Luckily, a growing number of dedicated yaoi and bara fans are now creating fan translations themselves and then sharing them on the Internet. For years there have been folks in the publishing industry who have predicted that yaoi and bara could be very big outside Japan – but so far it has been hard for Japanese manga makers to find good publishing partners in the U.S. At least, not via official retail channels. Unfortunately, not much yaoi or bara manga has been translated and released in the United States. Really good yaoi and bara is pornographic, but it’s not just porn – and that’s one reason why there’s a growing underground fan base in the United States. Not all yaoi and bara is amazing, but the masters of the genres manage to combine erotic, graphic sex with meaningful narratives that can often be funny, thought provoking, deeply touching, and even very sad – and everything in between.
Yaoi (Boy Love) and Bara (Man Love) are both successful and established sub-genres that have attracted some incredibly talented artists and storytellers. In Japan, gay erotic manga continues to be a popular genre. Whinny Estrapade gives us the lowdown on where to score some free yaoi and bara online.
