More PW stories about manga! I interviewed Seven Seas founder Jason DeAngelis and I also wrote a short piece about Dark Horse’s 25 years of publishing manga.

Lissa Pattillo checks out the past week’s new manga in her On the Shelf column at Otaku USA.

The Manga Bookshelf team looks forward to this week’s new manga, and Melinda Beasi files a first-quarter report on her three favorite manga of the year (so far).

Erica Friedman posts the latest edition of Yuri Network News at Okazu.

Lissa Pattillo has word of a new manga publisher, the fledgling Kansai Club, and she’s guardedly optimistic about them despite some reservations; their first project will be a Kickstarter drive to fund a limited edition of Osamu Tezuka’s Crater.

Jason Thompson Shaenon Garrity looks at some classic shoujo manga, Love Song and Four Shojo Stories, in his latest House of 1000 Manga column at ANN.

Caitlin McGurk spotlights Jiji Manga, a newspaper supplement published in 1921 that is the first publication anyone can find that used the word “manga” in its title. And the cover feature is about women’s liberation!

I’m really late to the party with this, but Matt Brady is doing an amazing series on why Eiichiro Oda’s art in One Piece is so awesome at his blog, Warren Peace Sings the Blues. He has lots of analysis and examples—Matt takes his One Piece seriously! Here’s the first post, if you like to start at the beginning.

Lori Henderson debuts her Manga Dome podcast, which covers a wide variety of manga topics, at Manga Xanadu.

News from Japan: The March issue of Nakayoshi came with a bonus: The Super Saikyo Manga-ka Set, a manga kit containing drawing tools and a guide to drawing like a pro. The editors seem to be serious about encouraging would-be manga-ka, as they are running a drawing contest and plan to have more special supplements in the future. Rocket24 pays a visit to the new manga park in Tachikawa City, where you can read manga from their 30,000-volume library for just 400 yen per day. Kazune Kawahara and Kimi ni Todoke creator Karuho Shiina are working together on a one-shot manga for the 50th anniversary issue of Shueisha’s Betsuma Margaret magazine. Dragon Ball manga-ka Akira Toriyama has created a short stand-alone comic to promote environmental awareness among children. And while it looked like the threat letters to anyone associated with Kuroko’s Basketball had stopped for a while, the latest doujinshi event, scheduled for Shizuoka next week, has been cancelled after a new threat was received.

Reviews

Matthew Warner on vol. 1 of Barrage (The Fandom Post)
Ash Brown on vol. 20 of Blade of the Immortal (Experiments in Manga)
Matthew Warner on vol. 55 of Bleach (The Fandom Post)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 4 of A Bride’s Story (Blogcritics)
Lori Henderson on vol. 1 of Btooom! (Manga Village)
Kristin on vol. 1 of Crimson Empire (Comic Attack)
Seth T. Hahne on vols. 1 and 2 of Cross Game (Good OK Bad)
Ken H on vol. 1 of Cyborg 009 (Comics Should Be Good)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 5 of A Devil and Her Love Song (Blogcritics)
Sweetpea on Eagle: The Making of an Asian-American President (Organization ASG)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 25 of Excel Saga (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Victoria Martin on vol. 11 of Fushigi Yugi Genbu Kaiden (Kuriousity)
Daniella Orihuela-Gruber on Good Morning (All About Manga)
Justin on vol. 7 of GTO: 14 Days in Shonan (Organization ASG)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 20 of Higurashi When They Cry (The Fandom Post)
Infinite Speech on vol. 8 of Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit (Comic Attack)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 7 of Jack Frost (The Fandom Post)
Brian Gardes on vol. 1 of Knights of Sidonia (Stumptown Trade Review)
Connie C. on Lychee Light Club, No Longer Human, and Genkaku Picasso (Comics Should Be Good)
Victoria Erica on vol. 1 of Magic Knight Rayearth (omnibus edition) (Inside AX)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 6 of Naruto (Blogcritics)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 8 of Oh My Goddess! (Blogcritics)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 4 of Punch Up! (I Reads You)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Tiger & Bunny (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 15 of Toriko (The Comic Book Bin)
Manjiorin on Trigun: Multiple Bullets (Organization ASG)

Christopher Butcher, who is the manager of the Toronto comics shop The Beguiling in addition to marketing director of Udon, talks about manga from a retailer’s point of view, looking both at who is buying manga these days and what manga can do for retailers who are willing to invest a bit of time and money. This should have been part of my big manga story at PW, and it’s definitely a worthy addendum.

