Manga Bookshelf

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Sean Gaffney

Urameshiya, Vol. 1

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By Makiko. Released in Japan by Futabasha, serialized in the magazine Women’s Comic Jour. Released in the United States by Futabasha on the JManga website.

Well, JManga is finally open, and there was no way that I wasn’t going to get a title or two to test out, even if the prices are currently ludicrous, and the flash reader content means you are essentially paying for the right to read rather than buying an actual manga. That said, my goal was to find titles that I would never otherwise see here. The two companies who debuted with the most unseen manga were Futabasha and Kadokawa Shoten. Sadly, Kadokawa was all hype but no delivery as of yet, with no previews or chapters. Futabasha (who are clearly one of the big powers behind this site) had real content, and not just stuff already out in the US. So I picked two titles, one seinen and one josei, and began to read.

I will note that this manga is listed under the ‘seinen’ tag on JManga, but I’m pretty sure this is incorrect: it runs in Futabasha’s ‘Women’s Comic Jour’, a mystery-themed magazine whose covers and content definitely look like josei. The author, Makiko, has been drawing it since 1998, and it’s still running, with 14 volumes.

The story takes place sometime in the Edo period of Japan. We meet a young woman, Oyou, who’s trying to drink sake in a local bar. Unfortunately, she’s got a reputation as creepy and terrifying, and the bar owners beg her to leave as she’s driving away their business. (They also beg her not to curse them.) On her way out, she runs into a young man – literally. She knows a pickpocket when she sees one, though, and grabs him before he can get away. Though Saji, the thief, finds her weird, he’s also attracted to her, and offers to take her back to his place for some sake – and maybe get lucky, he thinks.

However, this isn’t just a romance. It’s a supernatural mystery title, and the mood overall is that of unease. Young men have been found frozen to death in greater numbers than usual this winter, and there’s a very good reason for this. And when Saji’s old childhood friend winds up the latest victim, he’s determined to get to the bottom of things. Luckily for him, Oyou is the titular Urameshiya, a woman who can see and, to some extent, control ghosts, spirits and monsters. And while this has made her a hated loner and outcast in the village, it also makes her a powerful spiritual detective.

There’s only 3 chapters available in this volume, but don’t worry, they add up to a full 200 pages – each story is lengthy and goes into detail. I wouldn’t call the stories horror, necessarily. This is a supernatural mystery with tinges of romance. I was actually rather surprised at the latter, as I was expecting this to be more along the lines of a ghost of the week type of story, with Oyou and Saji mostly being sounding boards to figure out the mystery. But the mysteries aren’t very mysterious. What works best throughout the volume is the prickly relationship that develops between Oyou and Saji, two lonely people used to being shunned by society who can’t quite have a normal romance. Oyou in particular is quick to act uncaring and cool around Saji, despite her obvious growing feelings. The two become lovers almost immediately – another sure sign this is josei – but Saji is going to have to get used to his lover being from the ‘show, don’t tell’ school of affection.

The first story deals with a vengeful ‘snow woman’ type, but the second one gets a lot more explicit, and reminds me to warn folks that this is not a title for anyone under 18. It deals with a girl who has a ‘vagina dentata’, so to speak – or “a nice set of chompers”, as Oyou points out in one of the few actual funny bits in a mostly serious book. Oyou’s solution to the problem is also fairly explicit, but works quite well. Unfortunately, solving the girl’s own personality is a much harder task, and not one Oyou particularly wants to try. The third story introduces a new male into the mix, a bratty fox spirit who goes to great lengths to make Oyou his – even if it means killing Saji off. This is the longest story of the book, and probably also the best – there’s no mystery here, so the romance is allowed to develop more, and the ending is fantastic. Best of all, no cliffhanger ending here, which is good, as only Volume 1 is available at this time.

The art is fairly typical ‘pointy chin’ style, being neither exceptional nor distracting. Oyou is conveyed very well, giving the impression of a woman wise beyond her years, one who’s been hurt a few too many times. As for the translation, I’ve heard that others have found titles that are more unsuccessful in that regard, but this one was just fine – no obvious awkward spots, and despite being in the Edo period it did not attempt to use anything other than modern speech. It’s very serviceable.

