MangaBlog

In this week’s Publishers Weekly Comics Week, I talk to Asako Suzuki and Jim Chadwick of CMX about the return of Crayon Shinchan.

David Welsh takes a short look at a short list of new manga for this week.

Erica Friedman interviews freelance translator Erin Subramanian of Lillilicious at Okazu.

Gia explains yaoi for beginners at The Escapist.

At Sporadic Sequential, John Jakala continues his imaginary argument with DC’s Paul Levitz over whether manga is more diverse than genre grapic novels. UPDATE: It’s not imaginary any more: John went to the source and got some answers!

Craig Fischer and Charles Hatfield discuss Junji Ito’s Uzumaki at Thought Balloonists.

Cathy bids farewell to two concluding series, Fruits Basket (she’s reading a foreign edition that’s ahead of Tokyopop) and Hana-Kimi, at It can’t all be about manga.

The Anchorage Daily News profiles local artist Brett Uher (Dark Moon Diary) and the teenagers who enter the Bosco’s Manga/Anime contest.

Matt Badham visits the exhibit “How Manga Took Over the World” at the Manchester (UK) Urbis Museum.

At Comics Worth Reading, Johanna Draper Carlson notes that Tokyopop’s Manga magazine is continuing to shrink.

Kristy Valenti recounts the things she liked about Sakuracon at ComiXology.

Tiamat’s Disciple looks at some new titles from Yen Press. Also, he goes to a Tokyopop event in the UK and comes back with some news: Kino no Tabi has been dropped, Scrapped Princess and Slayers will be back, and Tokko is on hold. UPDATE: Not so, says Tokyopop’s Peter Ahlstrom, in comments.

Reviews: Tangognat enjoys Your and My Secret, which was recently revived by Tokyopop, calling it “the craziest gender-bending manga I have ever read.” Erica Friedman reviews Mars No Kiss at Okazu. The denizens of Manga Village turn in another set of reviews: John Thomas on vol. 4 of MPD-Psycho, Dan Polley on vol. 12 of Nodame Cantabile, Charles Tan on vol. 5 of Chinese Hero: Tales of the Blood Sword, Sabrina on vol. 8 of O-Parts Hunter, and Lori Henderson on vol. 1 of Metro Survive. Ben Leary reviews vol. 1 of Street Fighter II at Anime on DVD. Ed Sizemore is disappointed by vol. 1 of Crayon Shinchan at Comics Worth Reading. At the Manga Maniac Cafe, Julie reads vol. 1 of Hotel Africa and vol. 1 of A Wise Man Sleeps. A.E. Sparrow reviews vol. 2 of Gyakushu and vol. 4 of Strawberry 100% at IGN.com.

The Otaku USA podcast features an interview with Stan Lee about ULTIMO, which he is working on with Shaman King mangaka Hiroyuki Takei.

The Everett (Washington) Herald profiles two manga-making sisters, Danielle and Nicole Pelham, creators of As Told By, which puts classic fairy tales through the manga-tron.

NYCC watch: Ed Chavez posts DMP’s PR at MangaCast. Go Speed Racer!

At Mecha Mecha Media, John T has a peek at Detective Ritual, a book he would like to see in English.

It’s WaiWai, so who knows, but… it looks like Astro Boy has put on some weight.

News from Japan: Canned Dogs has the story of a fairly obscure manga artist who was arrested for “indecent acts” with a 15-year-old girl. He also got a female fan to give him $1,500, which is legal but kind of tacky.

Reviews: Chloe Ferguson gives middling grades to vol. 21 of Red River at PopCultureShock’s Manga Recon blog. At Sporadic Sequential, John Jakala awards nine shocked Shos to vol. 9 of The Drifting Classroom. Ferdinand is unimpressed by vol. 1 of Honey and Clover. At Manga Xanadu, Lori Henderson has some short takes on Shonen Jump titles: vol. 12 of Beet the Vandel Buster, vol. 21 of Bleach, and vol. 21 of Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac. Dave Ferraro says goodbye to three series that have reached their final volumes, vol. 11 of Drifting Classroom, vol. 10 of Dragon Head, and vol. 23 of Hana-Kimi, at Comics-and-More. Robert Harris reviews vol. 9 of Wallflower and Matthew Alexander gets on board for vol. 5 of Train+Train at Anime on DVD.

And you can read all of them at The Beat, but this is MangaBlog so let’s see how manga fared this year.

Pretty well, as it turns out.

