I Don’t Know Which Is Love, Vol. 1 | By Tamamushi Oku | Yen Press – If you have been reading all those ridiculous harem comedies, the sort where it gets more and more ridiculous with each new love interest, and wished that there was a version for the yuri fan, I have good news for you. Our heroine is going to college to find a girlfriend after getting rejected in high school. She finds a number of girls, all of whom fall for her immediately. The harem members themselves include an up-and-coming idol, her roommate, her teacher, a drama student trying to lure her into acting (with a fetish for voices), and one girl who simply wants to have sex with her and is prepared to get very aggressive, full stop. The entire series would be questionable if it weren’t taken at such a fast pace and if it weren’t clearly designed for comedy, not romance. – Sean Gaffney
Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 26 | By Aka Akasaka | Viz Media – This isn’t the final volume of the series—there’s two more after this—but this is the resolution of all the plots we’ve had going forward; the rest is a victory lap. It’s a good resolution. Rescuing Kaguya and resolving her family issues is shown to be hard enough that it requires everyone working together to solve it (as well as a few frankly ludicrous physical feats on the part of Miyuki), but not too hard—after all, everyone survives even after having been shot at, chased over cliffs, etc. And, of course, we get the most dramatic confession of love ever, flying over the trees while dangling from a rope ladder under a helicopter. Of course, there are still a few loose ends, notably Ishigami’s love life, but that can probably be saved for later. Let the main couple have this. – Sean Gaffney
Medalist, Vol. 7 | By Tsurumaikada | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – Medalist will finally get a print release soon. It deserves it so much. One of the reasons it’s so great is that it balances its look at figure skating between its two leads. Yes, Inori is learning fast (a bit TOO fast, worryingly) about fantastic new moves that might help her catch up to her rival, including the biggie, the quadruple salchow. On the other hand, we also follow Tsukasa as well, who is leaning how best to coach her, when to recognize that she’s pushing herself too hard… and when to realize that he can’t help her and to call for help. All this combines with some truly stellar artwork, showing off the fast, gracious and athletic moves of these athletes to the hilt. It’s probably only getting print because an anime was announced, but I’ll take it. Read this. – Sean Gaffney
Offshore Lightning | By Nazuna Saito | Drawn & Quarterly – “Being alive is so much stranger than we think. More complicated, too. And it doesn’t make a lick of sense.” Collecting eight short manga from the early 1990s, two from the early 2010s, and an accompanying essay by Mitsuhiro Asakawa, Offshore Lightning is a brilliant introduction to the work of Nazuna Saito. Working within the gekiga tradition, the humanity present in Saito’s stories is remarkable, demonstrating great insight as well as empathy. There is an ever-present desire for human connection within Offshore Lightning, a deep sense of longing which still recognizes the absurdity of life with both humor and grace. Taking as her subject ordinary people, their lives, and their often fraught relationships, Saito shows that even the common can be interesting, engaging, and meaningful. It’s wonderful to see more alternative manga created by women make its way into translation; I would read more of Saito’s work in a heartbeat. – Ash Brown
The Saga of Tanya the Evil, Vol. 20 | By Carlo Zen and Chika Tojo | Yen Press – I read the Tanya manga but don’t usually review it, since I leave that for the light novel. But the manga is its own thing, especially in its treatment of Visha, who gets a far larger role in the manga than she does in the novel (or even the anime). Indeed, there’s even a third, new recruit in the manga who is also a woman (unnamed as of yet), so the manga is making it so it’s not ONLY Tanya and Visha in an all-male group. On the bright side, Visha’s adoration of Tanya and willingness to overlook her more evil moments are funny and a bit disturbing. That said, her love for Tanya actually DOES seem romantic in the manga, and so you need to do the weird “35-year-old man in the body of an 11-year-old girl = ???” but mostly just ignore it. The manga is fun but odd. – Sean Gaffney