MangaBlog

Roland Kelts looks at the international popularity of One Piece in an article that includes an interview with manga-ka Eiichiro Oda and the Viz editors who localize his work for American readers.

The Manga Bookshelf team discusses next week’s new manga releases and this week’s Pick of the Week.

Justin presents parts 2 and 3 of his interview with Seven Seas social media maven Conner Crooks at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses.

Sean Gaffney checks out the new digital manga service Manga Box.

Motion comics haven’t been as much of a thing in the manga world as elsewhere, but Manga 2.5 is offering five titles in Japanese and English; Jason Thompson checks it out in this week’s House of 1000 Manga column at ANN.

Ash Brown writes about finding manga in the library.

News from Japan: The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries announced its first round of Japan Food Culture Contents Awards this week, and Hiromu Arakawa’s Silver Spoon took top honors. Moyashimon got the Gold Award in the manga category, and Oishinbo received a Special Jury Award. Demand was so strong for the January 2014 issue of Aria magazine, which contained the first chapter of the Attack on Titan spinoff Attack on Titan: No Regrets, that Kodansha had to go back to press for a second printing. Three new manga series will launch in the February issue of Dragon Age magazine, which ships January 9. Young Ace also has some new series in various stages of development, including one by The World of Narue artist Tomohiro Marukawa.

Reviews: The Manga Bookshelf team keeps it short and sweet in this week’s edition of Bookshelf Briefs. Ash Brown looks at a week’s worth of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

Lissa Pattillo on Alice in the Country of Hearts: The Clockmaker’s Story (Kuriousity)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 5 of A Bride’s Story (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 11 of A Devil and Her Love Song (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 12 of A Devil and Her Love Song (The Comic Book Bin)
AstroNerdBoy on vol. 31 of Fairy Tail (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)
Jocelyne Allen on Helter Skelter (Brain Vs. Book)
Alice Vernon on vol. 1 of Magi (Girls Like Comics)
Erica Friedman on Marriage Battle! (Okazu)
Rebecca Silverman on vols. 1-3 of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin (ANN)
Anna N on Ordinary Girl in a Tiara and The Greek Tycoon’s Defiant Bride (Manga Report)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 2 of Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 1 of Shugo Chara! (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 1 of Zombie-Loan (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)

Seven Seas has Tweeted news of yet another new license; this time it’s D-Frag, a high school story about a guy who is sort of a delinquent who joins a gamer’s club that’s mostly girls. In case you missed it, Sean Gaffney rounds up all the recent Seven Seas announcements, with commentary.

Erica Friedman brings a fresh edition of Yuri News Network at Okazu. And she also presents a yuri-themed gift guide.

Suehiro Maruo’s horror manga Mr. Arashi’s Amazing Freak Show and The Strange Tale of Panorama Island are the topic of Shaenon Garrity’s latest House of 1000 Manga column at ANN.

Khursten Santos reviews the Crunchyroll manga service at Otaku Champloo.

Lori Henderson checks out the new digital manga service Manga Box in her latest Manga Dome podcast at Manga Xanadu.

Attack on Titan creator Hajime Isayama once thought of killing off all the characters at the series’ end, but he has backed off of that; he still wants to “betray his fans,” though.

Reviews: Carlo Santos has some quick takes on recent volumes of Btooom!, Wolfsmund, and more in his Right Turn Only!! column at ANN.

A Library Girl on vol. 1 of Captive Hearts (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 5 of Demon Love Spell (The Comic Book Bin)
Erica Friedman on vol. 1 of Fuurai Shimai (Okazu)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 3 of Genshiken Second Season (The Fandom Post)
Erica Friedman on Koi ha Hisokani Minorumono (Okazu)
Ash Brown on vol. 3 of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin (Experiments in Manga)
A Library Girl on vols. 1 and 2 of Nabari No Ou (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 69 of One Piece (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Rebecca Silverman on vols. 1 and 2 of Puella Magi Oriko Magica (ANN)
Erica Friedman on vol. 1 of Sakura Trick (Okazu)
Matthew Warner on Tiger and Bunny: The Beginning, Side A and Side B (The Fandom Post)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 9 of Toriko (The Comic Book Bin)
Mark Thomas on vol. 7 of Vampire Hunter D (The Fandom Post)

Seven Seas has announced a slew of new licenses in the past few weeks: two Haganai spinoffs Haganai: Club Minutes and Haganai: Now with 50% More Fail, both collections of short stories; two new Strike Witches licenses, Strike Witches: 1937 Fuso Sea Incident and Strike Witches: The Sky That Connects Us; and I Am Alice: Bodyswap in Wonderland, a gender-bender take on the original Alice in Wonderland story.

Conner Crooks, the new social media maven for Seven Seas, talks to Justin at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses about his job and what he has learned so far; since all the above licenses were announced on Twitter, Conner has been busy lately.

