YAOI MANGA REVIEW: Ruff Love

Jennifer LeBlanc AKA Asami's Girl — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 03:53:48 +0000

Ruff Love – Tamaki Kirishima – Manga Review

I’ve been trying to get my hands on this one for awhile and finally saw Amazon had it available (Deux was out). Let me start off by saying I’m surprised at how explicit this one is considering it is a Deux title. I prefer explicit yaoi, which is why I typically stick with 801 Media or Kitty Media. Seeing a Deux title that made me take notice was unexpected but pleasant.

The plot of this story is relatively interesting although not exactly new but what is in yaoi, right? Taketora’s grandfather had a beloved dog Shiba who was buried in the back yard. One day Taketora finds Shiba digging his way out of his resting place except now he’s a human with ears and a tail. Shiba mistakes Taketora for his grandfather but is quickly corrected. He tells Taketora that he has returned to repay the kindness his grandfather showed him but since he has since passed away, he will repay it to Taketora instead. Too bad he’s not really good at doing much and is a total klutz. The story gets a little more interesting at the introduction of another dog turned man that shows up a bit later in the story adding the conflict.

The illustrations are pretty typical of Tamaki Kirishima. There’s the weird lip outlining thing and when naked, the characters are sometimes anatomically “off”. Although I will say there has been some improvement since The President’s Time with its squared, out of place pecs and really dark outlined lips. I do love her sense of humor with how she draws the chibi versions, though. Sooo funny and cute!

As I said earlier, this is pretty explicit however I feel the lack of proper illustrating of the scenes takes away from it. I found I was less into the sex scene and more into analyzing the drawing of them, which is never a good thing. As far as translation and clarity of speech bubbles, I found no issue in the translation at all.

Overall, I do like this story and I love the cute factor that Tamaki Kirishima brings to her stories. If you want cute and fun, I would get it. If you want it for hot sex, I’m not sure it will satisfy.

Plot = A-

Characters = A-

Illustrations = B

Sexual Content = B+ (explicit but lacking)

Translation = A

Overall Grade = A-

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The Yaoi Review » Tamaki Kirishima

YAOI MANGA REVIEW: Ruff Love