Overall, this wasn’t completely amazing, but was pretty much exactly what I wanted from JManga anyway. A title I’d never even heard of before, in a genre that hasn’t generally knocked it out of the park over here (mystery romance for young women). And the result was quite satisfying, and left me wanting to get the next volume to see if Saji can get Oyou to open up to him any more – and also to see what sorts of yokai might show up next. Anyone wanting to get a good look at what Futabasha is offering for US readers would be advised to check this out, even if JManga is still clearly a work in progress.

Flower of Life, Vol. 1

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By Fumi Yoshinaga. Released in Japan by Shinshokan, serialized in the magazine Wings. Released in North America by Digital Manga Publishing.

This has been on my to-read list for some time. I found a copy at World’s Biggest Bookstore in Toronto this May and picked it up, mostly as it’s quite hard to find these days. I had both this title and Antique Bakery in the back of my head, as they had been the subject of a debate regarding the casual use of the word ‘yaoi’ in fandom to refer to anything with the suggestion of gay men in it, even titles that did not necessarily have any romance or sex in them. So I had a certain set of expectations about the content going in. I wasn’t too worried about the quality – this is a Yoshinaga manga, I knew it would be enjoyable.

after the first few pages, which deal with a new pretty boy transfer student running into his flamboyantly swishy teacher, I remained unsurprised. After all, this is a series that ran in Wings, a magazine that seems to specialize in the very debate I mentioned earlier. It rarely has explicit BL, but its shoujo fantasy content skirts the edges a lot. Wings is not a magazine for your typical hot-blooded heterosexual Love Hina reader. So I sat back and enjoyed the otherwise amusing slice-of-life school comedy. This is why the payoff of the teacher’s real gender was possibly my favorite moment of the series. I love a good fakeout, and Yoshinaga handles it perfectly.

The characters in the series are, in fact, the main reason to get it. This is a lot of fun. It doesn’t have much of an actual plot, to be sure. Essentially it’s about Harutaro, a young man returning to school after a long battle with leukemia, and his trying to fit in among a close-knit class of eccentrics. He seemingly does very well, but much of the series examines how people treat others when they know what’s expected of them, and Harutaro finds that everything doesn’t quite go as easily as it would in your typical shoujo manga.

Harutaro bonds immediately with the boy sitting next to him, Shota. Shota’s another example of Yoshinaga writing a seemingly ‘typical’ school comedy, but adding her own eccentricities. He’s not your typical pretty boy, being short and rather portly – several characters call him cute/adorable, and one of the chapters deals with the other classmates casually calling him fat, and how upset that gets Harutaro. If there’s any hitn of BL in the series, it would be here, and clearly it can be read as such, but doesn’t have to be – it’s the perfect Wings-style plausible deniability. These two read just as well if they’re merely a budding friendship.

And then there’s Majima, who was the character in the end I think I found the most fascinating. It’s entirely possible that in later volumes he will open up to someone and show a hidden, vulnerable side, but I hope not, because my god, he’s such an amazingly appalling asshole. And he’s so good at it! He hits all those buttons that would make anyone back away – he’s a giant otaku who unashamedly reads artbooks in the middle of class, and will talk your ear off about it with no thought to whether you care. He’s brusque and rude when you try to interject your own problems and issues. And he gets angry at slights, even when the intent is clearly to apologize to him. He’s a horrible person, and I love that the two leads try to deal with him ANYWAY. His presence enriches the book.

There’s a lot of discussion of manga here, and it gets fairly metatextual. Harutaro has a definite talent for art – he was holed up in his recovery room with only manga and drawing paper, so is mostly self-taught – and once the class finds out about it, they’re quick to ask him to create something for them. This is also a great scene in the book, as everyone asks for their own fetishes, and Harutaro is quick to reject any that offend his sensibilities (incest, intergenerational yaoi), while still showing he’s a pervy guy at heart (yuri is OK). Later volumes apparently take the drawing aspect of this further, which is good to hear.

Also, his parents are chicken sexers. Words can’t describe how awesome that is.

There’s a lot of Yoshinaga out there, ranging from the more explicit yaoi titles that DMP has released to the currently running alternate universe political drama Ooku. But if you’re new to Yoshinaga, and have access to a copy, the first volume of Flower of Life is a good place to start. It has fun characters, a relaxed pace, and lots of humor. It proved to be quite refreshing.

Manga the week of 8/24

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Um… yeah.

