December 2007 Yaoi News

Ayako Suwa's boys' love vampire manga RH Plus will be developed into a live-action drama for Japanese television. RH Plus follows the lives of four male vampires who live together in a mansion: the building manager Kiyoi who is nearly 100 years old, college junior Masakazu, and high school freshmen Akira and Ageha. Anime News Network reports on the cast members selected. The Japanese web site for the drama RH Plus is now online.

Image © 2008 Ayako Suwa/Published by Enterbrain, Inc./RH Plus Production Committee.

Deux Press' web site has been launched after a long wait. Deux, the yaoi imprint of Aurora Publishing, the English-language arm of Japanese publisher Ohzora Publishing Co., is releasing Kazuna Uchida's I Shall Never Return and Makoto Tateno's Hate to Love You in English, among other titles. Their newly-launched website features detailed information on each of their licensed titles, release dates, news, and a small section of information about the company. Visitors may also sign up for an e-mail newsletter on the site.

Deux's next release is Shiuko Kano's Yakuza in Love, due for English release in January of 2008.

Fumi Yoshinaga's BL manga The Moon and Sandals, published by June Manga, was the only BL title out of the 70 or so Japanese manga, manhwa or world manga titles nominated for the Young Adult Library Services Association's (YALSA) 2008 Great Graphic Novels.

Anime News Network breaks down the nominations by publisher, with a link to the full list.

Since these nominations are for graphic novels for young adults, i.e. teenagers, it's not surprising that there aren't more BL manga on the list, since the majority of BL manga published here are rated Mature/18+.

Today at a panel at the New York Anime Festival, John O'Donnell, the Managing Director of Central Park Media and Be Beautiful, CPM's yaoi imprint, had a few words to say about Be Beautiful's problems with the Japanese publishing company Libre. Anime News Network reports:

"John talked about CPM's Yaoi imprint Be Beautiful and the recent struggles of the company with a few Japanese firms. According to O'Donnell, CPM acquired a number of yaoi titles from Japanese publisher Biblos. However, Biblos later went out of business and was bought out by another company, Libre, who later accused CPM of stealing their products in a post to their website. To this day, Libre refuses to meet with CPM and discuss the issue. O'Donnell expressed how he was upset that many American fans got mad at CPM over the issue, stating that 'there is no good or bad in these negotiations.' He also suggested that a lawsuit against Libre may be in the works. "