Review: Tale of the Waning Moon (Vol.1)

Title: Tale of the Waning Moon (Vol.1)

Author: Hyouta Fujiyama

Age Rating: M 

Publisher: Yen Press

Genre: Romance (yaoi) 

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Okay. So this was the first book containing actual yaoi in it that I ever bought. I believe I bought it several months ago in February or something. Dunno. Anyway, point is, this is the first yaoi manga I ever bought. It's actually kind of a funny story as to why I bought it. Of course, I was using my birthday money at the bookstore. I also happened to be underage and not "supposed to" buy M rated manga. Not to mention yaoi.

Anyway, my step dad was there with me and he didn't seem to notice. Neither did the old guy who sold me the book in the first place. Neither of them know about yaoi, or my dwindling passion for it.

Now onto the book.

This manga is about a man (Ryuka) who is dumped by his girlfriend and decides to drink a shit load of alcohol and stand on top of a hill to wish for a new lover (he's straight). Then this spirit of the quarter moon with a stupidly hard to pronounce name (Ixto) appears before him decides to grant his wish, but the people he presents the main character with all happen to be men. Then Ixto has random sex with him. Then he leaves and tells Ryuka to find him (because apparently the random sex made him want to go look for him). So he goes on this long journey to find Ixto with his companions, a cat boy who looks like he belongs in a shota and a dude whose in love with his horse (no joke). Every place they go SOMEONE tries to have sex with Ryuka, which makes the manga look like some sort of awkward harem.

The art is kind of awkward, but definitely not the worst I've seen. The plot is okay, if you're not planning on taking it seriously. There's sex in it, but it's very vague and it's not explicit at all. Well...depending on what your definition of "explicit" is. Heh heh...but over all I'd give the book a three out of five. Even so, I'm going to buy the next volume (which came out in June) the next time I come across it in a bookstore. Because this was the first yaoi I'd ever read, naturally I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread. It's a good manga to read if you're interested in something more than shonen ai, but less than hentai. 

So that's my (very lengthy) review of Hyouta Fujiyama's Tale of the Waning Moon.