First and foremost, I have no idea if this is in the right subforum; I posted it here because from what I remember, when the Order of Phantasmal Architects first put their recruitment up, they did it here. Dear mods, if this is in the wrong subsection, do tell me where it should go instead, I'd be in your debt m(_ _)m

Anyway

Hi everyone! I'm AcquiHime, author of Lily Ex Machina. I'm relatively new to this site, joining about...5 months ago? And love what the team has done in creating a site for amateur and aspiring authors to practice and improve. A while back, I read the update about semi-official groups, and thought that this would be a good chance to form a group to gather people with similar interests!

The Motivation

There's only one thing I enjoy more than writing and reading; and that's writing and reading Yuri. For the uninitiated, Yuri is a Japanese term which refers to romance between two girls. There's also a finer split between Yuri(Mature) and Shoujo Ai (Fluffy Vanilla), and while I personally tend towards Shoujo Ai, for the sake of simplicity I'll be using the term <<Yuri>> to refer to both.

Why Yuri?

This is a question that's hard to answer. For some strange reason, much of the yuri manga/VNs/LNs I read have romance sequences that are far more fluffy and heartwarming than their hetero contemporaries. Perhaps its the notion of a perfectly equal relationship? With both sides equally capable of giving and recieving. I don't quite know. What I do know is that Yuri has been an obsession of mine for a very long time, and my love for the genre has only continued to grow.

Why is the group named "Garden of Lilies"?

This is again a reference to Japanese media. In Japanese, "Yuri" means "Lily". And Lilies, in the language of flowers, represent purity and innocence, which I suppose do summarise a large component of depictions of Yuri in Japanese media. 

This group is intended to bring together those of us with an interest in Yuri and provide an outlet of discussion and/or generic fangirling/fanboying. It's meant to be a collective of Yuri lovers, giving us a home and a garden to nurture our love for the genre. Hence, "Garden of Lilies". I'm open to changing it, though, if there are any better suggestions.

What will the group do?

Primarily, the group will hopefully provide an avenue for its members to swap recommendations for stories with Yuri or shows/games/manga with Yuri undertones. It will bring together authors who enjoy writing Yuri, and will hopefully allow authors to provide each other with critique targeted specifically at improving the quality of Yuri development in their story. There may also be competitions or livestreams hosted, but I'll only look into those once/if this group gets going :s

Who is invited to join?

Anyone who loves Yuri!

Artists, Authors, Readers, Reviewers, Composers, Magicians, Postmen, it doesn't matter what you do or who you are. The one and only qualifying criterion for joining is to have a love for girls who love girls.

...And that's all from me. If you wish to join me in forming this group, and proclaiming your love for Yuri, Just leave a comment below, or PM me! Hopefully, I can get this group going, so that us Yuri lovers will have a home here on RRL.

With love and lilies,
AcquiHime.

I moved this over to General just because more people tend to look at threads here.

Just to remind you, you would need one of the staff to agree to be your group supervisor in order to get approved.

AcquiHime-san,

Your group idea is interesting however I think it is a little too niche and I'd be interested if you made it more generally Romance as opposed to just Yuri romance.

Hear me out~ 

I write Yuri (a lot) but not solely as my genre is more general ROMANCE and I think that broader Romance genre is under-represented on RR. At least as a monolith. 

Most stories on Royal are Fantasy that happen-to-have-romance. But I think I'm literally the only author here writing straight reality Crime/Romance. And most of it is Het-Rom but with yaoi and yuri liberally sprinkled in.

So please broaden your group to encompass all love stories with say Love being a solid theme in the stories, be they-yaoi, het, yuri-and I will join and champion your group ^_^ and yes, I am elite. 

oh~ here are my works to prove it~: JayDirexs Works~


..

'unice5656' pid='598155' dateline='1459781896' Wrote: I moved this over to General just because more people tend to look at threads here.

Just to remind you, you would need one of the staff to agree to be your group supervisor in order to get approved.

I'm aware, but that's only to get semi-officially recognised, right? Well, in any case, I don't want to waste any mod's time until I get some interested parties

'JayDirex' pid='598193' dateline='1459783073' Wrote: AcquiHime-san,

Your group idea is interesting however I think it is a little too niche and I'd be interested if you made it more generally Romance as opposed to just Yuri romance.

