Hey, everyone, sorry about the spotty posting the past few weeks. I’m up to my neck in my biggest project of the year, my city’s Memorial Day parade, which actually happens on Sunday. That and sundry other things have conspired against me. However, once the parade is over, normal posting will resume. In the meantime, here’s an oversized post with lots of good reading for the long weekend. Enjoy!
I put together a Sailor Moon primer at MTV Geek, for those who are wondering what the fuss is all about, and I also took a look at Tokyopop licenses that are likely to be rescued (OK, some are wishful thinking). No sooner had I done this, then two publishers picked up two licenses that I never would have guessed were in play: Vertical has acquired the license to the Great Teacher Onizuka prequel, Shonan Junai-gumi, and the sequel, Shonan 14 Days, and marketing director Ed Chavez held out the possibility that they may license the GTO series as well; and Cryptozoic put the World of Warcraft and StarCraft manga on its iPad app.
In other publishing news, DramaQueen has announced it will release Shushushu Sakurai’s one-shot BL manga Junk on June 1. ANN spots some new books on Amazon: Yakuza Cafe from Digital and The Innocent from Yen. And Digital Manga continues to live up to its name by expanding onto yet another platform, Google Books.
At Anime Vice, Tim Beedle talks about his time at Tokyopop, and how things changed over the years he was there. If you’re curious what went wrong there, this is a great place to start.
Shaenon Garrity steps in for Jason Thompson this week and explains why she loves Club 9 so much in the latest House of 1000 Manga column at ANN.
Always a step ahead of the rest of us, Sean Gaffney looks at next week’s new manga releases and finds… none. Johanna Draper Carlson has some recommendations from this week’s batch, which should tide us over.
The Manga Moveable Feast continues with reviews and commentary on Mitsuri Adachi’s Cross Game; check out all the links at host blog The Panelists.
Melinda Beasi convenes the final session of the Breaking Down Banana Fish roundtable at Manga Bookshelf.
At Manga Xanadu, Lori Henderson bemoans the loss of Tokyopop’s Warriors manga, which were global manga based on Erin Hunter’s tween novels about clans of cats. I’m sure she’s not the only one, as Warriors was Tokyopop’s best-selling series last year by a healthy margin, and they had more volumes scheduled to come out; perhaps someone will rescue that license as well.
Manga Therapy continues its mental health month theme with a guest post by Ricky Alvarez on the Fruits Basket character Kyo Sohma.
License request: David Welsh would like to see some of Cross Game creator Misturi Adachi’s shoujo manga. Also, David reaches the letter Q in his Josei Alphabet.
Feeling lucky? Ash Brown is giving away a copy of Natsume Ono’s Gente.
Job Board: Digital Manga is has a few openings.
Blogging note: Manga expert Jason Thompson is abandoning his LJ and will now be writing and drawing at Mockman.com and kingofrpgs.com.
News from Japan: All sorts of creativity is being unleashed at the moment, and hopefully some of it will make its way over here. est em, the creator of Seduce Me After the Show and Red Blinds the Foolish, has begun a bullfighting manga titled Golondrina. Ai Yori Aoshi creator Kou Fumizuki has launched a new series, Itadaki! about a new student who joins a school’s mountain-climbing club. Shueisha has revealed the manga-ka who will have serials in their new Jump X magazine, and they include Nodame Cantabile creator Tomoko Ninomiya, who will start a new series. Tanbishugi has the official cover of the new CLAMP manga, Gate 7. Helen McCarthy shows off some pretty Rose of Versailles stamps from Japan Post. And since China won’t allow comics made by foreign artists into the country, Kadokawa got together with a Chinese publisher to do a homegrown comic adaptation of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.
Reviews: Omar whips up some brief reviews of recent manga at About Heroes. At All About Manga, Daniella Orihuela-Gruber gives quick impressions of some Tokyopop manga she picked up at their garage sale. Michelle Smith and Melinda Beasi discuss their latest reading in their Off the Shelf column at Manga Bookshelf.
Michelle Smith on vol. 6 of Alice in the Country of Hearts (Japanese edition) (Soliloquy in Blue)
Lissa Pattillo on vol. 5 of Arata: The Legend (Kuriousity)
Kate Dacey on vol. 1 of A Bride’s Story (The Manga Critic)
Ed Sizemore on vol. 1 of A Bride’s Story (Comics Worth Reading)
Serdar Yegulalp on vol. 1 of A Bride’s Story (Genji Press)
Michelle Smith on vols. 1-4 of Full House (Soliloquy in Blue)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 3 of Gente (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
TSOTE on vol. 7 of Geobreeders (Three Steps Over Japan)
Marcus Speer on Higurashi When They Cry: Demon Exposing Arc (Japanator)
Leroy Douresseaux on vols. 1-3 of Kekkaishi (omnibus edition) (The Comic Book Bin)
AstroNerdBoy on The Manga Guide to Relativity (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 6 of Natsume’s Book of Friends (The Comic Book Bin)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 1 of Negima! (I Reads You)
AstroNerdBoy on vol. 29 of Negima! (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)
Jennifer LeBlanc on Open the Door to Your Heart (The Yaoi Review)
Clive Owen on vol. 3 of Rosario + Vampire, Season II (Animanga Nation)
Carlo Santos on vol. 3 of Saturn Apartments (ANN)
Bill Sherman on Scarlet (Blogcritics)
Kristin on vols. 5 and 6 of Seiho Boys’ High School (Comic Attack)
I do also love mangas :)
I think your site is really interesting and I LOVE Sailor Moon :)
I have also published something on my blog about mangas, but about Fashion. Maybe you know the mangas I introduced.. !