That’s it. The third of DMP’s small releases of Yellow 2, its yaoi title featuring two ‘snatchers’ who go up against the mafia.

And… nothing else. No Viz, no Yen. Not even Kodansha, who seem to be absent from my comic shop as well as Midtown. Just… Yellow 2.

With that in mind, why not get some titles from the new JManga initiative?

Higurashi: When They Cry, Vols. 13-14

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Story by Ryukishi07; Art by Yutori Houjyou. Released in Japan as “Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Meakashi-hen” by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Gangan Wing. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Sorry for the numbering confusion. Initial solicits from Yen noted that the omnibus ‘Demon Exposing Arc’ was Volume 13, but I went with that. But they’ve apparently now decided that it’s a special one-off, and 13 and 14 are the rest of the Eye-Opening Arc proper. So we’ll go with that. In the meantime, let’s take a look at Shion! When we last left her, she’d locked Mion in the Sonozaki family torture chamber and was laughing maniacally. Where can we go from here?

Oh, there’s always somewhere further down you can go! Shoin still has to figure out what happened to her beloved Satoshi, after all. So she disguises herself as Mion and starts an odd double life, using Keiichi and the others to try to further her own agenda. Or at least what she thinks her agenda is. In doing so, she also runs afoul of the Village’s Council of Elders. Honestly, some of their reaction to hearing there were intruders in the shrine might be Shion’s paranoia, but I doubt it. They’re simply reactionary people in power, and not pleasant at all.

Of course, this isn’t comparing them to Shion, who outstrips everyone else in this arc for pure evil, even if it’s in the name of a misplaced love and revenge. She kidnaps the head of the village and sets him up in a slow hanging torture device that, well, slowly hangs him. (Shots of his feet danging in the backgrounds in Volume 4 are chilling, especially as they’re never the actual focus of the scene.) And unfortunately, Shion is still no closer to finding anything out, as the head of the village doesn’t know anything, and her grandmother is dead.

Shion has been attempting to be crafty, but it’s not particularly working well except against overly trusting people like Keiichi. So it’s no surprise that when Rika comes over to ‘borrow some soy sauce’, it seems to be a ruse in order to inject Shion with something. We think. This is the trouble with trying to trust a viewpoint in Higurashi. It makes for a good cliffhanger, though.

Then we get to Volume 4. It’s the final volume of the arc, and by far the bloodiest to date. Shion manages to defeat Rika from injecting her, and decides to take her off to be tortured like she did with the village elder and her sister. Rika, oddly, does not really want to be tortured, and decides that since it’s clear Shion is too far gone, she will commit suicide instead. By stabbing herself in the neck with a knife. Repeatedly. It’s a horrific scene to see, and even Shion seems briefly horrified by it.

But at least she avoided what’s coming next, after Shion invites Satoko over for some tea and torture. Given that Satoko is Satoshi’s brother, this is the grimmest scene in the whole arc (and that’s saying a lot). Shion is filled with misplaced blame and anger, and as it turns out so is Satoko, who has been blaming herself for her brother’s disappearance, and is convinced that if she’s a good girl and doesn’t cry that she can see him again. This is the only scene in the manga where Shion threatens to slowly torture someone to death and actually does it, as she stabs Satoko (who she has already crucified – no vague symbolism here) repeatedly in the arms until she dies from blood loss.

This is followed by an epiphany that would be rather touching if it wasn’t far too late – Shion, going over all her memories, finally recalls Satoshi asking her, right before he disappeared, to take care of Satoko for him. And I’m pretty sure he did not mean ‘take care’ as in torture. Shion’s anguish as she realizes that not only did she not do this but in fact has failed at everything she wanted to do to get closer to him is equal parts heartbreaking and amusing (there’s a wonderful shot of her thinking about Satoko and Satoshi, beloved brother and sister, keeping their promise to each other, and them slowly swiveling her head over to the crucifix where Satoko still hangs.), but in the end it’s a mere illusion, as Shion decides she is ‘possessed by the demon’ and goes off to kill Keiichi (who she still seems to blame for not being Satoshi.)

