Only the Ring Finger Knows, Vol. 4 Review

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Only the Ring Finger Knows, Vol. 4 ReviewFirst and foremost I want to talk about the translation. Karen McGillicuddy lends a new set of eyes to the OtRFK series, replacing Duane Johnson from two of the previous volumes. I'm not sure where the quality change came from, but this translation is the most cohesive, clear, flowing and consistent of the series thus far. There are still typographical errors, but they are few and far between, and don't distract the eye the way they did in previous volumes. The poetically descriptive writing style is vastly toned down in this volume, giving way to a more clean and straightforward means of describing situations and events (there were far fewer "from the bottom of his heart"'s in this book, which honestly was a pleasant change). I'm not sure if this is a change in the nature of the adaptation, or a change in Kannagi's writing style, but I list it as a plus.
Secondly, the illustrations were done again by Hotaru Odagiri, and as always, her style is typical "shojo pretty," however, there were only four illustrations in the whole book, and while they were spaced a bit better to match the events they depicted, they were still a page or two off.
Thirdly, there is only one love scene in this entire 250+ page book (far outnumbering the pagecount of the first two books and about matching the third). This isn't a "make or break" sort of issue, because as it was written (or perhaps as it was adapted) the scene is far more tangible than offerings of previous volumes, which seemed too keen on flowery allusions than actual descriptions of what was actually happening. If this is an indication of how these scenes will play out in the fifth and final volume (in hopefully greater numbers) I'll be quite thrilled to read it when it comes out.
As for the book itself, get ready for an angst-fest. This volume of OtRFK is a total downer, from the brooding to the misunderstandings to the underhanded plotting (and not just by Kazuki's brother this time). Wataru spends an inordinate amount of time waffling about his relationship, not with Kazuki whom he is more devoted to than ever, but with Masanobu. He knows he needs to break it off cleanly, not only to settle the jealousy of his boyfriend, but to ease the suffering of his upperclassman and friend, but he just can't seem to separate his own fear of being the "bad guy" for pushing Asaka away and hurting him by breaking his heart once and for all. Things aren't helped when Kazuki finally spills all the beans about his former "strictly speaking" girlfriend, now awaiting serious surgery in America alone. Bring in Masanobu's hot-headed over-protective younger brother and Shohei's usual scheming to try and break the couple up, and this volume is an exercise in misery. The cliffhanger that was predistined to lead into the final volume of this series doesn't help to assuage any reader's feelings.
But that's not to say that this book isn't worth reading. If you are as emotionally invested in this story and these characters as I have been through this long ride of inconsistent English localizations and predictable plot-points, you are already in too deep to back out now. This is a full-steam-ahead to the finish storyline and you are not going to regret the ride. For anyone considering picking this story up from this fourth volume, I honestly would not recommend it. Unless you are, indeed, heavily emotionally invested in Yuichi, Wataru and their forbidden love for each other, you are probably going to have a hard time getting past the angst in this volume or feeling even the least bit sympathetic to their problems. Best to start from the beginning (or the manga) and see if it is even worth it to you to come this far in the first place.Only the Ring Finger Knows, Vol. 4 Overview

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 2: The Left Hand Dreams of Him (Yaoi Novel) (v. 2) Review