Last year’s nominations were pretty manga-friendly, but this year’s are even more so, with manga competing against other comics in a number of categories. Here are all the nominated manga (defined pretty broadly, as you will see):

Best Short Story
“Book,” by Yuichi Yokoyama, in New Engineering (PictureBox)
“Town of Evening Calm,” by Fumiyo Kouno, in Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms (Last Gasp)

Best Continuing Series
Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, by Naoki Urasawa (Viz)

Best Publication for Kids
Yotsuba&!, by Kiyohiko Azuma (ADV)

Best Archival Collection/Project—Comic Books
Apollo’s Song, by Osamu Tezuka (Vertical)

Best U.S. Edition of International Material—Japan
The Ice Wanderer and Other Stories, by Jiro Taniguchi (Fanfare/Ponent Mon)
MW, by Osamu Tezuka (Vertical)
Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, by Naoki Urasawa (Viz)
New Engineering, by Yuichi Yokoyama (PictureBox)
Tekkonkinkreet: Black & White, by Taiyo Matsumoto (Viz)
Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms, by Fumiyo Kouno (Last Gasp)

Best Writer/Artist
Fumi Yoshinaga, Flower of Life; The Moon and Sandals (Digital Manga)

Best Writer/Artist—Humor
Brandon Graham, King City (Tokyopop); Multiple Warheads (Oni)

Best Penciller/Inker or Penciller/Inker Team
Takeshi Obata, Death Note, Hikaru No Go (Viz)

Best Comics-Related Book
Manga: The Complete Guide, by Jason Thompson (Del Rey Manga)
Understanding Manga and Anime, by Robin Brenner (Libraries Unlimited/Greenwood Publishing)

Also, the first issue of Comic Foundry, for which I contributed a brief article on manga, was nominated in the Best Comics-Related Periodicals/Journalism category, which is pretty darned awesome. I feel like a few molecules of magic Eisner dust have sifted down to me.

It strikes me as odd that no manga was nominated in the “Best Publication for Teens” category, as teens are the greatest consumers of manga. On the other hand, I’m delighted to see Yotsuba&! nominated in the kids category, although that title seems to appeal to adults as much as children.

Over at Precocious Curmudgeon, David Welsh is pleased that Fumi Yoshinaga got on the list.

Recently, I became aware of a hole in the blogosphere: Nobody seemed to be blogging regularly about children’s comics. I mentioned this to a couple of like-minded folks, and the next thing I knew, Word Balloons was born. Unlike MangaBlog, this is not a solo effort; our opening group of contributors includes super-librarian and former Eisner judge [UPDATE: and current Eisner nominee!] Robin Brenner, PopCultureShock’s Manga Recon blogger Kate Dacey, Manga Xanadu blogger Lori Henderson, school media specialist Esther Keller, Diamond Comics Distributor’s Janna Morishima, webcomicker and blogger Jason Sigler, librarian and MangaCast reviewer (and current Eisner judge) Eva Volin, and teen librarian and Manga Jouhou reviewer Snow Wildsmith. Dan Hess, the talented creator of Angel Moxie and Realms of Ishikaze, was kind enough to draw the header image, and J. Dee Dupuy handled design (and was very patient about it, too). Word Balloons will go beyond manga to cover kids’ comics in all their glory, including classy graphic novels, cheap and garish floppies, and even webcomics. We have started out with a review of a Tiger Moth comic and an interview with Jerzy Drozd of Sugary Serials, and there’s lots more on the way, so come on down and check it out!

NYCC is coming up this weekend! Who’s going? I’ll be there, covering it for PWCW and MangaBlog and appearing on a panel on kids’ comics on Sunday, and at PopCultureShock, Kate Dacey has a handy list of manga and anime related events. Clip it and save it, along with Erin’s indispensible manga map of midtown Manhattan.

VIZ veep Gonzalo Ferreyra is the guest on the latest Anime Today podcast from RightStuf. (Via ComiPress.)

Is manga better in color? The Manga_Talk LJ community, which has been quiet for a while, discusses the question of color vs. black and white.

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

Manga by the numbers: Once again, Matt Blind crunches the online sales numbers for manga and comes up with the top 500 manga, top 50 series, publishers’ scorecard, and midlist chart, then discusses the burning literary question of whether light novels are manga.

Reviews: Emily of Emily’s Random Shoujo Manga Page reappears with writeups of three unlicensed titles: Hana to Akuma, Ai Hime ~ Ai to Himegoto, and Kimi ni Todoke. Lori Henderson has short takes on vol. 20 of Bleach and vol. 9 of Black Cat at Manga Xanadu. Tangognat reviews vol. 1 of Yumekui Kenbun Nightmare Inspector. At The Yaoi Review, Sakura Kiss enjoys a non-yaoi title, Voices of Love. It’s a Drifting Classroom marathon at Slightly Biased Manga, where Connie reviews vols. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11. Mangamaniac Julie checks out The First Stage of Love at Mangacast, and back at the Manga Maniac Cafe, she’s reading vol. 5 of D. Gray-Man and vol. 1 of Yumekui Kenbun Nightmare Inspector. At PopCultureShock, the Manga Recon crew review an assortment of books and Isaac Hale calls vol. 1 of Yumekui Kenbun Nightmare Inspector a “pit of medocrity.” Johanna Draper Carlson updates her Emma page to include a review of vol. 7. Lissa Pattillo fears the concept is starting to wear thin by vol. 6 of Satisfaction Guaranteed at Kuri-ousity. Michelle enjoys vol. 5 of Maison Ikkoku and vol. 4 of Love*Com at Soliloquy in Blue. At Active Anime, Sandra Scholes reviews the UK editions of vols. 1, 2, and 3 of Buso Renkin. Marina Neira checks out vol. 7 of Crimson Hero.