What follows is the end of the Cotton Drifting Arc, only from Shion’s perspective, now that we know it was actually her and not Mion. My favorite part of these two arcs occurs here, as Shion has basically made an unspoken bet with her sister to see if Keiichi is able to discover that she’s really Shion. He doesn’t, so she gleefully starts to torture him – only to have him beg the ‘demon’ inside her to release Mion, and Shion realizes that he not only can’t believe that his good friend Mion would be capable of such things, but ALSO can’t suspect Shion. Keiichi is simply too nice.

So she knocks him out with her taser, and goes to have a final heart to heart with Mion. We do actually get a few answers here, this being the first of the answer arcs – but not too many. It’s made clear that the Sonozakis don’t really have anything to do with Satoshi’s disappearance – they’re just really good at bluffing and looking evil. The whole twin switching thing is also given its last twist, as it turns out that when they were kids they switched so that Shion could attend a meeting and Mion could go to the amusement park. The only problem was this was when the elders of the family tattooed ‘Mion’ with the mark that branded her as the next head of the family. So Shion was actually born Mion, and fell into disfavor. Yet another reason she’s so screwed up. Unfortunately, this does not help the Mion we know, who Shion allows to fall into the pit in their basement and break her neck.

And so Shion, tormented by now by absolutely anything and everything she’s ever done in her life, goes to the hospital to stab Keiichi, convinced by now that she has to kill everyone to gain forgiveness. And then she falls off a roof trying to escape. Bad end. REALLY bad end. There’s a brief shot of a dying Shion regretting all the decisions she made, and imagining what would have happened if she’d ,listened to Satoshi and become a big sister figure to Satoko. Sadly, it’s just a fantasy, and the final shot is of her corpse staring up at the reader.

This was gripping stuff, but not exactly what I would call feel-good material. What’s more, we have yet another arc with a singularly unsympathetic protagonist, as despite all attempts to make Shion likeable, you really can’t get past the paranoia and madness. Luckily, this arc is over. In October we begin the ‘Atonement’ arc, which stars Rena (remember Rena? The supposed star of the series?), and is the ‘answer arc’ to the very first Higurashi manga. Hopefully it will be as well-told as this arc was… and perhaps a little lighter in tone? I know I can’t get a good end yet, but…

Natsume’s Book of Friends, Vol. 8

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By Yuki Midorikawa. Released in Japan as “Natsume Yuujinchou” by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine LaLa. Released in North America by Viz.

This is one of those shoujo manga that keeps getting better as it goes along. Midorikawa is finding what her strengths and weaknesses are, and thus as Natsume grows so does the series. I’ve gotten to the point where I can’t wait for each new release.

The early volumes had Natsume almost entirely interacting with yokai and those humans who interact with yokai every day. Which is nice and all, but he is still trying to be a normal kid as well. That’s why I was pleased to see this volume focused so much on his relationships with both his classmates and his adapted family. Tanuma and Taki do interact with yokai, but at a level far lower than that of Natsume. As a result, their worry for him is far more oriented in the human world. Natsume’s this awkward teen who tries to take on too much, and they aren’t sure that he’d let them know if something was too difficult a burden.

The culture festival was excellent, and shows that Natsume can also open up to classmates who have no supernatural powers whatsoever. It’s also a good example of what I was just talking about, which is Natsume having to realize that he can’t do everything all by himself, and that it’s OK to rely on others sometimes. “Life is full of new challenges,” he notes at the end of the chapter. Indeed, the next two chapters seem to follow on directly from this, as he tries to deepen his friendship with Tanuma while attempting to deal with a broken Yokai mirror. There’s no explicit BL in this series, but those who like to be fans of it will find plenty of evidence in this volume for the two of them having unresolved sexual tension.

(On a related note, Taki looks totally hot cross-dressing as a guy, and I fully support an OT3 between the three of them.)

The last main chapter of the book talks about Natsume’s relationship with his adopted parents, and we see flashbacks to where they met. Given that Natsume is so desperate to keep his yokai powers hidden from them in order to avoid having them worry (or, it’s unstated, to avoid creeping them out), this is another welcome look into Natsume’s life. Seeing the younger boy that he was, we realize how far he’s come in just a few short volumes. And a lot of it seems to be due to the love he gets from the Fujiwaras, who really do care about him as they would their own child. Seeing Natsume break down at the end was quite touching.