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 2: The Left Hand Dreams of Him (Yaoi Novel) (v. 2) Review...DMP needs to proofread their novel translations! Geez. I can't tell you, since I actually lost count, how many easily identifiable mistakes were in this printed novel. I actually think this one had more than the first novel for this series. It wasn't that there were mispelled words, no. I'm sure DMP ran MS Word Spellcheck on it at some point, but that seems to be where they ended. There were words that were obviously meant to be other words and numerous mistakes that I could believe someone who did not read and write English as a first language would make grammatically. I would hope that a major publisher of yaoi manga in America would hire someone to do the job of an editor and fix these kinds of things, though. The translation was a little awkward, but I'm not about to blame the fact that English and Japanese are such different languages on the publisher. I can however complain that the writing style in the translation lacked cohesiveness. Sometimes thoughts were in quotations, but often they were not, and as the reader I had to spend more time trying to figure out who was saying what, or if they were saying it at all. It also seemed that in a number of the instances where thoughts were not quoted, that they originally had been, because the first letter in those thoughts was still capitalized. There were also a lot of punctuation mistakes. Some of them were unfinished sentences, and a few seemed to be the result of a paragraph or sentence being broken in the middle, but the punctuation to correct this not being added.
Also, related to this is the seemingly out of place illustrations in this volume. In the first volume the illustrations popped on the pages at just the right moments for the events they depicted, but in volume two they are often either several pages too early or too late. Odagiri does the illustrations again, and again they are beautiful. The color illustrations at the beginning of the book are even wonderful enough to make me want to have them as a poster on my wall.
Anyway, aside from my nitpicking it really isn't a bad read. My heart has a little place carved out for Yuichi and Wataru's love for each other (one of the more beautifully written in the genre), and I always enjoy reading their adventures. The story really is beautiful. It is not that anything is overwhelmingly surprising or exciting, but I would have to settle on "inspiring." This lovely couple makes you want to believe that everything, despite obstacles, fighting and misunderstandings, is going to turn out just fine.
The Left Hand Dreams of Him is a true sequel to the first novel, so if you aren't familiar with the first book, you might want to read that before giving this one a try. This one was written after the manga version, so that little extra side story that Odagiri wrote for the end of the manga makes some cameo appearances in this volume (a couple parts towards the end of the book were laugh out loud funny).
Volume two of the OTRFK novel series takes place almost a year after the first story. Yuichi is in college and Wataru is about to get busy with his exams in a couple months, much like Yuichi had been back in part two of the first novel, so Yuichi plans a vacation. To do this he has to make some money, so he gets a job working for his senior, who bears a striking resemblance to himself in both appearance and personality. This of course creates a lot of drama for the couple. Part two, Eternity of the Palm, takes place during the vacation itself, and another person comes to try to stand in the way of Yuichi and Wataru's relationship, so they have their hands full even as they try to relax and enjoy themselves away from the prying eyes of Tokyo and their lives there.
As far as graphic content goes, Kannagi has a beautifully descriptive style that lends itself to being vague enough not to feel erotic, but clear enough to be entirely romantic when it comes to the lovemaking scenes of our heroes (of which which there are numerous in this volume).
I give it four stars because of the awkward translation, but otherwise a wonderful story. If you liked the first novel, I highly recommend continuing through the series. I know I will be ordering volume three just as soon as it comes out.Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 2: The Left Hand Dreams of Him (Yaoi Novel) (v. 2) Overview

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 3: The Ring Finger Falls Silent (Yaoi Novel) (v. 3) Review

