Blood Honey

Blood Honey

By Sakyou Yozakura

Overall: Mediocre
Smex Factor: Red Lantern
Art: Generic
Status: 1 Volume; Complete

Review: A super fluffy manga that contains little to no substance at all! Also it has vampires in it.

This stuff is so standard, there really isn’t much to say about it. The ukes look like titless pretty-girls, and the semes are average looking. (This isn’t even the type of manga I would use the words “top” and “bottom” for, because it’s just so utterly…yaoi. I can’t even think to apply “BL” to it. It’s just. Yaoi.)

Not to be overly critical; it doesn’t try to be something it isn’t. It’s cute, it’s fun, it’s thoughtless. The couples like each other, and they resolve each other’s conflict without much difficulty.

Akabane, our cute little nurse-vampire (fetish-fuel much?), leans a tad towards the tsundere, and Mayuzumi has something of a multiple-personality complex. Either that or serious anger issues. Make of that what you will. They're lovey and cutesy, and they don’t really have a whole lot of sex. By which I mean any. Ever.

I forgot: Akabane is all about taking blood, but, if you hadn’t guessed by the nurse comment, he takes it with a needle. Speaking as one who came this close to passing out the last time I got blood taken (granted it was about ten vials, I am not even exaggerating), I can say that this really isn’t bad. It’s not graphic or anything, and it’s an action performed casually and almost in the background. (Despite being a plot point, it’s not overtly noticeable.)

There’s also some weird pseudo-science about blood that seems very Japanese-old wives’ tale-y. But hey, in a manga about sexy gay vampires, I don’t think a little suspension of disbelief is difficult.

The second story is about a high school kid and a Buddhist priest, and learning that arrogance and materialism will make you lonely. Kiri is an annoying, shallow little BEAST, so I certainly don’t mind seeing him put in his place. He does make some stupid-cute faces though. The priest is tough and lacks scruples. Also his name is Yamada Tarou which is so lamely white-bread, it’s awesome.
Also they have lots of sex. They're the reason this is Homocheese.

Going back some years, there’s an after-story about Yamada and Mayuzumi as teenagers and fooling around a bit. What an interesting choice for an author to make…They’re both seme after all. Yamada is a punk, which would be dear to my heart, except all he does is smoke and sleep around. The story implies that he likes fighting, but it must take place off-panel. I remain unimpressed—without the fights, he’s just a manslut.

And Mayuzumi is a genki-boy, which is great.

As I said before, this is a typical manga (with vampires), but the one part I actually really like is the 4koma at the back, in which Yamada gains my respect with his Mokona impression.