Adorkable Musings

It has been well-established that I love smut.  In this day and age, most romance readers are smut readers.  There is a genre that does not get a lot of love.  It is BL mangas. Reader, I will tell you now: BL is Boys’ Love.  This manga genre focuses on the relationship between the male characters.  This is a genre that is mainly written for the female gaze.  Mostly, the BL stories I read are slice-of-life or cute love stories. While there are stories with darker themes, the love story usually helps to get through the dark parts.  This week’s manga review is Delinquent Daddy & Tender Teacher by Tama Mizuki.

The story starts with Grade school teacher Hitsuji taking attendance.  He notices that one of his students, Saitou, is not in class for the third time that week.   Understanding that Saitou’s mother recently died, Hitsuji becomes worried about his progress in school. Meeting with Saitou’s dad, Hatoyama, he realizes they went to high school together.  Not only that, but Hitsuji had a massive crush on him when they were classmates.  This starts with a series of events that begin with them becoming friends again.

This is a good story about coming to terms with who you are.  Hitsuji, for the most part, was still in the closet when he decided to pursue a relationship with Hatoyama.  Hatoyama, for his part, is interested in Hitsuji.  There are also some more serious themes.  Saitou’s grandparents don’t think Hatoyama is good enough to parent him independently.  So they attempt to take his rights.  In the story, even though Saitou is still grieving his mom, he makes it known that he wants to live with his dad.  It was a lovely and touching moment.

If you are open to BL manga, I will recommend this series. It’s adorable and lives up to the slice-of-life category. If MM stories are not your thing, please try something else.