News, reviews, and free Bakuman

Over at Japanator, God Len posts this week’s new anime and manga releases.

Deb Aoki has exciting news, but not for me: Japanese Shonen Jump is posting the first chapter of Bakuman, the new manga by Death Note creators Takeshi Obata and Tsugumi Ohba, at their Jumpland site. It’s in English, as well as German, Japanese, and French, and it’s free until August 31. The bad news is that in order to read it you have to download their comics browser, which only works on Windows XP or Vista. That means it’s off limits to Mac users like myself, which is annoying.

Deb also posts her take on Digital’s new eManga service. And over at the NSFW but highly entertaining Icarus blog, Simon Jones casts an expert’s eye on the eManga browser.

ANN’s Carlo Santos interviews Fairy Tail creator Hiro Mashima.

Active Anime talks to the Italian yaoi creators Dany&Dany.

At Shuchaku East, Chloe looks at the age constraints on manga, particularly global manga, which is still mainly aimed at teenagers in the U.S.

Yidi Yu, a.k.a. Kiriska, has been thinking about digital distribution of manga, and his thoughts are worth checking out.

Erica Friedman rounds up the week’s yuri news at Okazu.

ANN reports that the official New York Anime Fest guidebook will include a previously unpublished Vampire Hunter D short story.

News from Japan: ANN reports on several new and relaunched manga serials slated to launch in Shogakukan’s Big Comic Spirits in September, including a manga adaptation of the novel Nobō no Shiro, illustrated by Oishinbo artist Akira Hanasaki, and a new manga by GTO creator Tohru Fujisawa. Lots of details at the link.

Reviews: Ed Sizemore reviews issues 1 and 2 of Yen+ and Johanna Draper Carlson reads vol. 3 of High School Debut, vol. 8 of Beauty Pop, and vol. 10 of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs at Comics Worth Reading. Steve Roby reviews vol. 3 of the Star Trek manga at Starfleet Library. At his blog, The Hooded Utilitarian, Noah Berlatsky reprints the review he did of Parasyte for The Comics Journal. Lyn Jenson reviews Queenie Chan’s In Odd We Trust for the Orange Coast Voice. Leroy Douresseaux enjoys Wild Butterfly and vol. 1 of Warcraft: Legends at The Comic Book Bin. Carl Kimlinger checks out Cowa! and Casey Brienza has plenty of good things to say about vols. 1 and 2 of Bride of the Water God at ANN. At Comics-and-More, Dave Ferraro dives into vol. 1 of One Piece, and so far he seems to be enjoying the ride. Lori Henderson reviews vol. 1 of Zombie Powder and the web version of vol. 2 of Dark Metro at Manga Xanadu. Jason Van Horn takes a look at vol. 1 of Densha Otoko (the CMX version) at The Hachiko. Charles Tan reads vol. 3 of Uzumaki and Lori Henderson gives two thumbs up to vol. 6 of Godchild at Comics Village. Mangamaniac Julie reviews vol. 1 of Steal Moon at the MangaCast and looks at vol. 1 of Kekkaishi, Ruff Love, and vol. 10 of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs at the Manga Maniac Cafe. At Okazu, Erica Friedman posts part 1 of her review of vol. 13 of Yuri Hime. Lissa Pattillo checks out Love Circumstances and Twilight of the Dark Master, and guest reviewer Kanami Han’ei reads vol. 1 of Sunshine Sketch at Kuriousity. Sesho puts away the microphone and posts text reviews of vol. 2 of Tetragrammaton Labyrinth and vol. 8 of GTO. Jessica Severs reviews vol. 1 of Me and the Devil Blues for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.