As you would expect from a volume dealing Natsume’s relationships with his friends and family, the yokai content is not as high as prior volumes. Though the yokai in the chapters with the Fujiwaras makes up for this by being extra creepy with a side of horrific. You’re quite pleased when Nyanko-sensei “deals” with it (and it’s always nice to see Nyanko-sensei in full-blown huge mode). There’s also a cute mini-story featuring Chobi, the odd moustachioed yokai we’ve seen as comic relief in a few volumes. It’s cute to see, and also serves to show how much the yokai are learning from Matsume.

Between this and Nura, Viz has sort of been on a yokai kick lately. (Any hopes for Gegege no Kitaro?) But the joy of reading this title is not for the yokai, though they’re very well done as well. It’s seeing an awkward, reclusive young boy come out of his shell and begin to show the love and affection to his friends and family that he hasn’t been able to do before. It’s a terrific series.

Pick of the Week: Short Stack

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With only five new manga releases shipping to Midown Comics this week, what will our bloggers pick? See below to find out!

SEAN: It’s a smaller week this time around, but even if there were tons of titles, my pick would likely be the same. I found the first volume of Q Hayashida’s Dorohedoro to be my favorite out of all the SigIkki titles, and subsequent volumes have only added to my enjoyment. Its grim and unforgiving fantasy dystopia is lovingly detailed (you can pore through the backgrounds for hours), and its plot straight out of anyone’s nightmares (ever wake up with your head replaced with a giant lizard’s?). The reason that I can deal with its sordid underbelly is the wicked (and equally violent) sense of humor it has, with its main cast never seeming to let the bad things that happen to them crush their spirits. In fact, Ciaman and Nikaido, and their ‘evil’ counterparts Shin and Noi, can be quite jovial! Give this quirky series a try (if you don’t mind blood, it’s quite violent.) Plus, female creator!

MJ: This is a tricky pick for me, with nothing I’m really excited about shipping into Midtown Comics this week. With that in mind, I’m going to go completely off the list and get into the spirit of this week’s Manga Moveable Feast by recommending that everyone pick up something by Fumi Yoshinaga. My rereads this week include favorite older series Flower of Life and Antique Bakery, but there is plenty of newer or current Yoshinaga to check out if those are hard to find. Both Yen Press (Not Love But Delicious Foods Make Me So Happy) and Viz Media (Ooku, All My Darling Daughters) have served up recent helpings of Yoshinaga that should be relatively easy to acquire. I recommend keeping some snacks handy. Reading Yoshinaga always makes me hungry.

DAVID: It might have escaped your notice, but our long, national nightmare is finally over, and the Eisner Awards have finally given a prize to Naoki Urasawa. After an enormous number of nominations, he won a 2011 Eisner for 20th Century Boys. Conveniently enough, the 16th volume of this series arrives this Wednesday. Equally convenient is the fact that this is my favorite Urasawa title to be released in English, so I have no problem recommending it. One of my few complaints with Urasawa’s work is his inclination toward over-seriousness, so the generally wry tone of this series is especially welcome. It’s a great thriller that doesn’t neglect humor as it spins its various yarns. (Oh, and if you happen to have the Viz app on one of your various devices, you can now read Oishinbo in that format. This is something that bears repeating.)

KATE: After reading Bluewater’s unauthorized bio-comic of Lady Gaga, I’m morbidly curious about Fame: 50 Cent. The Lady Gaga comic was almost impossible to describe: it featured a middle-aged rock journalist who reluctantly agrees to write an article about Gaga, only to have a surreal experience when he listens to “Bad Romance.” (He actually imagines that he’s Lady Gaga; the sight of a balding, hairy man in one of Gaga’s most outre costumes was worth the cover price alone.) I don’t know that the 50 Cent story lends itself to such an avant-garde presentation, but given the sheer weirdness of Bluewater’s other Fame comics, I can’t imagine it will be boring.

MICHELLE Sometimes I feel like the only person who likes Bokurano: Ours. Indeed, it is very grim—there are quite a few similarities with Ikigami, actually—and somewhat repetitive, as members of a group of children sit quietly in the background until it is their turn to sacrifice their life piloting a giant robot that is ostensibly defending Earth. As you might expect, this is very depressing, but some creepy circumstances surrounding the arrival of the aliens makes me question is any of this even real? In addition to being cruel and horrible, is all of this just futile? Just a game? It’s this underlying mystery that keeps me coming back despite the need for a fluffy shoujo transfusion I typically feel afterwards.

