Tokyopop has announced two new yaoi series debuting this fall under its Blu imprint, Gerard et Jacques and Junjo Romantica.  Yaoi manga, stories about male-on-male romances created primarily by females for a female audience, is one of the fastest growing genres here in the States, where, as in Japan, the vast majority of the readership for yaoi manga is female.  These two new yaoi series carry a Parental Advisory (18+) and both stories feature a relationship between a young man and an older, more experience character, who happens to write erotic literature.

Fumi (Antique Bakery) Yoshinaga's Gerard et Jacques, which is due out in September, is a period drama set against the turbulent background of the French Revolution.  Jacques is the son of a noble family whose decadent family sells him into slavery at a high class brothel from which Gerard, a commoner, liberates him.  Ms. Yoshinaga's saga includes plenty of humor along with some astute observations about 'class' during the turbulent time that marked the end of feudalism. 

Shungiku Nakamura's Junjo Romantica, which is set for an October release, is a contemporary story, but it also has at its core the relationship between an inexperienced young man and a suave older man, though in this case the older man, in addition to penning erotic novels, decorates his room with teddy bears and toy trains.