Ai no Kusabi (1992) Animation; Drama; Sci-Fi & Fantasy; On planet Amoi, a great society has developed, creating a computerized city called Tanagura, ruled by supercomputer Jupiter.
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Riki's stumbled his way into the upper class's neighborhood?! Guy, who's hot on his trail, is shocked to discover that Iason is Riki's patron. However, before Riki's eyes, Iason announces 'Riki is my pet' in a display of dominion over him. Blinded by his jealousy, Gai kidnaps Riki and challenges Iason to a no-holds-barred confrontation. Master and pet.love forged in the Riki's stumbled his way into the upper class's neighborhood?! Guy, who's hot on his trail, is shocked to discover that Iason is Riki's patron.
However, before Riki's eyes, Iason announces 'Riki is my pet' in a display of dominion over him. Blinded by his jealousy, Gai kidnaps Riki and challenges Iason to a no-holds-barred confrontation. Master and pet.love forged in the bonds of a twisted relationship - this is the stunning conclusion of Ai no Kusabi! - Taken from back cover: 'When I was in Eos I thought I would never back down, never give in. Even in the last three years in Eos, I was a slumdog to all of them, but that was what I had pride in.But since coming to Apatia. I thought it was meaningless to keep holding onto that.
And when I'm with Iason, my head spins and I can't help it.' It dawned on Katze at last. The one who changed wasn't just Iason. It was Riki as well. 'So you love him,' Katze said matter of factly.
Riki, the Ceres slumdog, has a new cage: Apatia, the place where the elites of Midas hide their mistresses-and their human pets. Iason Mink has allowed Riki to live in Apatia under the watchful eye of Katze.
Determined to earn a measure of freedom by working as Katze's assistant in the underground again, even while remaining Iason's sexual pet, Riki tries to leave the past behind. But unknown to him, forces are at work that will make this impossible. Word is leaked to Bison that Riki has been spotted in Apatia, and once Guy hears this, nothing will stop him from going after Riki. As the Bison members reunite to try to take back their former leader, Guy makes a final desperate attempt to turn back the clock-to change things back to the way they were when Riki and Bison ruled the streets of Ceres. And what happens next-changes everything forever.
Oh my God.this was pure greatness and an amazing ending for the series. I've loved Ai no Kusabi ever since I saw the (old) anime all those years ago and the books surely didn't let me down. I knew what would happen in the end, but it still got me in tears and I wept, sadness residing in my soul. The best ending was surely this one, in which their twisted burning love offered everything to the flames. I loved the fact that Iason and Riki's relationship wasn't explained thoroughly - how we only g Oh my God.this was pure greatness and an amazing ending for the series.
I've loved Ai no Kusabi ever since I saw the (old) anime all those years ago and the books surely didn't let me down. I knew what would happen in the end, but it still got me in tears and I wept, sadness residing in my soul. The best ending was surely this one, in which their twisted burning love offered everything to the flames. I loved the fact that Iason and Riki's relationship wasn't explained thoroughly - how we only got glimpses that made so much sense in the end. Love was hardly ever mentioned, but it surely was there.
The whole relationship setting was great, how it defied all odds and died with a loud explosion. Decisions here and there led to the inevitable end and a lot of 'ifs' were left hanging in the air as they should. The language worked out nicely and there weren't so many mistakes this time. This is truly a remarkable dystopian story that many should read. This shows the true nature of power that Fifty Shades cannot even comprehend.
I'm overwhelmed by emotions stirred by this great series. Do check it out. Riki and Iason are tangled in a mutually destructive affair and this novel brings it to its inevitable conclusion. While I could see how Riki had changed, Iason’s mindset remained as inscrutable as ever. Perhaps it’s not possible to make a machine-like creature as supposedly “perfect” as a Tanagura Blondy entirely personable. The supposed danger he’s in wasn’t quite clear either. I understood how Riki’s friends might suffer if they incurred Iason’s wrath.
But exactly what punishment awaited Iaso Riki and Iason are tangled in a mutually destructive affair and this novel brings it to its inevitable conclusion. While I could see how Riki had changed, Iason’s mindset remained as inscrutable as ever. Perhaps it’s not possible to make a machine-like creature as supposedly “perfect” as a Tanagura Blondy entirely personable. The supposed danger he’s in wasn’t quite clear either.
