MangaBlog

Seven Seas is changing around some of their web manga—one new title just started, and two are scheduled to end in April. Read all about it in my latest post at Digital Strips.

Everybody is busy reviewing books, so I’m going to just list them all in one big post after the cut. I’m working on a number of them myself, but life and paying work keep getting in the way. Look for a burst of them at the end of the week. In the meantime, here’s what everyone else is saying.

Active Anime

vol. 3 of Air Gear
vol. 7 of Golgo 13
vol. 5 of Guru Guru Pon Chan
vol. 19 of Knights of the Zodiac

Anime on DVD

Tsubasa Character Guide

BasuGasuBakuhatsu Anime Blog

Disgaea
vol. 3 of Yotsuba&!

Comics Worth Reading

vol. 8 of Mushashi #9

MangaCast

vol. 8 of Nodame Cantabile, vol. 4 of School Rumble,
vol. 1 of Kitchen Princess

Manga Life

vol. 2 of O-Parts Hunter.

Mangamaniaccafe

vol. 4 of Aishiteruze Baby
vol. 3 of ES Eternal Sabbath

PopCultureShock

vol. 2 of Satsuma Gishiden

Prospero’s Manga

vol. 1 of Gravitation EX
vol. 1 of Vampire Knight

Slightly Biased Manga

vol. 3 of +Anima
vol. 2 of After School Nightmare
vol. 5 of Immortal Rain
vol. 1 of Kashimashi
Lies & Kisses
vol. 6 of Lupin III
vol. 4 of Pastel
vol. 13 of Video Girl Ai
vol. 14 of Video Girl Ai
vol. 15 of Video Girl Ai

The Star (Malaysia)

Die Todliche Dolis [The Deadly Dolis]
vol. 1 of Goong: The Royal Palace
vol. 1 of Hayate the Combat Butler

The Japanese government is harnessing the power of cute, using cartoon characters to sell a wary public on the notion of revitalizing the military. This is an interesting article as of course there is a long history of cartoons being used as propaganda, both by and against the Japanese. But it’s probably carrying things a bit too far to suggest that Japanese trucks weren’t attacked in Iraq because they bore an image of Captain Tsubasa/Flash Kicker/Captain Majed.

Much more believable is this story about a military aviator who draws manga in his spare time. It’s actually a fantasy webcomic called Chisuji, and it looks like it’s worth a click.

At the Dark Horse forum, some readers are expressing concern that Dark Horse will go all ADV on them and become the Bermuda Triangle of manga series (“And after the third volume, Museum of Terror was never heard from again…”) So far the posters are just chatting among themselves as no one from the company has emerged to reassure them.

Asahi.com checks out the fujoshi, and there’s good news for otaku as well as marketers, because the fujoshi like boyfriends who share their interests.

At The Star, Pauline Wong has a cute take on Fruits Basket.

The Tezuka show is coming to the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco in June.

At MangaCast, Ed has the PR on vol. 2 of Galaxy Angel II. The Broccoli Blog has the 411 on vol. 6 of Kamui, which went on sale this week. And at the Vertical Blog, Anne Ishii is pimping the Aranzi Aronzo books, which are… hard to explain. I’ll be reviewing two of them this week, and for now, suffice it to say that The Cute Book has been a huge hit in my house, and we are now overflowing with little felt bunnies.

They are not one of the usual suspects, but Last Gasp published Barefoot Gen, and now they are bringing us another classic manga, Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms, about the aftermath of the bomb, told from the vantage point of 1955. (Via Icarus.)

NYCC watch: Ed has the Tokyopop schedule, which includes panels and signings at their booth. Dark Horse has posted their signing schedule.

At One Potato Two, translator Satsuma has her mother help her cut up yaoi manga, with predictable results. Also, apparently typecasting is a problem for translators as well as actors (be sure to read the comments). And Satsuma is way ahead of the rest of us with Kitchen Princess.

Happy birthday to Yaoi Suki! Jen and Jordan will be celebrating all week; they kick it off with a dramatic reading from Gerard & Jacques.

New to the blogroll, but not to regular readers: ChunHyang’s blog, which should be a regular stop for every reader of this blog, and 見ないで! 恥ずかしい…, an anime blog by JP Meyer, a grad student at NYU who studies anime and does some nice commentary on the larger issues around manga and anime. (For an explanation of the name, click on his “about” page.) Also, Icarus Comics, with the usual caveat.

And here’s one to watch: R. Writer for Hire is a new blog by Jens Altmann, who writes comics and translates manga into German. This particular blog is just about comics so it should be interesting.

To minimize damage to your screen, please set down your coffee before you read this: Shaenon Garrity’s overlooked manga festival takes a long look at Skip Beat, a book that my 14-year-old is really enjoying (and now I’m worried!).

ChunHyang72 rounds up the links for her Manga Minute, including some good news for CLAMP fans and an essay on why OEL creators and fans should ignore the naysayers.

At MangaCast, Ed looks at the new Previews and has info on two new titles. He also shares some doujinshi and other oddities.

Gon but not forgotten: Dave Carter is pleased that CMX may be bringing back Gon.

Speaking of Dave Carter, he recently looked at the top selling graphic novels on Amazon. Now David Welsh does the same for manga, and the results may surprise you.

Edit: I’m hoping to go to NYCC and will post when I’m 100% sure. In the meantime, here’s the Del Rey lineup, courtesy of MangaCast.

Off-topic, but fun anyway: Here is my article on the history of the Fluffernutter sandwich.