It’s the end of an era: The December issue of Yen Plus will be the last. The manga anthology started as a print magazine in 2008 and went digital-only in 2010.

The mobile game publisher DeNA has launched a new manga app, MangaBox; it’s free, at least for now, and has a diverse selection of previously unpublished manga from Kodansha and Shogakukan. I’ll be kicking the tires over the weekend. The Japan Times has more.

The Manga Bookshelf team discusse their Pick of the Week and take a look at next week’s new manga.

Digital Manga is releasing 30 new Harlequin titles during the holiday season, ten a week starting… yesterday. They can be found on eManga and are priced at a wallet-friendly $4.99 each.

AstroNerdBoy reviews Crunchyroll’s digital manga service—and discusses how it could be improved.

The folks at Japanator present their holiday manga gift guide. Anna N posts her own manga gift guide at Manga Report, and Lori Henderson devotes her Manga Dome podcast at Manga Xanadu to manga-themed gift suggestions.

News from Japan: Gundam creator Yoshiyuki Tomino has some harsh words for Attack on Titan, saying it is poorly drawn and too violent. Director Hayao Miyazaki’s samurai manga will appear in Model Graphix magazine, but don’t hold your breath; the retired director wants to have eight pages done for publication, but so far he has completed only three.

Reviews: Derek Bown catches up on a couple of weeks’ worth of Shonen Jump at Manga Bookshelf, and the Bookshelf bloggers file this week’s set of Bookshelf Briefs. Ash Brown rounds up a week’s worth of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

Sean Gaffney on vol. 7 of Alice in the Country of Clover: Cheshire Cat Waltz (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 9 of Attack on Titan (The Fandom Post)
Ash Brown on Black Bard (Experiments in Manga)
Ash Brown on vol. 27 of Blade of the Immortal (Experiments in Manga)
Ash Brown on Blade of the Immortal: Legend of the Sword Demon (Experiments in Manga)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 9 of Bokurano: Ours (The Comic Book Bin)
A Library Girl on vols. 2-8 of Chi’s Sweet Home (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 13 of Dengeki Daisy (The Comic Book Bin)
AstroNerdBoy on vols. 29 and 30 of Fairy Tail (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)
Derek Bown on vol. 31 of Fairy Tail (Manga Bookshelf)
Alex Hoffman on vol. 1 of From the New World (Manga Widget)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vols. 2 and 3 of Genshiken: Second Season (Comics Worth Reading)
Anna N on vol. 3 of Happy Marriage?! and vol. 5 of Demon Love Spell (Manga Report)
Justin on vol. 1 of Heretic Monk (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vol. 1 of Nisekoi (Comics Worth Reading)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 8 of Ooku: The Inner Chambers (The Comic Book Bin)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 31 of Slam Dunk (I Reads You)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 17 of Soul Eater (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vols. 6 and 7 of Strobe Edge (Comics Worth Reading)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Sweet Rein (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 15 of Tegami Bachi (The Comic Book Bin)
Alex Hoffman on vols. 1 and 2 of Wolfsmund (Manga Widget)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vol. 12 of Yotsuba&! (Comics Worth Reading)

RightStuf will publish volume 6 of Hetalia: Axis Powers next spring, with six color pages in the first print run; after those books are gone, the volume, like the other volumes published by RightStuf, will be print-on-demand and black an white only.

Seven Seas has licensed The Lucifer and Biscuit Hammer; if that title sounds familiar, it’s because it was previously published in English by JManga.

And Vertical has licensed Cardfight!! Vanguard, which as far as I know has never (legally) been published in English.

The Manga Bookshelf team discusses this week’s new releases.

Erica Friedman brings us all the latest in this week’s edition of Yuri Network News.

Say Hello to Black Jack creator Shuho Sato had a stroke last week, but he assured his fans via his blog that he is fine. Sato had been having warning symptoms for several days but ignored them; he finally took a cab to the hospital. He seems to be feeling well enough to goof around, as you can see from the photo at left, which he sent to a Japanese news service.

Connie C. looks at some underground manga anthologies in English.

Ash Brown is musing about which manga series to write about next.

Here’s a video of Japanamerica author Roland Kelts talking about Osamu Tezuka at the Japan Society in New York.

News from Japan: A Lucky Star spinoff is in the works. Weekly Shonen Jump is wrapping up two series, Atsushi Nakamura’s Kuro Kuroku and Kazuro Kyō’s Himedol!!!, and launching another, Tomohiro Yagi’s Iron Knight. Nanae Chrono is returning to Peacemaker Kurogane for a one-shot that will be bundled into a mook with several special chapters of Countdown 7 Days. Peach-Pit will bring Rozen Maiden to a close in three chapters.

