Apartments of Calle Feliz (Happy End Apartment) by est em is one of those series that break the mould of what BL usually is. It’s a fresh approach and feels very at-level with slice-of-life. Like, a slice-of-life that has BL elements, rather than a BL series that’s slice-of-life, if you know what I mean…!

It follows Luca, a writer stuck on giving his novel a happy ending, since he’s angsting over his own lack of happy ends. It’s a series of oneshots, all following the residents of this apartment and Luca giving them their own happy endings. These oneshots are all very emotion packed and everything gave me feeeeeeeeeels. Not in the sense that they were all full of angst and sadness (though that’s not to say there isn’t any), rather, they were really touching stories. est em truly knows how to write human relationships and each oneshot in Apartments of Calle Feliz shows a different type of relationship. I teared up reading some of the stories, not going to lie.

est em’s art is forever lovely. It’s very minimalist so there is a lack of background and a lot of white space, yet, it doesn’t feel incomplete; it adds to the atmosphere est em is trying to portray and lets us focus on the emotion of the faces or the posture of her men.

Anyway, a super charming read. Only fault I have is that it’s only one volume; I’d really love to read more about everyone. Highly recommend if you want your BL a bit different and full of well written, complex characters and relationships. If you like your BL full of action then it’s best to skip, it very much leans more on the slice-of-life side.