Hear me out~ 

I write Yuri (a lot) but not solely as my genre is more general ROMANCE and I think that broader Romance genre is under-represented on RR. At least as a monolith. 

Most stories on Royal are Fantasy that happen-to-have-romance. But I think I'm literally the only author here writing straight reality Crime/Romance. And most of it is Het-Rom but with yaoi and yuri liberally sprinkled in.

So please broaden your group to encompass all love stories with say Love being a solid theme in the stories, be they-yaoi, het, yuri-and I will join and champion your group ^_^ and yes, I am elite. 

oh~ here are my works to prove it~: JayDirexs Works~


..

Hi! While I do agree that pure Yuri is very much so a niche category, it is precisely because it is a niche that I feel like it's important to create a place of belonging for those who happen to love Yuri. Romance as a category is immense; almost all stories here have it in some form. And while the stories on this site may relegate Romance to a side role, it's far easier to find a story with het romantic undertones than it is to find one with Yuri - especially considering that stories with female protagonists in general are rare on this site. The purpose of this group is for like-minded individuals to get together and share works of Yuri that they have found/written; This is not a function that is necessary for the much larger and more common <<Romance>> Catagory; a simple filtered search will serve that purpose.

I do see where you're coming from, in that it is rare to find a story with a major focus on romance on this site, but that's not the type of story that I'm trying to promote with this group. This group is to share any and all stories with elements of Yuri in it, no matter how dominant or sidelined, because when we have so little choice to begin with, any little amount is welcome.

'AcquiHime' pid='598256' dateline='1459786611' Wrote:  ...especially considering that stories with female protagonists in general are rare on this site.... 

Nya? you added another element, though fitting~

'AcquiHime' pid='598256' dateline='1459786611' Wrote:
The purpose of this group is for like-minded individuals to get together and share works of Yuri that they have found/written

 Not really sure that Royal is the spot for yuri focus. I mean, you are aware Royal caters to VR, Xianxia, reincar, fantasy, etc as a primary reader base...seeking out pure Yuri up here is a stretch~

'AcquiHime' pid='598256' dateline='1459786611' Wrote:
This group is to share any and all stories with elements of Yuri in it, no matter how dominant or sidelined, because when we have so little choice to begin with, any little amount is welcome. 

 I hear you about Romance being too general, but it's a start. I think it would be better if you started from a bigger "tent" and narrowed it down, as there I am sure are more element "romance" writers up here (to include yuri, yaoi, het, gender bender) that would be interested in your group as opposed to such a really truly narrow focus on just Yuri...I mean you yourself added the element of "Female Protagonist"  and that's a whole other cool underrepresented genre in itself with a reader base. 

Anyway this is all just my opinion. Broaden your tent, or don't~

Just another opinion here so don't mind me too much.

Yuri in general is a very niche genre. Out of all the stories out there, even just focusing on LN and WN, its coverage in any form of media is fairly limited when compared to everything else out there, especially if you compare it to the more popular genres of shounen actionesque things. Take into account that you're trying to form a niche group on an already highly focused site, I think you'll have trouble garnering enough interest to create an actual group. As JayDirex said above, I'd think it would be more beneficial to have a more encompassing group, then focus down later as members join up and define it. There aren't many romance stories that I've read, much less liked, so it'd be interesting to see a group dedicated to focusing and improving romance novels.

Good luck forming up your group and I'm sure I'll see you around RRL.

'JayDirex' pid='598193' dateline='1459783073' Wrote: Most stories on Royal are Fantasy that happen-to-have-romance. But I think I'm literally the only author here writing straight reality Crime/Romance. And most of it is Het-Rom but with yaoi and yuri liberally sprinkled in.

..

*sniff*

OK, if it's specifically 'crime/romance'. You're not alone going heavily on the romance-track though. Anyway, mine's het-rom as well, with an extremely thin veneer of sci-fi added to it, so I'd join if the group went for general romance.

Edit:

My suggestion for a compromise would be an LN-romance group (more precisely an OELN as we write in English). I'd argue that the yuri/general-LN-romance combo has more in common compared to the western-romance/LN-romance combo.

