This month marks the start of Kodansha’s new line of titles which are bound to delight any yaoi and yuri fans. One of these is Kodansha’s first yuri title – the aptly named Yuri Is My Job. Hime is a picture-perfect high school princess – she’s admired by all and never trips up! So when she accidentally injures a café manager named Mai, she’s willing to cover some shifts to keep her façade intact. To Hime’s surprise, the café is themed after a private school where the all-female staff always puts on their best act for their loyal customers. However, under the guidance of the most graceful girl there, she can’t help but blush and blunder! Beneath all the frills and laughter, Hime feels tension brewing as she finds out more about her new job and her budding feelings…
The school café setting is a familiar one and there are plenty of character types that are well tested in that regard. The overly cute and slightly manipulative café manager Mai, and secret gyaru (overly peer and fashion conscious) Sumika are strong additions to the story and are exactly what you’d expect from this genre. But it is the two main characters who have the most to offer.
Hime (who is acting like a princess so she can one day become a trophy wife of a billionaire and live a carefree life) is not the first character in a manga to hide her true personality behind a façade. However, it’s less common for there to be two characters who possess those traits and for the lead character to be completely overshadowed in that department. Mitsuki in her waitress role treats Hime well in front of their customers, but in reality openly despises her. It creates a good dynamic as Hime cannot complain because she is doing the same thing to everyone else. It also leads to plenty of soul searching on her part as she tries to understand what the nature of her feelings for Mitsuki entail whilst Mitsuki struggles to understand who Hime is as a result of her act.
On the art side, Miman has a firm grasp on the style that you’d expect in this genre – especially on the fashion side. Character wise, she is clearly having a ton of fun depicting Hime’s dual nature and also does a tremendous job in depicting the tonal shift in the interaction between Mituski and Hime. It’s a quite a feat to shift from adoration to open contempt so seamlessly.
It’s an exciting time for Kodansha’s line of titles if Yuri Is My Job is anything to go by. As an introduction to the yuri genre, this new series is a great gateway.
Yuri Is My Job! 1 is out 22 January 2019 from Kodansha
9781632367778 – P/B – £10.99
