The New York Times manga best-seller list has a good mix of publishers this week; the final volume of xxxHOLiC (published by the otherwise mostly defunct Del Rey) tops the list, with vol. 1 of Soulless, from Yen Press, in second place and vol. 13 of Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei in third. Batting cleanup is vol. 11 of GTO: The Early Years, a former Tokyopop series that was rescued by Vertical. Overall, Kodansha and Viz each get three slots, Yen Press has two, and Vertical and Del Rey each get one, which makes for an unusually mixed list.
Meanwhile, manga grab 13 of the top 20 spots in February’s Nielsen BookScan list of the best-selling graphic novels in bookstores.
Looking ahead, Johanna Draper Carlson takes a look at the March Previews, which spotlights manga this month.
Erica Friedman has a new edition of Yuri Network News at Okazu, and she also discusses the concept of family in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha.
Graphic Novel Reporter has a preview up of Jiro Taniguchi’s Summit of the Gods.
Apparently, Digital Manga has been allowing members of the Digital Manga Guild to send DMCA (copyright infringement) notices on their behalf, a practice that disturbs Ginger Mayerson. She points out that many scanlators work hard and love what they do, and that they will almost always take down scans of a book as soon as they hear it is licensed, and encourage readers to buy the new edition. (She dismisses the large aggregator sites, although they really are a bigger part of the problem.) Looking at a thread from the DMG discussion group, she is bothered by the aggressiveness of the Guild members, although it seems from the discussion that they are sending takedown messages for licensed properties.
Three Steps Over Japan has another peek inside a seinen manga magazine for us; this week, it’s Super Dash & Go.
News from Japan: A new series is launching in Shonen Sunday: Area D – Inōryōiki, by Kyoki Nanatsuki (Project ARMS) and Kyung-Il Yang (Blade of the Phantom Master). Meanwhile, at Monthly Shonen Sunday (Gessan), Cross Game creator Mitsuru Adachi is winding up his series Q and A and working on a new one, which the promotional images suggest will involve baseball. Shūzō Oshimi, the creator of Flowers of Evil and Drifting Net Cafe, has a new series, Boku wa Mari na Naka (I’m in Mari), which just started running in Futabasha’s Manga Action magazine. And the French site Manga news informs us that Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei is coming to an end; the entire series will run to 30 volumes.
Reviews: Adam Stephanides discusses vols. 7 and 8 of Billy Bat, Naoki Urasawa’s current series (not out in English yet) at Completely Futile. Connie writes briefly about some manhwa that have crossed her radar at Slightly Biased Manga. Other reviews of note:
Sweetpea616 on vols. 1-3 of 100% Perfect Girl (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)
Ken Haley on vol. 1 of Erementar Gerade (Sequential Ink)
Lesley Aeschilman on vol. 1 of Flame of Recca (Blogcritics)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 6 of House of Five Leaves (The Comic Book Bin)
Kinukitty on I Give to You (The Hooded Utilitarian)
Lori Henderson on Kiichi and the Magic Books (Manga Xanadu)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 61 of One Piece (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 7 of Oresama Teacher (The Comic Book Bin)