I understood how Riki’s friends might suffer if they incurred Iason’s wrath. But exactly what punishment awaited Iason just for holding on to a man from the slums? The series has had its uneven patches; the spare nature of the writing and the insistence of telling over showing is one problem that never gets quite solved. However, the ending of Riki and Iason’s affair, reticent yet close, reflects the complicated nature of their relationship. A love triangle heightens the drama and the peril; it also blurs the lines between what love truly is versus what it demands. Japanese author and a key creator of the homoerotic subgenre known in Japan as shōnen ai 'boys' love'. Yoshihara spent the first three years of her career writing straightforward homoerotic romance, before stumbling into sf, seemingly by accident, with the success of her signature work Ai no Kusabi (December 1986-October 1987 Shōsetsu June; 1990; trans as The Space Between 2007-2008 see Checkli Japanese author and a key creator of the homoerotic subgenre known in Japan as shōnen ai 'boys' love'.
Yoshihara spent the first three years of her career writing straightforward homoerotic romance, before stumbling into sf, seemingly by accident, with the success of her signature work Ai no Kusabi (December 1986-October 1987 Shōsetsu June; 1990; trans as The Space Between 2007-2008 see Checklist for details). Originally published in book form as a single hardback novel, it was later reissued as a six-part series, from which the English translation was made. Yoshihara's work is strongly redolent of the sexually-charged mysteries of Ranpo Edogawa, and shares many overt themes with the controversial sf of Shōzō Numa. However, it reached an entirely different audience, one largely unaware of these precursors. The world of Ai no Kusabi is divided by decree into classes defined by Genetic Engineering as signalled by the hair colour of the blond rulers and their black-haired subjects. The Blondies are forbidden from sexual intercourse, but often keep members of the dark-haired underclass for use as 'pets' and 'furniture'.
In an attempt to curtail Overpopulation, no more than 10% of births may be female, effectively rendering the milieu as an all-male environment, as opposed to the female Keep of Yoshihara's contemporary Yumi Matsuo. In a sense, Yoshihara's work is an extreme comment on Women in SF, by excluding them almost entirely from a narrative of intense homoerotic relationships and macho vendettas. In depicting abusive relationships between men, in a world from which women are removed or somehow distanced, she tapped into an unexpectedly large subsection of female fandom. Ai no Kusabi found a passionate readership in Japan, sufficient to secure a Seiun Award for its illustrator Katsumi Michihara, although not for its author. The series has twice been adapted into anime, as a two-part video in 1992 and on DVD in 2012; there have also been CD dramas in the style of Radio plays, as well as a Manga edition. Long before its licensed translation in the twenty-first century, it gained a similarly passionate fan following at the periphery of US anime fandom, often among viewers who were forced to guess at the Japanese plot. In its romanticizing of both abstinence and abuse, it can be seen as a forerunner of certain subsets of twenty-first century fantasy, particularly the depiction of Vampires typified by Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series.
Ai no Kusabi was the subject of a prolonged fan translation project, the results of which are often at odds with the output of the legal English-language publication. This is a feature of the sheer fanaticism of Fandom, but also of the many difficulties facing a translator of its complex, multi-layered situations. Even the title encompasses a multiplicity of meanings, with 'The Space Between' in Japanese also a pun on 'Bonds of Love', 'Wedge of Interval' and numerous other possible readings. Moreover, some of Yoshihara's editions offer a decorative English-language subtitle on the Japanese cover, even though her English-language title is often an inexact or counter-intuitive rendering of the actual Japanese.
Such fogging of meaning is commonplace in modern Japanese sf, but plays havoc with encyclopedia listings ( Hisashi Kuroma). Although hardly one of the Mainstream Writers of SF, Yoshihara shares many of their concerns, being primarily an author in one genre (her mundane homosexual romances are largely unlisted here), who only occasionally dabbles in Fantastika. Several of her other books touch on otherworldly themes. Kage no Kan 'House of Shadows' (1994) eroticizes the relationship between Lucifer and his sworn enemy, the archangel Michael. Although not listed as a sequel per se, the following year's Satan no Fūin 'Seal of Satan' (1995), shares an illustrator, as well as an apparent continuation of the story as Lucifer lives out his exile on Earth ( Gods and Demons).