Publisher Showcase: Brite (Tulle & B.Pilz)

As you may have gleaned from our previous publisher showcase on KiR as well as our Citrus Con panel about the ins and outs of BL localization, when it comes to manga, paying attention to the publisher (and the publishing lines within) matters not just in terms of the type of content on offer, but also how easily a license request can be fulfilled. Different companies have ties with different publishers, either through long-standing relationships and trust building, or simply because they may be the subsidiary of a larger company. So it’s useful to pay attention to what publishers a localization company already has in their roster, because if they’ve licensed from them once, chances are the process of doing it again will be much smoother.

As I mentioned in the KiR showcase, we’ve had a long relationship with them as a publishing line, and frequently release their content. But another publisher we have a good relationship with is Brite Publishing, the larger company behind the two BL lines Tulle and B.Pilz . Our long-standing relationship with Brite Publishing is a major reason we’re able to bring you guys so many of their wonderful titles.

As you can maybe tell, we at the RentaBLog love Brite Publishing and the mangaka who release stories under them. I’ve discovered many of my more recent favorite mangaka through getting to work on Brite Publishing stuff through Renta!, and it’s made me really want to help push their BL out to a wider audience.

One of the things I love about Brite is that, as a medium-size publisher, they work with a great mix of established and newer, lesser-known mangaka. This not only means getting to experience lots of new art and writing styles, but since the artists are newer to the scene, they bring a fresh new take on established tropes and stories. Because of this, you might see a lot of youth culture references (which also makes them fun to translate—we live for the challenge!) or themes that previously didn’t show up in BL much. It makes it so there’s always something new and exciting releasing under Brite!

For that reason, we (me, and our newest BL Team member Yomogi) decided we’d showcase a handful of our Brite Publishing favs! (Aside from, you know, the many, many, many we’ve reviewed on the BLog already… hehe★)

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The good, the dark and the gritty: omegaverse

Blooming cherry blossoms be damned, Japan has been in a rainy mood lately. It’s probably the kind of situation when most people would like to indulge in something uplifting, like a comedy or happy song; but, if you’re anything like me, you prefer to consume media that affirm the rainy season tenfold. That’s sometimes the appeal of sad, dark stories, after all. Which is why this humble purveyor of angst embarked on another exploration through the Renta! catalog, not to find our many cute, sweet, domestic, sexy omegaverse manga, but the stuff that shows people utterly under the thumb of a society governed by biological urges.

Which means of course, here’s a hefty content warning for the most ruthless things omegaverse might offer—if you’re looking for something to scatter the rainclouds rather than darken them, how about Sou’s April Fool’s post?

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BL NON-Guilty Pleasures

When the idea of a “guilty pleasures” blog post was floated during one of our BL meetings, I (Ames) was originally not super into it. While the intention was good—creating a space to talk about less-common or accepted niches within the BL sphere—I’m not someone who likes the idea of ‘guiltily’ or ‘ironically’ liking things. (I know, I know—perhaps I’m a bit too serious and sentimental.) In my honest opinion as an ancient BL fan, just enjoying the things you love with your whole ass is most often the way to go.

There’s already so much shame in fan spaces as it is for just enjoying BL on its own, so I’m not so big on adding even more shame by referring to things as “guilty pleasures.” We already agreed this blog would be a positive space for and by BL fans, and I want to uphold that at all costs. So rather than making a post about guilty pleasures, Sou and Alice have shamelessly gone whole-hog talking about the aspects of BL and MLM media they love that maybe gets a little flack sometimes—but who cares? If you love something, love it.

I admittedly wasn’t able to participate in this post this time around, but maybe someday. パーティの翌朝 Nonetheless, I hope you all enjoy Sou and Alice baring their “rotten” souls to the world discussing Mpreg, and assholes.

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