Manga the Week of 11/28/18

SEAN: Time for some Black Friday manga titles. Maybe some of these will have low, low prices.

Cross Infinite World has another one-shot fantasy novel with Tia La Cherla. Normal guy meets mysterious girl with amnesia but tremendous powers.

Dark Horse gives us Yoshitaka Amano: The Illustrated Biography, which is what it says but also looks really lavish and able to justify its expensive price.

ASH: Oooh, that should be nice.

SEAN: Ghost Ship gives us a 4th volume of Yuuna and the Haunted Hot Springs, for all your ecchi needs.

J-Novel Club has a 2nd volume of Der Werwolf: The Annals of Veight and a 6th Outbreak Company.

Kodansha has a few print titles. We get a 3rd Grand Blue Dreaming, the Real Account 9-11 omnibus (I think – it’s been on this list before and then delayed), and The Seven Deadly Sins 29.

ASH: I will admit that Grand Blue Dreaming has made me laugh more than once.

SEAN: Digitally the debut is Blissful Land (Tenju no Kuni), which seems to be Kodansha’s answer to A Bride’s Story. It runs in Betsushonen, and is about a 13-year-old boy in Tibet and a mysterious bride who arrives one day. >_> OK, a *lot* like A Bride’s Story.

ANNA: Huh, do we need two of these series? I’m really behind on A Bride’s Story so I can’t imagine going out of my way to read a similar series when I need to get caught up on the original.

SEAN: There’s also a pike of ongoing digital for all. Ace of the Diamond 17, Ao-chan Can’t Study 2, Forest of Piano 8, Is Kichijoji the Only Place to Live? 5, Kakafukaka 3, Kira-kun Today 2, Liar x Liar 8, Peach Mermaid 3, and Those Summer Days 5. I have actually started one or two of these!

MICHELLE: I have only started one, so far, though there are several I will get around to sometime soonish. I hope.

SEAN: Seven Seas has no debuts, but a pile of ongoing series. Absolute Duo 4, Arifureta’s 3rd manga volume, the print edition of the 3rd Clockwork Planet novel, Devilman vs. Hades 3, The High School Life of a Fudanshi 4, Nirvana 3, and Saint Seiya: Saintia Sho 4.

Vertical debuts Katanagatari: Sword Tale. Despite the similar names, this is unrelated to the Bakemonogatari books except that it’s also by Nisioisin. It’s actually 3 novels in one – they were quite short, and he wrote one per month for a year. It’s set in the Edo era and has swords. What more could one need?

And Yen has a number of titles that got pushed back a week or two. We’ll start with an old title available in digital for the first time: Emma 1-10 (i.e not in omnibuses) is available digitally! As is Sekirei 19, whose core audience is… not the same as Emma’s.

ASH: I am still so incredibly happy that Yen Press rescued Emma.

ANNA: For sure a series that deserves to be in print!

SEAN: The light novel debut is one of the more anticipated titles of the year… for one reason or another. Do You Love Your Mom and Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks? is the mom isekai the fandom never knew it wanted. Supposedly a “parody” of Japan’s current obsession with incest stories, I suspect as with most Japanese parodies it will have its cake and eat it too. The premise is simple: a young man is called to be a hero in a fantasy world. But his mom is there too. And is more powerful. And dotes on him to a disturbing degree. We shall see.

MICHELLE: I wish this were totally free of any possibly creepy vibes because the idea of going to another world with your mom is kind of amusing.

SEAN: In non-mom isekai light novels, we have Defeating the Demon Lord’s a Cinch (If You’ve Got a Ringer) 2, Durarara!! 11, Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days: The Novel, The Saga of Tanya the Evil 4, and So I’m a Spider, So What? 4. Congrats to Tanya and Durarara!! for not being fantasy-based (Tanya’s still an isekai, though).

Lastly, two manga stragglers: Alice in Murderland 9 and A Bride’s Story 10.

ASH: I love A Bride’s Story so much.

SEAN: Will you be getting A Bride’s Story AND Blissful Land? What else?