Reading Diary: Old Fashioned Cupcake and Old Fashioned Cupcake with Cappuccino by Sagan Sagan

Here is a synopsis of Old Fashioned Cupcake from Wikipedia:

Soon to be approaching his 40s, 39-year-old Nozue feels his life is at a standstill, and because of his age, he feels he is at a point where he cannot take risks and change his life. As such, he continues to decline promotions at his job and romantic advances from other women. In an attempt to inspire him to move forward, Nozue's 29-year-old subordinate, Togawa, begins taking him to restaurants frequented by women, giving him new first-time experiences at his age. As the two spend more time together on what Togawa has called their "anti-aging experiment", Nozue becomes closer to Togawa while wondering why he is insistent on making him happy. Nozue grows fond of him, but he becomes unsure due to their gender, difference in age, and social standing. One day, Togawa confesses to Nozue that he has loved him ever since he inspired him to have a positive outlook towards life during his job interview. After reflecting, Nozue comes to accept his feelings for Togawa and the two become a couple.

Old Fashioned Cupcake and its sequel are slice-of-life stories about Nozue and his burgeoning romance with Togawa. The stories are pretty standard BL fare. Compared to Confessions of a Shy Baker, this romance leans more heavily on tropes, like the shy bottom who can't face his desires and the aggressive top who just can't control himself, and generally I steer away from these as they are just Not For Me. I also didn't like how much Nozue kept going on about what an old man he was. He's thirty-nine! He's not old!

I did like how the age gap and power imbalance due to their work relationship were handled in book two. I also like Nozue's work friends and how they helped talk him through his many anxiety attacks over his relationship. There were some miscommunications between the couple, but they didn't drag on and on.

Ultimately, I liked the story enough to seek out book two, but I won't look for any future installments because the way that the BL tropes play out ended up being Not For Me.

There is a live action drama version of this available on Viki, if you have a subscription. Like the books, these were fine because they were available, like having Oreos instead of homemade cookies, but at least with the books, the time committment was minimal.