Cold Sleep (Yaoi Novel)

All of you ladies are upset because this ends in the middle, but if your read the author's postscripe, she, at least I think it's a she, said it's the first of 3 books. On [...] I found the second book, "Cold Light" that comes on in 2010. So we must all be must be patient and wait for the story to unfold.

Ok there are many people out there who like gay stories but have yet to read yaoi manga- for whatever reason! But don't let that stop you! This is a wonderful novel, the spacing of the typing and indents are a bit different and the dialogue and discription are written in different paragraphs (these are translations from the orginal japanese,) but once you get past these visual differences the story itself was very good! The main story, "Cold Sleep" keeps you guessing right up until the very (though abrupt) end! Should Takahisa, who's lost his memory really trust Fujishima, who claims to be an old friend but is quiet and refuses to tell him anything about his life pre-accident? Takahisa is independent and stubborn, enough so that be hates feeling beholden to his rescuer and is therefore afraid to challenge the quiet man who is happy just to leave him alone.. as long as he isn't investigating his past. I can completely forgive the author for the abrupt ending- she explains in her afterword that these stories are orginally published chapter by chapter in short story magazines, then graduate to novels if they do well enough. I would definitely read more if DMP translates future novels! The 2 short stories after "Cold Sleep", "Class Reunion" and "The One I Love" are completely independant of the main story and equally good. "Class Reunion" follows Taniguchi, a photographer at the after-parties of his 11th year high school reunion. As we enter the last of the alumni are bar hopping in a group and Taniguchi finds himself sharing a quiet moment at the bar with Kurokawa, a highschool social outcast who was never excepted and flashing back to the times they'd meet back then. It was a smart and sweet story! "The One I Love" continues where "Class Reunion" cut off, this time Kurokawa is narrating. All three stories were interesting, smart and kept you reading! Highly recommonded!

For those unfamiliar with DMP's yaoi novel translations, Cold Sleep is another series by the same author as Don't Worry Mama. Unlike Don't Worry Mama, the illustrations in this shorter novel are done by Nanao Saikawa instead of Yuki Shimizu (artist of Love Mode). They are sparser and not nearly as provocative, but they help lend a visual aid to the reader nonetheless. Cold Sleep focuses on Takahisa, an amnesia patient recently released from the hospital to the care of his supposed "friend," Fujishima. Fujishima is very tight lipped and only claims they knew each other as coworkers and is very reluctant to divulge much more about their relationship or the accident or what kind of person Fujishima was before. This leads Fujishima down a dangerous path for answers on his own, and his growing feelings about his "friend" and roommate further deepen along the way. In terms of quality of translation, I'd put Cold Sleep somewhere inbetween the Only the Ring Finger Knows and Don't Worry Mama novels. All three novel series are being translated by different people, and while Cold Sleep's translation is good, there is still room for improvement. The awkwardness is less than in the OTRFK novels, but there are still numerous typoes and grammatical errors. In addition, Cold Sleep is not as interesting a story as Don't Worry Mama was. The latter series was, in defense, more complete, as the relationship is run through and tensions resolved and questions answered before the end of the first novel and subsequent novels will focus on other characters in this universe. In Cold Sleep, the relationship that Takahisa had with Fujishima before he lost his memory is still unclear at the end of the book, which is then filled at the end with a separate side story about a class reunion. That story is also a lot more sexually graphic than the title series in this volume, possibly to make up for the lack of graphic content in the supposedly "yaoi" series otherwise. We can only assume, that like in the OTRFK novels, that the physical relationship between Takahisa and Fujishima is forthcoming in future volumes. It certainly seemed that way from the unresolved nature of the end of this volume and the author's afterward. It was indeed very frustrating, however, to have all of these unaswered questions knocking around while reading this volume. I suppose it adds to the sense of helplessness of Takahisa being kept in the dark that we are as well. It felt a lot like we were being teased with snippets of information and snippets of sexual tension, but were going to have to buy the next book to get our wants and needs sated. Very shrewd of Konohara. The "twist" at the end was not very climactic, however. The true nature of the accident that gave Takahisa his amnesia are revealed, but they are revealed both to Takahisa and to us basically by being "overheard" from someone else, which took away any suspense that could have been built over the situation. We a

The main reason why I feel this BL novel is short of 5 stars is since though I found the novel quite interesting, the dramatic discovery of the real circumstances surrounding Takahisa Tohru's loss of memory and Fujishima's silence regarding Tohru's past simply isn't that intriguing. The explanation brings together a number of loose ends, yet is a slight disappointment after the great suspense throughout the novel leading up to that moment. The actual circumstances surrounding the accident reveal nothing about pre-amnesia Tohru's life while the revelation of said circumstances seems to be only a tool in bringing together Tohru and Fujishima as a romantic couple. Other than that, this novel was a great introduction to what appears to be a 3+ book series. Certain points of intrigue such as Tohru and Fujishima's previous relationship are hinted at, yet remain teasingly out of grasp and open up further questions. The small clues regarding their past seem so interestingly contradictory that it's even difficult to discern whether Tohru and Fujishima were friends or enemies. As a stand-alone, it's somewhat short and unrevealing considering the main story ends at p.166 (after which are two irrelevant side stories). However, looking at it as an introduction to the other novels, Konohara has definitely developed an interesting set of characters (taking into consideration the vast difference in Tohru's character prior to his amnesia) and has successively set a high intrigue factor. As a last note, this novel isn't nearly as explicit as Konohara's other translated novel, Don't Worry Mama Novel 1.