For the Love of Boy's Love Manga (Yaoi).
Reviews, thoughts, and recommendations galore from my blog: For the Love of BL
Introduction (Hello!)
Hi there! I’m Sy, and I fell into a BL/Yaoi manga rabbit hole after originally falling into a romance manga rabbit hole. I got started with the amazing Given, wholesome Sasaki & Miyano, and the classic, Embracing Love. I became intrigued by BL, mainly the fact that so much of it is consumed by women (hola my Fujoshis) and is a popular genre that stems from a place where same-sex couples still face heavy societal exclusion and lack political/legal rights/support. I studied media as a reflection of society in grad school, am a total lit nerd, and proud manga otaku. Lastly, BL has a very personal place in my heart because I have a lot of guys who I love dearly and I wish had grown up having this genre in their lives. As someone who had the great fortune of growing up in an accepting environment - I smile today but it still kills me when I think about the years they spent in pain and denial.
I started the blog: For the Love of BL as a place to keep all my thoughts and I will be sharing posts here, mainly reviews and recommendations. I am totally aware of some of the problematic themes in this genre and with the fact that I, a queer American woman, am writing so much about it - so please do take this all with a grain of salt. Otherwise, enjoy the rants, and recommendations, and hope to be able to chat BL with you!
I have read over a hundred titles so far and am delightfully re-reading and playing catchup with the blog - so would love to hear any requests!
Side note: I also read GL/Yuri, and other romance manga in general, stay tuned for more on those two areas as well. Lastly, I want to say here that I will always include a trigger warning and will not endorse/post content that I deem to be extremely grotesque. I also skew on the side of reading about adults, though I know school life is a big part of this genre, and will try to include those picks as well.
Shout out to proud Funadshis and Fujoshis alike!
Join Me
I wanted to start a community here because when I started reading BL I struggled to find a community outside of old Reddit posts. Additionally, I can’t turn the analytical part of my media brain off (don’t worry I still love a good story too), and wanted a place to have those conversations as well.
What I’ll Include Here
Each week, I will be sharing a review of what I read the week before, what I am reading currently, a spotlight review, and a theme/topic that I think is interesting and open to exploring further. My blog is updated twice a week, so if you find yourself needing more pre-vetted reading suggestions, you are always welcome to check it out!
Hope to hear from you
Just note that I am NEW to all of this - so I suspect the newsletters and my blog posts will get better over time. I thrive on constructive feedback and also would love to hear from you in general regarding suggestions on what you’d like to see covered here.