

I'm having a hard time judging how 'good' this is overall, since going into it I expected it to be so incredibly, cripplingly horrible I was sort of caught with my footing off when it turned out not to be completely. There are some...well, if not redeeming factors, perhaps stuff you'll get here that you won't get from normal yaoi, and just for that, and for not irritating me with lame attempts at plot and character when that's not what it's about, I semi-like this, in a weird way. Though I must say I'm still rather bemused at the fact they get separate authors to write these complete PWP stories. (In all but one case, and that case being the one where the writing was probably the best of all of them, from what little there is to go off of. Should we be handing comic fans who say manga must be worse than American comics because author and writer are the same (and therefore must not be as expert at either) copies of Yaoi Hentai?)½

I enjoyed the first volume of Winter Demon very much. This volume, while still enjoyable, just wasn't as good. I think perhaps because the story was less serious. Fuyu and Hakuin are escorting a sick friend to find a doctor. Fuyu isn't happy to be doing so and is even more unhappy to be charged with entertaining a child in order to gain the doctor's services. I think the purpose of this volume was for Fuyu to discover the true horror his rape caused Hakuin, but the surrounding "plot" was too weak to give the moment it's due gravity. Still, it made the point and began the change in Fuyu that will continue. The "action" in the story is decidedly derailed by the scene, but Fuyu becomes more tender toward Hakuin after that.

I like these characters and will certainly orderr volume 3, but hope that volume get back on the track set by Volume 1. Recommended.½

I enjoyed the first two volumes of this OEL western yaoi enough to keep buying. The story was different and the art pretty good. However, this volume kicks it up a notch, making the series must-read. The story of a monk who must join forces with the winter demon who once raped him takes on new twists and angles in this volume. The encounter with Figaru leads to an astonishing revelation for Fuyu and the "action" is hotter than in the first two volumes. The scene between the two demons was particularly singe-worthy! Beyond the hot yaoi content, the story itself became richer. While the first two volumes were more a series of incidents, this one ties the bits into a full plot. Though this wasn't a cliff hanger ending, it was close and now we must wait for the final volume.

I hate waiting.

My only gripe - I hate text bubbles on the cover art.½

This westernized yaoi manga is not as good as most Japanese yaoi that have been licensed in the U.S. However, it is much better than many other western offerings, and some Japanese ones, with an unusual story. Fuyu is a winter demon who raped a monk from a local village not long ago. Now the village is under attack by fire demons and only that monk can convince Fuyu to help. But, what will it cost him? And Fuyu will get more than he bargained for when the fire demons turn out stronger than he anticipated. These two have an uneasy relationship to say the least!

The art is not as clean looking as that of Japanese mangakas Nitta or Kodaka, but it doesn't look cartoonish either. The panels are laid out in a clear manner, with sufficient background to give some depth, and the text bubbles are clearly directed to their speaker. There is sex in the book, but while graphic it is not explicit (as with Nitta or Yamane). The book is laid out left to right, rather than in the Japanese style, but Yaoi press makes no bones about the fact that they do OEL/western yaoi. The cover art is lovely and the book well made. There is a secondary story after the primary one about another demon called Figaru. One nice thing Yaoi press has done is to take a "bonus" story and make it more than just an add on as with most Japanese yaoi. Figaru's is a sexy little story that will have surprising developments in the next two volumes of this series when they stories cross-over.

Overall, "Winter Demon" is worth the purchase if you're a yaoi fan looking for something new while waiting for the next volume of your favorite series. It's hot, with good art and an interesting storline. Recommended.