Reviews: The Manga Bookshelf team keeps it short and sweet in their latest round of Bookshelf Briefs. Ash Brown looks at a week of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

A Library Girl on vol. 1 of Arata: The Legend (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 8 of Attack on Titan (The Fandom Post)
A Library Girl on vols. 6-14 of Black Butler (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Matthew Cycyk on vol. 1 of A Centaur’s Life (Matt Talks About Manga)
Katherine Hanson on vol. 1 of A Centaur’s Life (Yuri no Boke)
A Library Girl on vol. 1 of The Guin Saga Manga: The Seven Magi (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
TSOTE on vol. 1 of Juu (Three Steps Over Japan)
Justin on vol. 1 of Marin (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)
Sean Gaffney on The Mysterious Underground Men (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Ash Brown on vol. 3 of No. 6 (Experiments in Manga)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 45 of Oh! My Goddess (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Ken H on vol. 2 of Sailor Moon Short Stories (Comics Should Be Good)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Senran Kagura: Skirting Shadows (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
A Library Girl on vols. 1-6 of The Story of Saiunkoku (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Matthew Cycyk on vol. 2 of Wolfsmund (Matt Talks About Manga)
Justin on vol. 2 of Wolfsmund (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)

The Manga Bookshelf team discusses this week’s new manga.

Dallas Middaugh and Ben Applegate of Kodansha Comics did an Ask Me Anything on Reddit—check it out for some interesting responses. Related: Tony Yao explains Billy Bat, which is on Middaugh’s shortlist of manga he’d like to see translated.

Jason Thompson kicks the tires on Crunchyroll’s new digital manga service, comparing it with its predecessors and taking a look at all 12 of the launch series.

Erica Friedman brings us the latest update of Yuri Network News at Okazu.

News from Japan: Hayao Miyazake may have retired from filmmaking, but he’s not sitting around watching Wheel of Fortune—he’s writing a samurai manga. Kodansha’s Morning and its digital sister publication D Morning are publishing a manga by Kazuto Tatsuta, a former worker at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, describing his experiences when the plant was damaged in the March 2011 earthquake.

Reviews: Ash Brown has reviewed every volume of Blade of the Immortal; here’s a link to a roundup of all the reviews.

Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Alice in the Country of Hearts: The Mad Hatter’s Late Night Tea Party (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of A Centaur’s Life (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 1 of Codename: Sailor V (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Kristin on vols. 14 and 15 of La Corda d’Oro (Comic Attack)
Kristin on vols. 8 and 9 of Dawn of the Arcana (Comic Attack)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 8 of Dogs: Bullets and Carnage (The Fandom Post)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 8 of Dogs: Bullets and Carnage (The Comic Book Bin)
Ken H on vols. 31 and 32 of Fairy Tail (Comics Should Be Good)
Anna N. on Helter Skelter and Utsubora (Manga Report)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Inu x Boku SS (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Alice Vernon on Lychee Light Club (Girls Like Comics)
Sakura Eries on Manga Melech (The Fandom Post)
A Library Girl on vol. 4 of Nightschool (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
A Library Girl on vol. 1 of Shinobi Life (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Sean Gaffney on Showa 1926-1939: A History of Japan (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
A Library Girl on vols. 16, 19, and 24-30 of Skip Beat! (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Anna N on vol. 1 of Vinland Saga (Manga Report)

As folks start to sample Crunchyroll’s manga service, Deb Aoki talks to the folks behind it about their plans for the future (including more series from more publishers) and the bloggers at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses discuss their thoughts and hopes for the service.

Over at Robot 6, I took a look at the Kuroko’s Basketball story; because of an ongoing series of threat letters, a number of doujinshi events have been cancelled, and now the letter writer is targeting retail stores, resulting in some stores removing the manga from the shelves and 7 Eleven pulling their Kuroko’s Basketball themed snacks.

Despite some initial doubts, the Digital Manga Guild seems to be going strong; Justin interviews editor Lindley Warmington about her work at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses.

Ben Huber has some fun with a make-your-own-manga book.

Reviews

Alice Vernon on vol. 1 of Durarara!! (Girls Like Comics)
Justin on vol. 1 of Eat for Your Life! (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)
L.B. Bryant on K-ON! High School (ICv2)
Sakura Eries on vol. 1 of Manga Mutiny (The Fandom Post)
Connie C. on Mantis Woman, Bride of Deimos, and Presents (Comics Should Be Good)
A Library Girl on vols. 44-50 of Naruto (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Kate O’Neil on vol. 18 of Pandora Hearts (The Fandom Post)
Justin on vol. 1 of Sherlock Bones (Organization Anti-Social Geniuses)
Ken H. on The Strange Tale of the Twilight Demon (Comics Should Be Good)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 11 of Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle (Lesley’s Musings… on Manga)
Kristin on vol. 1 of Voice Over: Seiyuu Academy (Comic Attack)
Sarah Hayes on vol. 1 of Voice Over: Seiyuu Academy (Nagareboshi Reviews)