Readers, what looks good to you this week?

Bookshelf Briefs 8/15/11

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This week, MJ, Michelle, David, Kate, & Sean check out recent releases from Viz Media, Bandai Entertainment, Vertical, Inc., & Dark Horse.

Dorohedoro, Vol. 4 | By Q Hayashida | VIZ – After reading the first volume of Dorohedoro, it was obvious to me that Q Hayashida had serious drawing chops and a vivid imagination, but the graphic violence, choppy storytelling, and eccentric cast kept me at arm’s length from the material. Revisiting the series at volume four, I’m pleased to report that Dorohedoro has improved: not only do the characters seem better defined, but the plot is more coherently presented, and the dialogue is crisper. The highpoint is a macabre baseball game that’s amusingly reminiscent of “Foul Play,” an EC Comics short from 1953. The characters’ dugout banter is genuinely funny, as are some of the grislier sight gags. Much as I appreciated these scenes, I’m still not sold on Dorohedoro — it’s well written and smartly drawn, but its visceral imagery and fantasy elements place it squarely in the Not My Thing category. – Katherine Dacey

Gantz, Vol. 18 | By Hiroya Oku Works. | Published by Dark Horse – As I spend the week of the current Manga Moveable Feast steeped in the humane, sexy comedy-drama of Fumi Yoshinaga, it’s always nice to take a break with something very different for contrast and perspective. And really, how much farther away can you go than this ridiculously, randomly violent smackdown of a comic? For the uninitiated, people on the verge of death are snapped up by a computer to don skintight suits and fight aliens. It’s every bit as absurd as that makes it sound, particularly since there’s virtually no successful, intentional satire in play. (Oku may be shooting for that, but any meta winks come off as just as straight-faced as the serious bits.) This volume is basically a long battle scene, but every volume is basically a long battle scene. And it’s always fun to try and concoct a justification for the fan-service-friendly back covers. – David Welsh

Kamisama Kiss, Vol. 4 | By Julietta Suzuki | Published by VIZ Media – Volume four is unequivocally the best volume of this series so far. Nanami has finally acknowledged that she’s in love with Tomoe, her fox yokai familiar, but he dismisses her feelings (in a scene that might give my fellow acrophobes some serious jibblies) as a side effect of puberty. It’s clear Tomoe feels more than he lets on, however, and he risks his own life to fulfill a desperate request from Nanami. To rescue him, she travels back into his past and sees a few things she’d rather not see, but emerges determined not to be so passive in their relationship. I enjoyed the InuYasha vibe I got from this volume—Nanami turns out to have a stone-like item inside her body that was originally consumed by the human woman Tomoe, a white-haired, pointy-eared demon bishounen, once loved—but more than that, it was genuinely exciting. More like this, please! – Michelle Smith

La Quinta Camera | By Natsume Ono. | Published by Viz – While I did enjoy this disparate collection of anecdotes, it’s pretty clear why Viz licensed a pile of other Natsume Ono stuff first. Compared to much of her later work, this is simply not as engaging, and the art is even more sketchy than usual. (The eyes of the characters give me a Scott Pilgrim feeling, for some reason.) And a lot of the intertwined characters slowly growing as the seasons change would be used to greater effect in her other Italian series, Ristorante Paradiso and Gente. Still, I ended up having fun with this anyway. The characters are likeable, and even though we only focus on them for a short period, it’s simply nice watching them interact. Much like a good European art film, there’s no actual plot or a major emotional catharsis. It’s just people watching. – Sean Gaffney

Natsume’s Book of Friends, Vol. 8 | By Yuki Midorikawa | VIZ – Though I’ve enjoyed previous installments of Natsume’s Book of Friends, volume eight has transformed me from follower to fan. The three stories provide some badly-needed background on Natsume, giving us a window into his life before he lived with the Fujiwaras, and helping us understand what a burden his “gift” truly is. Yuki Midorikawa’s mastery of the material is more assured than in previous volumes; though the stories offer plenty of supernatural twists, what really stays with the reader is the lovely way in which she maps Natsume’s journey from lonely outsider to cherished son and friend. Even the artwork is improving; Midorikawa’s layouts are more fluid and expressive than in the earliest chapters, making it easier to figure out what’s happening on a moment-to-moment basis. Recommended. – Katherine Dacey