At Manga Bookshelf, the team discusses their Pick of the Week, and Melinda Beasi and Michelle Smith discuss Library Wars, The Dark-Hunters: Infinity, and Tiger & Bunny in their latest Off the Shelf column.

Rocket News takes a look at Japanese Shonen Jump‘s best-selling manga, the 20 series that have survived years of reader surveys, and at Manga Xanadu, Lori Henderson looks at the ones that have not been licensed in North America.

News from Japan: The messaging platform LINE has added a digital manga service that carries over 30,000 titles from top publishers such as Kodansha, Shueisha, and Shogakukan.

Reviews: The Manga Bookshelf bloggers post their latest set of Bookshelf Briefs.

Connie on vol. 1 of 21st Century Boys (Slightly Biased Manga)
TSOTE on Afternoon Dinosaur (Three Steps Over Japan)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 2 of Blood Lad (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Crimson Empire: Circumstances to Serve a Noble (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Connie on Drops of Desire (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on Expecting the Boss’s Baby (Slightly Biased Manga)
Erica Friedman on Gakuen Polizi (Okazu)
Anna N. on vol. 1 of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin (Manga Report)
TSOTE on vols. 1 and 2 of Monju (Three Steps Over Japan)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 13 of Nabari no Ou (The Fandom Post)
Connie on Not for a Student (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vol. 53 of One Piece (Slightly Biased Manga)
Michael May on Pokemon the Movie: Kyurem vs. the Sword of Justice (Good Comics for Kids)
Erica Friedman on Sabegu! (Okazu)
Derek Bown on this week’s issue of Shonen Jump (Manga Bookshelf)
Connie on vol. 9 of Tenjho Tenge (omnibus edition)

It’s been a busy time: I took a comprehensive look at the manga market at Publishers Weekly, including interviews with large and small publishers. I did a lot of number-crunching, too. Overall, the market is smaller but the remaining publishers believe it’s sustainable, and several are actually seeing growth.

Big news at Yen Press: They will release the next chapter of Highschool of the Dead simultaneously with Japan.

Chromatic Press has launched their Kickstarter for the new editions of the first two volumes of Off*Beat. I covered it in my Kickstand column at CBR.

Reviews: Ash Brown chronicles another week of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 9 of Case Closed (Blogcritics)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 46 of Case Closed (The Fandom Post)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 9 of Chi’s Sweet Home (Blogcritics)
A Library Girl on vol. 1 of Gamerz Heaven (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Laura on The Infernal Devices (Heart of Manga)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 5 of Naruto (Blogcritics)
Jocelyne Allen on No Longer Human (Ningen Shikkaku) (Brain Vs. Book)
A Library Girl on vol. 2 of Strobe Edge (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Ash Brown on vol. 2 of Summit of the Gods (Experiments in Manga)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 1 of Tiger and Bunny (I Reads You)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 4 of Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s (The Comic Book Bin)

PictureBox has plans to publish five manga in 2013, including Osamu Tezuka’s The Mysterious Underground Men; ICv2 has the details.

Lissa Pattillo checks out this week’s new manga releases in her latest On the Shelf column at Otaku USA. Sean Gaffney looks forward to next week’s new releases at A Case Suitable for Treatment.

Moonlitasteria has some personal reflections on digital vs. print manga.

