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Manga Bookshelf

Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews

August 22, 2011 by Michelle Smith, David Welsh, MJ, Katherine Dacey and Sean Gaffney 13 Comments

Pick of the Week: JManga

With only one volume of new manga shipping to Midtown Comics, this week’s pick looked bleak. Fortunately, David came to the rescue, by suggesting a new way for us to spend our money. See below!


MICHELLE: The big news in the manga sphere this week was JManga‘s launch on 8/17. I have already spent more money than I’d intended snapping up first volumes of some intriguing-looking series. All look potentially great, but I am perhaps most interested to read Ekiben Hitoritabi, a seinen series from Futabasha in which a train-loving man receives a trip around Japan from his wife on their tenth wedding anniversary. He proceeds to travel around, sampling the bentos available at the various stations. Like Sean mentioned in his recent review of Urameshiya, what I was really looking for out of JManga was a title I’d never heard of before that probably wouldn’t have sold well in a print edition. Ekiben Hitoritabi seems to fit the bill perfectly, and I’m really looking forward to reading it.

SEAN: As has been noted, I’ve already reviewed a manga from Futabasha, Urameshiya. I therefore wanted to highlight something new by another company. Shonen Gahosha has only free previews (in Japanese) of its titles best known here in America – Excel Saga, Hellsing, and Trigun). But it does have Volume 1 in English of a title that has not been released here – Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru, which translates approximately to ‘And Yet The Town Turns’ and is generally referred to as ‘Sore-Machi’. It’s about a maid cafe in a small town, and our plucky hero who tries to deal with events as best she can despite being not a particularly good maid. The manga also got an anime in Japan in late 2010, which might be why it’s available here, and is still running in Young King OURS, Shonen Gahosha’s best known magazine. In amongst all the worthy josei and seinen manga that my colleagues will no doubt be pushing, it’s nice to see a goofy, weird, slice-of-life maid comedy popping up as well to cater to slice-of-life fans and maid otaku (though I suspect this might be a bit too strange for the typical otaku).

MJ: With so much to choose from, I hardly know where to start! But I do have my eye on Hyakkiyakoushou, one of the site’s josei series from mangaka Ichiko Ima, previously licensed (but never published) by Aurora Publishing. I’m always a sucker for supernatural manga, and this one has lured me in with its free preview. There’s no new ground here, really, in terms of ghost stories, but it looks genuinely creepy and a little melancholy, both of which tend to appeal to me. It’s award-winning, according to the internet, with expressive artwork and some nice period details. The names of the first three chapters (“The Voice Calling from the Darkness”, “The Sea-Hare” and “Cherry Tree Sparrow”) appeal to my sensibilities as well. Looks like my kind of manga!

DAVID: One of my personal fascinations is fixated on comics that explore the way people work and the way that activity factors into their lives. I love just about any comic that’s set in a workplace in a meaningful way, and I think there are far too few of them. So the first offering to really grab my attention would have to be Anesthesiologist Hana by Nakao Hakua and Kabbei Matsumoto. The title is about as literal as you can expect from manga, offering a realistic depiction of the challenges of a young woman working as an anesthesiologist, an often-under-appreciated medical profession. The manga does not seem to offer a particularly realistic depiction of boobs, but you’re cutting out a lot of seinen if you use that as a limiting factor. I also find myself writing tag lines for the series: “She can put you to sleep, but her adventures will keep your pulse racing!”


Readers, have you checked out JManga? What looks good to you?

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Filed Under: PICK OF THE WEEK Tagged With: JManga

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Jim says

    August 22, 2011 at 3:24 pm

    I’d really love to dig into some of the Seinen titles on JManga but, alas, I don’t live in a country where it is accessible. :-(

    Reply
  2. frens says

    August 22, 2011 at 8:13 pm

    well done!

    Reply
  3. Travis says

    August 24, 2011 at 2:55 am

    Oh wow, I never expected to see Ekiben Hitoritabi in translation! I have some friends who will be happy about that news for sure.

    One series I would recommend that I see on there is Girl Friends by Morinaga Milk. It’s a cute/sweet yuri series that didn’t feel overly fanservicey to me.

    Reply
    • Michelle Smith says

      August 24, 2011 at 8:23 am

      I’m reading Ekiben now and enjoying it. I already feel the need to follow in the protagonist’s footsteps. :)

      Girl Friends (called Girlfriends on JManga) was actually my first purchase, I think. :)

      Reply
    • Melinda Beasi says

      August 24, 2011 at 10:59 pm

      Oh I was eyeing Girlfriends! I’m so glad to hear a recommendation for it from someone I trust. That will have to go on my list for sure.

      Reply
      • Travis says

        August 25, 2011 at 12:42 am

        I definitely enjoyed it. And at five volumes total, it’s a nice length for a romance. Not too short that it feels whirlwindy, but not so long that you feel the author is just making up problems to stretch out the series.

        Reply
    • Logan says

      August 26, 2011 at 7:30 am

      I really didn’t have a ton of interest in JManga because of it being online and the ludicrous prices, but I’d pay any price to support Girlfriends being in english. So stoked to hear the series made it on there — you’ve convinced me to go give it a try! Now we just need to get some Octave up on there and we’ll have (arguably) the biggest yuri of recent years on there.

      Reply
  4. JManga says

    August 24, 2011 at 5:49 pm

    Glad to know you’re finding some interesting titles on JManga. Perhaps you’d also be interested in “Star Protector Dog” or “To All the Corners of the World”

    Reply
    • manuel says

      August 26, 2011 at 7:21 pm

      I’d rather not double dip. Sampling a chapter might be worth it, but since Star-Gazing Dog is being printed this fall by NBM I’d rather save my money for the print version since that copy will likely be quite nice to look at given NBM’s quality standards.

      To All the Corners might be interesting though.

      Reply
  5. Puchu-Puchu says

    August 24, 2011 at 11:45 pm

    Nice blog, keep writing

    Reply
  6. Melinda Beasi says

    August 27, 2011 at 10:43 am

    Testing comments

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. JManga reactions, MMF winds up « MangaBlog says:
    August 23, 2011 at 7:43 am

    […] 1 of Adekan, Sean Gaffney reads vol. 1 of Urameshiya, and the Manga Bookshelf bloggers devote their Pick of the Week to the JManga offerings as […]

    Reply
  2. Elsewhere update says:
    August 23, 2011 at 3:03 pm

    […] also make my pitch for the jManga title that interests me most… at the moment. I may soon be distracted by something […]

    Reply


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