The Story of Saiunkoku, Vol. 4 | By Kairi Yura and Sai Yukino | Published by VIZ Media – While it is certainly wonderful to read about a heroine as smart and capable as Shurei, Emperor Ryuki really steals the show in this volume. Not only is he proposing a measure allowing women to take the civil service exam, he’s doing it largely so that Shurei will be able to achieve her dream. Yes, he hopes that Shurei being in the palace will help him win her heart, but more than that, he simply wants her to be happy. Ryuki has absolute confidence in her abilities and, though he hasn’t given up his romantic pursuit, he would rather she come to him on her own terms, when she is ready. He reminds me a lot of Tamaki from Ouran High School Host Club, one of those oddly perceptive goofball types that I love so much. The recurring gag involving his misunderstanding of the phrase “midnight tryst” is also quite amusing.– Michelle Smith

Tales of the Abyss: Asch the Bloody, Vol. 1 | By Hana Saitou and Rin Nijyo | Bandai Entertainment – As someone whose consumption of Japanese media consists almost exclusively of manga, Bandai releases offer a very particular challenge. Though a few of their manga series genuinely start at the beginning, most——even those labeled “volume 1″——are offshoots of the company’s anime and game franchises, so reliant on the background and mythology of their source material that the learning curve for manga readers can seem impossibly steep. On the surface, Asch the Bloody falls into exactly this mold. Following the side story of one of the series’ antagonists, its early chapters read like gibberish to anyone not already familiar with the franchise. Fortunately, as the volume continues, its main character’s inner struggle between pride and self-loathing as he observes the life of his own “replica” becomes the story’s centerpiece, offering genuine food for thought, even for the uninitiated. Not bad, Bandai, not bad. – MJ

Twin Spica, Vol. 8 | By Kou Yaginuma. | Published by Vertical – I never quite know what tyo say about Twin Spica, which is why my reviewing of it is so erratic. I always enjoy each volume as I get it, and it never fails to bring a smile to my face. But frequently it’s a rueful or melancholy smile, the sort reserved for watching the fallibility of life, or seeing a sweet moment that you know will never last. This volume of Twin Spica is filled with such things. Asumi’s burgeoning teen romance is over almost before it starts, but for all the right reasons, and I think both of them end up being happier they had their feelings. Moreover, this volume finally gives some much needed depth to Shu, who’s been the most cryptic of the group of five. And, true to the tome of the series, the depth comes with a growing sense of unease, and a sense that the group is not going to be together for much longer. Twin Spica loves to highlight the fleeting springtime of youth, both to show its strength and to emphasize how fleeting it really is. Surprisingly mature. – Sean Gaffney

K-On!, Vol. 3

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By Kakifly. Released in Japan by Houbunsha, serialized in the magazine Manga Time Kirara. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Time, believe it or not, keeps marching on for our girls, as they enter their senior year in this volume. Of course, trying to think about their future plans is just a little bit too hard right now, so they continue to do what they do best – drink tea, glomp each other, do boke/tsukkomi routines, and occasionally play music.

By now Azusa is fully absorbed into the cast mix, and there’s no new people introduced here. The amusement comes from watching the girls behave the way we want them to, and occasionally subvert our expectations. (In fact, I noticed that’s how Ritsu tends to work a lot of the time – she’s crafty enough to know how folks will react to her doing something, and takes advantage of it. Thus when it doesn’t go the way she planned, she’s more upset than usual.) This is typified by one of the earlier stories, where the cast decide to try to help Mio get over her stage fright by working at a maid cafe so she can open up more. Naturally, though, being terrified of performing is one of Mio’s ‘cute’ points, so it’s doomed to failure.

I also really enjoyed the chapter devoted to Mugi and Ritsu. Mugi usually gets the short end of the stick when it comes to developed appearances – in fact, the moment Azusa arrived, she started to do more and be seen more than our yuri-loving keyboaardist. So seeing her go around town with Ritsu was nice, and shows us a more serious side. Even if it’s played for laughs, it’s quite clear that Mugi is desperate for interaction with other girls her own age, and that much of her own obsession with the girls hugging and occasional yuri fantasies are due more to her completely sheltered upbringing. To Mugi, Mio hitting Ritsu all the time is a sign that they’re the closest of friends. To Ritsu, it just hurts. And Mugi gets the perfect capper here as well, saying something so oblivious that it actually provokes the aforementioned ‘friendship hit’. This was probably my favorite part of the book.