'StenDuring' pid='598512' dateline='1459798851' Wrote: My suggestion for a compromise would be an LN-romance group (more precisely an OELN as we write in English). I'd argue that the yuri/general-LN-romance combo has more in common compared to the western-romance/LN-romance combo.

Sten, me and you have seen eye to eye on the LN-Romance combo forever. I agree 100 percent-o-! 

Romance, OELN group. In the sense that Romance is a key theme. You know, characters can save the world, but they have to blush and go "Tsun" or "Dere" when certain cute boys/girls interact with them  ^_^

~ Ne

something Reshi-chan would read ^_^

Somebody wants to create a yuri group and nobody invited me, the Queen of Yuri? You guys are horrible!

Most of my stories have elements of yuri, except those that do not have the elements of yuri, which is a few. :P

As for the niche issue, in many Asian countries, yuri is not really niche compared to, say yaoi. In my country for example, lesbian couples are more accepted than gay couples, although both are equally prosecuted. Thus why, yuri stories are digested more than yaoi stories.

As compared to western literature. In western literature, lesbian romance is not accepted at all for some strange reason. In comparison, gay romance take up a huge chunk of audience in niche romance genre. I assume because women are the greatest purchaser of romance and they can't stomach lesbianity.

Regardless, it's true that yuri is a niche genre, even in Japan. But that by itself is its charm. When Yuri Hime magazine first came out in the 1980s, nobody bought it. Over time, people started shedding their shame of liking mild lesbian mangas and Yuri Hime prospered for a time, with other publishers jumping in on the niche bandwagon until it was finally replaced with Yuri Hime Wildrose.

My point is, although it is 'niche' it is not lacking in fans, so just let the OP make the yuri romance group instead of having yuri be a subtopic of 'romance', which defeats the purpose of yuri having its own group.

If a bigger romance groups is created, with a subsection being yuri, the romance group will be saturated with non-yuri, due to the nicheness of yuri, thus swallowing up yuri stories and defeating the reason for the group's creation in the first place.

BTW, if there is a yuri group, you can count on my support.

The group has not been created yet. This was an interest check to see if enough members could be gathered. It will probably be hard to gather members as Yuri is a bit uncommon. That being said, gender bender stories tend to go Yuri, I wonder if those count too?

The previous suggestions are pretty good and they have valid points.
How about you switch it to romance in general? as part of romance you could write Yuri normally, and you could see among the other members who else have your interest and become friends with them. Not surprisingly Ai-Chan is already here [ o/ hi ai-chan].

I understand you want to push "Yuri" on RRL. But, what we truly lack is Romance in general.
Anyway, ReshResh already said she is willing to supervise anything romance related. If you change it from Yuri to Romance you will also get the admin's =approval and all you will need is the numbers which I am sure will quickly join.

Well I for one would join a general romance group. The number of stories here with romance taking centre stage seems to be small as it is. It'll be interesting to see what happens with the new three genre limitation system. Hopefully we'll see less stories where the protag accidentally touches a female breast in once scene and the story promptly gets labelled romance as a result.

i would join a yuri group but not a romance group in general 
i personally can not make myself to care even remotely for male characters i understand that this is a far from universal point of view but at the same time i know that i am not alone in this point of view

Yuri is one of my favorite genres.

From looking at the replies, most favored the general-romance route to encompass all romantic pairings, stories, and whatnot. While I think making a group for general-romance does have more potential in bringing a high amount of  members and increase amount of discussions, that was a little far from the OP's intentions. The OP wanted to gather a handful of individuals who likes a niche genre and talk about all things yuri. Bringing in everyone under the umbrella with different preferences and biases will create a less coherent group. Otherwise, I don't know why someone hadn't already made a general-romance group by now. Looking at the list of groups, not one is towards a specific genre.

If a yuri group is made, I'll join.

'BlaiseCorvin' pid='598612' dateline='1459802760' Wrote: Keep in mind that if you do form a "Romance" group, you could create subsections for your group's story list and simply make one of them, "Yuri".

I think this is the best way to go about it. Win-win for everyone, especially for people like me with interest in both.

Yuri is easily my favorite genre in general from its innocence to its fiery heat it utterly captivates me, and when compared to normal or bl they don't even compare... I fully support a yuri group and feel that a romance group would just overshadow the yuri niche with all its cliches and fandoms.