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Manga Bookshelf

Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews

June 26, 2014 by Sean Gaffney, Ash Brown, MJ, Michelle Smith and Anna N 3 Comments

Manga the Week of 7/2

SEAN: It’s not QUITE as bad as last month’s pile, but there’s a ton of things out the first week in July. Let’s to’t.

Dark Horse continues to give us omnibuses showcasing Lone Wolf & Cub in larger trim size and far more pages. Here’s the fifth.

ASH: Excellent! I’ve been needing to do a binge read of Lone Wolf & Cub and the omnibuses make that much easier.

MJ: I’m always happy to see more of these!

SEAN: Six volumes is an awfully long time for a Blue Sheep Reverie from DMP. Maybe the sheep should come out of it soon.

MICHELLE: *snerk* I actually kind of liked this one—at least it tried to have a plot—but just sort of drifted away from it. I’m glad it continues to exist.

SEAN: And another ‘we’re not just BL!’ title from DMP, as they put out the first volume of seinen dog-focused manga Kinokoinu – Mushroom Pup, which runs in Comic Ryu (home of A Centaur’s Life), and involves a man who can’t get over the death of his pet dog.

MJ: That sounds… heartbreaking.

Seven Seas has a quartet of titles dropping. Knight’s Knowledge is a Country of Clover title from the Alice franchise. It stars Ace. I’ve found titles where Ace is supporting are much better than titles starring him, but maybe this will be different.

ANNA: It probably says something about me that Ace is my favorite because he is so murderous. I haven’t read any of his solo titles, maybe I will give this a try.

arpeggio1

The new series from SS this month is Arpeggio of Blue Steel, which runs in Young King Ours, home of Excel Saga and Hellsing. I warn you in advance, this is another ‘sentient warfare/battleships shown as cute girls’ series. That said, I’ve heard this one is a slight cut above the usual fare, so we’ll see what it brings to the table.

Haganai is a popular series, both here and in Japan, so it makes sense that we’d see a few of the spinoff manga. Now With 50% More Fail is apparently filled with cute comedic one-shots that don’t impact the plot (such as it is).

Lastly, The Sacred Blacksmith continues to nudge its way forward towards its own main plot, here with Vol. 5.

Flowers of Evil 10 is a good 3 volumes over what I expected it to be, but hey, more creepy arty manga is always welcome, even if I dropped the series ages ago. Others here like it, right?

ASH: I do, indeed! The series seems to get better and better with each arc.

MJ: Indeed!

SEAN: The rest is Viz. They’re still giving readers of D.Gray-Man a chance to see it again, with the 4th 3-in-1 due out.

Demon Love Spell features what I believe is the 6th and final volume, and therefore I suspect will finally have a love scene that takes place in the *real* world, unless Mayu Shinjo has been corralled by the Margaret editorial department.

MICHELLE: Will Miko become more powerful than her dad and break his spell so she can get it on with her boyfriend?!

ANNA: I think this is the series where Shinjo effectively blends the sexy angst that was the trademark of her earlier series like Sensual Phrasewith the comedy stylings of Ai Ore. I’ve really enjoyed this series, and I hope Viz has another Shinjo series waiting in the wings.

MJ: I have fallen behind on this series, and am feeling very regretful!

SEAN: Midnight Secretary is almost over, this being the penultimate volume, so no doubt things will get far more serious and dangerous for our vampire and human couple.

ANNA: EEEEEEEE, Midnight Secretary!!!!!!!!

MJ: Heeeeee.

mylovestory1

SEAN: Viz’s new shoujo series, My Love Story!!, is one I’ve been looking forward to. By the author of High School Debut, it’s about a guy who longs for a shoujo romance (and this is a shoujo title), despite looking like your typical big, burly, not bishonen at all guy. His struggle begins here.

MICHELLE: I am looking forward to this so much!

ANNA: This sounds great. Planning on picking this up!

ASH: My copy arrived early and I’ve already read it and I loved it and Takeo is the best!

MJ: I am so on board with this.

SEAN: Naruto hits Vol. 66. Be careful! That’s the Third Cousin Once Removed of the Beast!

Nisekoi drops the print volume of Vol. 4. Will it continue to juggle the girls it has, or add a new one to the mix? The eternal question of every harem title.

Phantom Thief Jeanne has Vol. 3, and I suspect things will get even more serious soon, given we’re just about halfway through this omnibus-ish rerelease.

MICHELLE: I’m enjoying this quite a lot.

ANNA: This is my favorite Tanemura series. I’m glad it is getting reissued with an updated translation.

SEAN: Speaking of omnibuses, though not ish in this case, Skip Beat! has its 8th omnibus pop up as well.

MICHELLE: Yay, Skip Beat! Now if only the next standalone volume would hurry up and come out!

ANNA: Skip Beat! is the best.

SEAN: Sweet Rein comes to an end with its third volume, ending inappropriately enough in mid-summer. Expect more Santa and reindeer antics.

ANNA: This was sweet and cute, if not very deep.

MJ: I can’t say that I’m sad to see it go. Does that make me a grinch?

SEAN: Lastly, there is a Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal 5, which I can’t even make jokes about. Here it is, Yu-Gi-Oh fans.

What’s tickling your fancy?

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Filed Under: FEATURES, manga the week of

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Aaron says

    June 28, 2014 at 9:54 am

    I pre-orderd Arpeggio of Blue Steel back in December and I am happy to see it finally out it is less “oh look at the moe submarine girl” and more post apocalyptic sci-fi and questions about what constitutes humanity and sentience, it’s really quite good (the Anime was my pick for best of The Fall). It’s worth reading and besides a lot of Mecha Mesume series haven’t been released here other than Strike Witches and maybe some fan subs of Sky Girls it’s a sub genre that has a lot going for it it’s just underrepresented and gets lumped together too much with slice of life Moe series becuese the girls are cute.

    Reply
  2. AshLynx says

    June 29, 2014 at 9:49 am

    My comic shop got in some stuff early, so I already got my copy of My Love Story. I quite enjoyed it, the lead guy doesn’t belong anywhere near a shojo and he’s quite entertaining. I very much look forward to the next volume (which I wasn’t sure about because High School Debut bored me around vol 4).
    They also got Black Rose Alice in super early, much to my eternal glee as it was one of my more anticipated new titles for this year. I really enjoyed Afterschool Nightmare (the second least-shojo shojo I’ve read after Banana Fish I’d say) and this is also not a terribly shojo-like shojo so I much approve of that. All I can say is, it’s gonna be a long wait tip November for me.

    Reply
  3. manjiorin says

    July 2, 2014 at 4:53 pm

    I’m really excited for Flowers of Evil 10; it might be safe to say it’s my favorite release right now. I’m always glad to see another volume of Midnight Secretary too, but I’m really, really looking forward to getting My Love Story!!.

    Another Skip Beat omnibus just reminds me that I really need to pick up that series sometime…

    Reply


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