Reviews

Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 2 of Barrage (I Reads You)
Connie C. on Doing Time, Disappearance Diary, and Panorama of Hell (Comics Should Be Good)
Milo on Gundam: The Origin (Blog of the North Star)
Michael Buntag on vol. 9 of Honey and Clover (NonSensical Words)
Matthew Warner on vol. 3 of Is This A Zombie? (The Fandom Post)
TSOTE on vol. 32 of QED (Three Steps Over Japan)
Kristin on Sakuran (Tentative) (Comic Attack)

At PW, I take a look back at JManga’s brief existence with business manager Robert Newman. And Justin rounds up some thoughts on the demise of JManga at Organization ASG.

I also rounded up the new license announcements from SakuraCon at MTV Geek.

PictureBox, which published Yoichi Yokoyama’s Garden and Travel, announced two new titles yesterday: World Map Room, by Yokoyama, and Gold Pollen and Other Stories, a collection of short stories by Seiichi Hayashi, the creator of Red-Colored Elegy.

Matthew Cycyk writes about Cross Game and the Artistic Subtleties of Mitsuru Adachi at Matt Talks About Manga.

Laura looks forward to some upcoming shoujo releases at Heart of Manga.

Reviews

Jeremiah Fajardo on vols. 50 and 51 of Bleach (Inside AX)
Sweetpea on Gunslinger Girl (Organization ASG)
Ken H on vol. 1 of Inazuman (Comics Should Be Good)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 5 of Love Hina (omnibus edition) (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Manjiorin on Neon Genesis Evangelion: Comic Tribute (Organization ASG)
Matthew Cycyk on vols. 1-7 of Ooku: The Inner Chambers (Matt Talks About Manga)
Anna on vols. 1-5 of Please Save My Earth (Manga Report)
Matthew Warner on vol. 8 of Psyren (The Fandom Post)
Derek Bown on this week’s issue of Shonen Jump (Manga Bookshelf)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 13 of Soul Eater (The Fandom Post)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 9 of The Story of Saiunkoku (The Fandom Post)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 6 of Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle (Blogcritics)
Matthew Warner on vol. 8 of Ultimo (The Fandom Post)

Senran Kagura

Seven Seas confirmed a new license, Senran Kagura: Skirting Shadows, which follows the adventures of a quintet of teenage girls in a secret ninja high school.

Still catching up with manga news… Lissa Pattillo has a quick roundup in which she notes that Seven Seas will not license future volumes of Blood Alone, as the title has shifted to a new publisher, Kodansha, in Japan. Kodansha, of course, has their own American arm, Kodansha comics, although they do license to other publishers as well (and they are co-owners of Vertical).

The Manga Bookshelf bloggers discuss their Pick of the Week.

Reviews: Adam Stephanides posts some quick reviews of untranslated manga at Completely Futile. Ash Brown looks at a week’s worth of reading at Experiments in Manga. And it’s time for more Bookshelf Briefs at Manga Bookshelf.

Kristin on vol. 2 of 21st Century Boys (Comic Attack)
Katherine Hanson on vol. 1 of Asagao to Kase-san (Yuri no Boke)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 18 of Black God (The Fandom Post)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 4 of Bleach (Blogcritics)
L.B. Bryant on vol. 1 of Dark-Hunters: Infinity (ICv2)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 4 of A Devil and Her Love Song (Blogcritics)
John Rose on vol. 23 of Fairy Tail (The Fandom Post)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 3 of Ghost (The Comic Book Bin)
Lori Henderson on vols. 3-5 of Hero Tales (Manga Village)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 7 of Kamisama Kiss (Blogcritics)
Ken H on vol. 1 of Kikaider (Comics Should Be Good)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 2 of Neon Genesis Evangelion (omnibus edition) (I Reads You)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 66 of One Piece (The Comic Book Bin)
TSOTE on vol. 31 of QED (Three Steps Over Japan)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 27 of Slam Dunk (The Comic Book Bin)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 2 of Strobe Edge (Blogcritics)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 34 of Vagabond (I Reads You)