Manga Bookshelf

September 22, 2017 By Sean Gaffney

Baccano!: 2001 The Children of Bottle

By Ryohgo Narita and Katsumi Enami. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Taylor Engel. This must have been quite startling to readers at the time, and it’s still pretty startling. The first four books in this series all took place around the same two year period, and there was no reason to expect anything else. Thus suddenly jumping forward to 2001 is jarring, even if you do know intellectually that a large number of the cast are Immortals. Furthermore, Isaac and Miria, bar a cameo at the start (which ended up being used in the anime) and the end, are absent from this book. But that’s OK, because we are introduced in this book to Elmer C. Albatross, a man with…

September 21, 2017 By Sean Gaffney, Ash Brown, Anna N, Melinda Beasi and Michelle Smith

Manga the Week of 9/27/17

SEAN: Another final week of the month with far more than we’d come to expect for a final week of the month. Mainly thanks to our friends at Kodansha (yeah, sorry Ash, it’s all digital again). ASH: They may be digital, but at least there’s some really great manga being released! ANNA: It is true, but it also makes me a little wary, having seen plenty of digital manga efforts go under in the past. SEAN: Starting with their weekly Del Rey rescue, Princess Resurrection 18. The first digital debut this week is All-Out!, which is a rugby manga. I’ll repeat that: a rugby manga has been licensed for North America. It runs in Kodansha’s experimental seinen magazine Morning Two, and is, I’ll repeat once more, a RUGBY MANGA. Must…

September 21, 2017 By Anna N

Beasts of Abigaile, Vol. 1

Beasts of Abigaile Volume 1 I make no secret of the fact that I’m generally a shoujo enthusiast, and I also enjoy reverse harem manga. Though the plots may be thin, and the characters may never vary from their highly specific and formalized roles, I still find manga of the genre trashy fun to read, even if there might not be much depth to the stories. As I started reading Beasts of Abigaile I was struck with a strong sense of deja vu, because something about the aesthetics reminded me of some of the older series that were published by Go! Comi. Sure enough this is an Akita Shoten title, so maybe that’s why I felt a bit of pleasant nostalgia as I was reading Beasts of Abigaile. The set…

September 21, 2017 By Sean Gaffney

Nichijou, Vol. 10

By Keiichi Arawi. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in the magazine Shonen Ace. Released in North America by Vertical Comics. Translated by Jenny McKeon. I haven’t reviewed Nichijou in full since its first volume, it not being the sort of series that lends itself to deep discussion. This is the final volume, though, and I think that it’s worth looking at to see how far the series has come and how abstract it is now. The creator almost seems to be hiding it with the final cover, which features the cast in class paying attention stoically, but it’s meant to contrast with the first volume, which had a random deer on Yukko’s desk. The cast does still feature, and there is, believe it or not, character development of…

September 20, 2017 By Sean Gaffney

Accel World: The Carbide Wolf

By Reki Kawahara and Hima. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jocelyne Allen. After last volume’s short story collection, we’re back to the main plotline, as Silver Crow is (finally) cleared of the accusation of hosting the Chrome Disaster. Of course, now that they know he’s not evil, the leaders all get together to try to use Silver Crow for their own purposes. It’s a very Haruyuki-centric book as he tries to gain a new ability, learns his companion’s tragic backstory, prepares for the upcoming culture festival at school (yes, Accel World has a real life aspect as well), and worst of all, deals with getting utterly humiliated in a duel against a Level 1 who has super strength hard armor….

September 19, 2017 By Sean Gaffney

Hayate the Combat Butler, Vol. 30

By Kenjiro Hata. Released in Japan as “Hayate no Gotoku!” by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz. Translated by John Werry. This is the first volume of Hayate the Combat Butler to be released in North America after the manga has already ended in Japan, and it will be interesting to see how it does going forward. (ominous thunder rumbles in distance) We are, of course, nowhere near finished here in North America, where Hayate is not quite Kaze Hikaru, but pretty close. Last time we were discussing how long Hata would drag things out before Hayate’s true gender was finally revealed to Ruka, and we get an answer here. It’s actually a good question when you’re dealing with Hata, who is a…

September 18, 2017 By Michelle Smith and Sean Gaffney

Bookshelf Briefs 9/18/17

Akashic Records of Bastard Magica Instructor, Vol. 1 | By Hitsuji Tarou, Tsunemi Aosa and Kurone Mishima | Seven Seas – Combining a magical academy story with the ‘eccentric guy who ends up being a good teacher’ story that manga likes so much isn’t a bad idea, and Akashic Records does a decent job of it, though it gets off to a sluggish start. Frankly, Glenn is far too irritating to bear, and this one of the rare times where you are 100% behind the angry tsundere from the start. Of course, what he really needed was something to snap him out of his funk, and once he decides to actually turn on his brain and start teaching, things get exponentially better. It’s still a standard light novel adaptation, but…

September 18, 2017 By Katherine Dacey

Elegant Yokai Apartment Life, Vol. 1

Elegant Yokai Apartment Life suffers from multiple personality disorder, lurching awkwardly from one situation to the next without comfortably settling into one storytelling mode long enough for the reader to decide if it’s a sitcom, a soap opera, or a horror show. In fairness to creators Hinowa Kouzuki and Waka Miyama, few stories purely embody a single genre; the labels that the publishing and entertainment industries have coined — “rom com” chief among them — give ample proof that hybridization is a common strategy for enlivening familar plots. For such hybrid forms to work, however, the tonal shifts must be intrinsic to the story, arising naturally from the interactions between the characters and their environment. Elegant Yokai‘s narrative swerves, however, feel more like a desperate attempt to appeal to as many…

September 18, 2017 By Anna N

Water Dragon’s Bride, Vol. 3

The Water Dragon’s Bride, Volume 3 by Rei Toma The story in The Water Dragon’s Bride has been unfolding at a measured pace, in the third volume Asahi and Subaru are almost all grown up. As they become more adults, this results in some increased tension with Asahi’s eventual destiny as the bride of the Water Dragon as well as her role as priestess for Subaru’s village. The volume opens with a little bit of backstory showing Asahi filing her role of priestess as she moves through adolescence. Every year, there’s a ritual designed to gain the favor of the water god, and Asahi disappears under the waves for three days. Her encounters with the water god are first limited to staring, glaring, and finally smiling. The elemental gods still…

More Features & Reviews