Book Review - Zowie It's Yaoi

Zowie It's Yaoi edited by Marilyn Jaye Lewis

Overall

Waste of money. I purchased it because it was my genre and I was making several other purchases and it was a good price. I was incredibly disappointed. Some of the stories were good/interesting, but even those felt blocky, almost clumsy. They didn’t feel like professional works to me. I read better stories here.

Reviewed by story

“Kai Stubborn”

This was the first story, so I had no concept of what to expect. I enjoyed it about equal to what I read by “amateur” writers and the story felt similar (this is in no way offensive, I read high-quality unpublished stories). The tale picked up as it went and ended pleasantly enough. I had a slight sensation of the author trying too hard not to reveal too much information, but it wasn’t detrimental to the story.

“The Hungry Ghost”

I enjoyed the beginning and the end of this story, but the majority of the center I didn’t. The main characters do nothing to appeal to me and I can’t even work up the energy to pity the main character, because he does little to warrant my pity. He isn’t a bad kid, but he isn’t anything I enjoyed reading. I ended up skimming a large chunk of the story because the wordy storytelling was tiresome and I wanted to move on.

“A Princely Gift”

This was one of my favorites in the book (although that’s not saying much). It was very basic and straight forward in both writing style and relationships. It gave us a beginning, middle and end. The tale of a peasant and prince falling in love is pretty common, but was worked well here and nothing felt off. The end drug out a little bit, but I can understand the author’s reason for doing so, and it was peaceful enough (matching the rest of the story) that I didn’t mind.

“Beauty”

I’m middle of the road on this one. It wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t amazing either. It didn’t waste my time, but I don’t know if I’d return to it again.

“The Winged Leopard in a Foreign Land”

This felt like the worst to me. Half the time I didn’t know what was going on, I didn’t know why it was going on, and I didn’t particularly care. The confused writing didn’t work to entice me, it worked to bore me. At the end, when much is revealed, I was happy for the relationship, but still a little confused about everything else. The sex felt obscene and unnecessary. I’m reminded of a very bad porn based on Alice in Wonderland.

“Legacy of Boy”

I probably short-changed this story because it was last and after “The Winged Leopard” I just wanted to finish the book. The concept of the story and the tale it tells seemed interesting, but I ended up skimming/skipping large chunks of it. I think it probably deserves a closer read than I gave it, but I just didn’t have the energy to. I think what I liked about the story was that it was a happy ending without being a happy ending. My biggest complaint was that the names were awful.