Desire – Dangerous Feelings
Story by: Maki Kazumi
Illustrated by: Yukine Honami
Published by the Juné Imprint of Digital Manga, Inc.
ISBN-10: 1-56970-573-9
ISBN-13: 978-1-56970-573-5
Review by Kris
It seems that many of the yaoi novels that are published are ones that are based on popular yaoi manga. You have Passion: Forbidden Lovers, Only the Ring Finger Knows, and now Desire – Dangerous Feelings. Desire is a yaoi manga written by Maki Kazumi and illustrated by Yukine Honami. If you are interested in reviews for the manga you can check out my review or Ginger Mayerson’s fantastic review of this manga.
Toru Maiki is in quite the quandary. He’s fallen in love with his best friend Ryoji Nakajo. He’s afraid that if he discloses these feelings his friendship with Ryoji will be over. One day at lunch Ryoji blurts out that he gets turned on when he looks at Toru. Toru thinks that Ryoji is playing some sick joke and doesn’t know how to respond. Ryoji wants Toru to forget whatever he
said but that’s easier said than done. Time moves forward and Ryoji just can’t seem to get Toru off of his mind. He suggests that the two of them sleep together. Toru is bothered by this development but reluctantly goes along with the plan. Soon the two start sleeping together on a regular basis but is it possible to have sex without love? That’s the emotional roller coaster that Toru is riding on.
When one reads these yaoi novels that are based on manga one can either like them or hate them. I find them to be a great addition to the original manga and make it possible to delve into the story a bit more. It makes it possible to delve deeper into the characters emotions and feelings. With Desire – Dangerous Feelings not only do you get the main story that was featured in the manga but then you get a follow up story and a brief story told from Ryoji’s point of view.
I found that I really appreciate this novel adaptation. The characters stand out in more brilliant hues due to the fact that when reading a novel it has the space needed to flesh the characters out. I found myself on the verge of tears both times I read this story. Whether its because my doctor cut back on the antidepressants or I was just moved by the story I’ll leave that up to the yaoi novel gods. Of course with the story in prose instead of graphic novel format Ryoji’s cruelty seems
that much more acute and in your face. It is a somewhat emotionally challenging story so you’ll want to be prepared when you pick up this book.
The quality of the translation and editing seems to be done quite well and I only caught one typo (instead of Toru it was spelled Toto). Other than that I don’t recall catching any other spelling issues. The story flowed well during the first two stories but when you read the story told from Ryoji’s point of view it seems to be a bit halting. It’s not quite as smooth. The quality of the material is higher than that of regular paperbacks and you have the full color cover page. It’s not at all steamy like other cover pages but over at the Digital Manga website they give this a Young Adult rating and say that it’s appropriate for those 16 and up. Because of that they have to keep things a little more vanilla.
If you liked the manga Desire chances are you’ll like Desire – Dangerous Feelings. If you are on the fence about the manga then you might want to pick this up for good reference. If you didn’t like the manga then chances are you won’t like the novel either. I’m going to leave this one up to you. I found that the manga and the novel go together hand in hand and reading both made for a much more pleasant experience.