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 3: The Ring Finger Falls Silent (Yaoi Novel) (v. 3) ReviewVolume three of the Only the Ring Finger Knows novel series, The Ring Finger Falls Silent, suffers many of the same problems that its predecessor, The Left Hand Dreams of Him, did. Again it is translated by Duane Johnson, and again it suffers many instances of awkward sentence structure, and particularly very confusing dialogue and unquoted or even not so much as clearly defined thoughts. It is however an improvement in quality over the last volume (did DMP perhaps read my previous review and take notes? Too much to hope for, I know...), which was almost laughable for its many typographic and grammatical errors. There were also a number of instances of hyphens attached to the word "in" and a word to follow it, that seemed very out of place (was I the only one drawn to this?).
Odagiri's illustrations are again beautifully drawn, but of course, as in volume 2, they are out of place. Each of them seem to be several pages late in this volume, and in a few of the more pivotal moments, the allure that would have been added to the scene is lost and the scene has changed focus by the time the reader gets to experience the illustration. Very unfortunate.
That aside, this installment doesn't hold quite as much emotional power as the previous two installments. As the loyal readers, which if you have followed these awkward DMP localizations you must be to plow through a third book, we get our Yuichi/Wataru fix satisfied. Their love is as strong for each other as ever, but always at a difficult price. Their relationship is only known to a few, and the number of people who know and do not approve is on the rise, as we discovered in volume 2. Shohei in particular makes his intentions and reasonings behind his attitude towards his younger brother's relationship known and he hatches a plot to drive a wedge between them in part 2, Your Confession in Both Hands. For his part, Asaka in part 1, also makes his intentions, long suspected by Yuichi, and us, known to Wataru as well with some forward and desperate, and ultimately hopeless, actions. Don't worry though, everything, like it always does to fill our hearts with warmth reading the books of this wonderful series, works out just fine for our boys in the end.
The Ring Finger Falls Silent is quite a bit longer that the second novel, which itself was quite a bit longer than the first novel (about 50 pages increased each volume) and therefore took me an extra hour or two to get through. More for your money I suppose.
The love scenes are more descriptive in this volume, for those who are interested in the graphic romantic bits, but there are fewer scenes of Yuichi an Wataru's physical relationship. Instead of being merely flowery some actual spacial detail is provided, though it still retains the beauty of Kannagi's poetic style.
The afterward by Kannagi herself is probably the most hopeful part in the whole book, though. Within those few pages we are revealed that this storyline is not quite done with and we can look ahead to more novels from our fair author and her loyal illustrator chronicalling the deep love and bond of our heroes, Yuichi and Wataru, in the coming years.Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 3: The Ring Finger Falls Silent (Yaoi Novel) (v. 3) Overview

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 1: The Lonely Ring Finger (Yaoi Novel) (v. 1) Review

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Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 1: The Lonely Ring Finger (Yaoi Novel) (v. 1) ReviewThe original novel of the popular BL manga is finally on American shores. This has got to be one of the most anticipated BL releases of the year for me, and I was not disappointed. Setting aside the awkward cliches and predictable plot, the story is absolutely beautiful.
If you enjoyed the manga version of this story, you will definitely enjoy the novel. It is divided into two parts. The first part, Only the Ring Finger Knows, follows very closely the story of the manga. Or, should I say, the manga followed this story very closely. This was fairly refreshing, as often a story gets condensed when it is transferred into a visual medium.
If you haven't read the manga, but are interested in the genre, you may very well still enjoy this title. The premise of the story is that Wataru Fujii, a second year high school student accidentally switches rings, a symbol of romance and fad at his school, with the very popular third year Yuichi Kazuki, who is renowned for his gentle kindness and good looks. Kazuki's attitude towards Wataru is anything but kind, and it leads the two down a two week long path of misunderstandings, confusion and heartache, all of which revolve around their "coincidentally" matching rings. Part one is very tame, only describing a couple of very sweet kisses and dealing primarily with the boys' conflicted emotions and their complicated relationship.
The second part, The Lonely Ring Finger, occurs less than two months after the first. Kazuki is studying for his practice entrance exams for college and this causes their already strained relationship to become even more difficult as the two are not as able to spend time together. Things are complicated further when Wataru "loses" the ring that Kazuki exchanged with him, and lies about it.
Part two is considerably more heated than part one was. If more graphic depictions of [...] romance make you sqeamish, I suggest passing on the novels and stick with the manga, which stops the story after part one. If they don't make you sqeamish, the end of part two will be a beautiful climax to a beautiful story.
The translation is lacking in some places, and the numerous typoes were annoying to someone like me who is a stickler for such things, but in all, the experience was not unpleasant. The illustrations were few, but they were in fact drawn by the same illustrator as the manga, and include depictions of scenes that are not in the manga.
The read actually takes some time. Most of the novelized manga I have read so far have been very quick reads, sometimes taking as much or less time to get through than their manga counterparts, but this smaller than normal sized novel took me several hours to get all the way through.
All we can really do now is wait impatiently for volume two to come out.Only The Ring Finger Knows Volume 1: The Lonely Ring Finger (Yaoi Novel) (v. 1) Overview

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