Shout Out Loud vols 1 and 2 - Satosumi Takaguchi

[louiselux]

I successfully pimped this to at least three people last weekend, scribblemoose, new_kate and toscas_kiss. It's one of Tokypop's Blu titles, and I found it addictively sweet and funny.

It's about Shino, a baby faced thirty something voice actor, whose greatest creation is a squeaky voiced kids cartoon character. His seventeen year old son suddenly turns up at his door and announces that he's going to live with him. Money is tight and Shino decides he must accept boys love voice scripts (oh noes!) to make ends meet.

One of the most interesting things is the reflection of real life voice acting (not that I know anything much about it), like the dodgy jokes the casts constantly make about each other, the pairing off and the rumours. I did wonder if the manga-ka was basing her characters on actual seiyuus. I'd love to know.

I liked the pacing, overall, although it did fall down at one or two points. I felt like some plot points were rushed, like the story at that point needed a few more panels just to form a pause or a beat. It made me realise that good pacing is important to me in a manga, and actually I've never properly considered how mangaka do it.

In a story I can usually tell when an extra bit of something is needed-- either a whole scene or just an extra beat, such as making the characters simply look at each other, or having a silence, or describing some sound or bit of the environment. I noticed that, quite often, Minekura introduces the same sort of feeling by making the last panel of an arc big and expansive and roomy - lots of sky and landscape. A natural stopping place because you have a lot to look at? In any case, it introduces a pause.

I've forgotten quite a lot about the plot by now, having only read through once. But there is teenage hockey drama. Shino has two other very hot voice actors lusting after him, and the son starts having UST with his (male) hockey coach. There’s also a lot of charming stuff about Shino trying in vain to hide his yaoi tapes from his son.

Comments

[jamjar.livejournal.com]

Satosumi Takaguchi is one of the best mangaka out there. She (probably she) wrote critically acclaimed manga about yankii girls and female juvenile deliquents, before she wrote yaoi. She wrote a straight romances with a girl who dresses as, and is usually asumed to be, a guy (though she doesnt speak or pretend to be one, just dresses like one) and a male PI who dresses as a girl for cases, with scenes where the girl watches him change. She writes m/m/f threesomes and yakuza manga, and girls that play baseball, one plain and boyish, the other physically pretty girly-girl. Shout out Loud is probably her most traditional yaoi manga, in terms of character types, because in most of hers... well, how a character looks does not inform how they act, their sex and sexual preference doesn't determine personality.

[(Anonymous)]

I think there are definitely elements of that approach in Shout Out Loud - particularly in how Shino enters this whole new world and how he deals with this new, baffling element to his sexuality. I really like how it's all fixed in the mundane details of a voice actor's daily life, too. Those other titles you mentioned sound great, btw.

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Oh, that was me. Lj helpfully logged me out.

[lisa-bee.livejournal.com]

Do you happen to know the titles of any of her other work (or where I could go to look it up)?

I quite enjoyed Shout Out Loud and would love to see more of her work.

[xsmoonshine.livejournal.com]

Just a note in case your pimpees want to ask for it at yuletide or just look for fic - the fandom is pre-existing from last year, under the title Sakende Yaruze.

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Oh cool - thanks:)

[quatorze.livejournal.com]

Oh, I totally love Sakende!!! It's full of great characters, and I also like the airy art.

[tochira.livejournal.com]

Oh, how weirdly coincidental! Another friend was describing this story on the phone to me recently-- and according to her, there are definite nods at actual voice actors, etc, right down to parodying the names of popular seiyuu. XD It sounds like something I'd get a kick out of reading.

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Damn, that makes me wish I knew more about seiyuu now. *g*

[kanzenhanzai.livejournal.com]

Oh yes! Pimp! I think Sakende was the first multi-volume BL manga that I was incredibly disappointed to see end. I could have read at *least* a volume or three more of that story^^

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

That sounds promising. How many vols are there, out of interest?

[kanzenhanzai.livejournal.com]

If it's being published the same way, there should be 5 volumes

[coles-lover.livejournal.com]

Shout Out Loud is one of my favorite mangas. I have been able to acquire *all* the titles published by Blu manga so far. Their series of books have consistently been wonderful to read. I like the artwork & storylines.

*smiles & hugs*

[(Anonymous)]

Where are you, Louise? I'm missing you terribly! What's going on? Are you having some sort of a psychotic episode? You've turned everything green and now you've gone away! Don't you know how many of us are depending on your cheery insights to help us through our wretched, dreary lives? Come back!

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Hello, I am here! But who are you? No psychotic episodes or anything. Yet! I wasn't very well this week so I've just been keeping a low profile. Thanks for the concern though. *g*

[(Anonymous)]

Just a concerned and journal-less voyeur who shouldn't be let near a computer when she's been drinking. So sorry to hear you've not been well. Hope you're back to strength very soon, she added, selfishly. X