Although the final story comes close, where we see how Mio and Ritsu met, and the story of their unlikely friendship. This was a special chapter, so manages to break out of the 4-koma format, and it’s better for it, feeling a lot more relaxed and nostalgic. Mio and Ritsu as children are much the same as they are now, but we start to see how Ritsu can get Mio out of her shell, and how Mio is a better person for it. Though Mio may not see it that way…

Again, Yen’s translation is mostly excellent. Azu-meow continues to niggle at me. There’s also a class trip to Kyoto, which brings us to the dreaded Kyoto dialect translation. This is next to impossible to convey without jarring somewhat, especially if the gag is to show it being said by someone that would not normally use such a dialect, such as Mugi. That said, the choice of ‘urban New York’ and seeing Yui and Mugi swearing… feels really off to me. I think I’d have preferred the usual southern drawl instead.

Some noise was made in this volume about thinking about the future, and we see Yui struggling with a future career. But that’s all for Volume 4. For now, there’s tea and cakes, and sometimes music. And there’s cute 4-koma silliness. K-on! is not winning any awards, but it remains a light, fun, breezy read, and has some loveable cast members.

Roundtable: On Fanfiction

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MJ: So, I’ve been blogging in this general location about manga since late 2007, and this has long been my “professional” venue for writing about the things that make me fannish. I’ve met nearly everyone I know in the manga blogging community through this blog, including both of you. But what I don’t talk about much here are the many years before that I spent blogging on LiveJournal, in a subsection of fandom focused mainly on fanfiction.

Up until recently, I was the only blogger here at Manga Bookshelf with a real history in fanfiction, but with Sean now on board things have changed, and I admit I’m kinda thrilled to have the opportunity to talk about this aspect of fandom that was once incredibly important to me. To that end, I’ve invited Sean, along with Michelle (whose interest in fanfiction is new and somewhat tentative), to join me in a roundtable discussion on fanfiction.

Now, I have a lot of highfalutin’ ideas about fanfiction, why I wrote it, and why I think it’s important as a form of meta discussion and even criticism, but let’s start by talking a bit about how we got into fanfiction in the first place. Sean? Michelle?

SEAN: As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I am that sort of person who got into fanfiction, and indeed started writing it, before he got into anime and manga. Barring the usual Battle for the Planets/Speed Racer as a kid, my first exposure was in 1995, when I started reading Stefan Gagne’s Ranma fanfics. This quickly led me to John Biles’ fics, and from there I was hooked. I began writing Ranma in early 1996… and started reading it about mid-1996. XD

I was hardcore Ranma for about a year and a half, but then started branching out to more fandoms. At last count, I’d written for a good 30 or so fandoms, including some Buffy and Phoenix Wright fanfics in the non-anime world, with my last fic to date being in the world of Strawberry Marshmallow. I’m semi-retired (the fancy Internet way of saying lazy), but you never know what will pop into my head.

As for why I wrote it? The ideas get in your head and won’t let go. Or you want to finish the story before the author does. Or you’re rebelling against the preferred pairing. Or you want to see if you can do something people tell you is impossible. Or you want to expand on a minor character’s motives. Or you want to bash. I mostly avoided that last one. Mostly.

I still READ fanfiction constantly, of course.

MICHELLE: And then there’s me. I have read three fanfics so far and written about half a dozen drabbles.

MJ: Yeah, but you did a lot of RP writing, right? That doesn’t seem all that much different to me.

MICHELLE: Oh yes, tons and tons, mostly in the Harry Potter realm. I suppose it’s not that different. Though the way we did it—picking a point in chronology and continuing on from that point—didn’t set off my “canon is sacrosanct!” alarms as much as it would’ve if we’d been trying to wedge our original characters into the official storyline or something.

MJ: Like Sean, I got into fanfiction long before getting into manga, and in fact, I’ve written relatively little in manga fandoms. Though my first formal attempt at fanfic was in 2003, in retrospect I realize I’ve been writing it since I was a child, one way or another. From the epic Zenna Henderson-inspired stories my little sister and I acted out with our Barbies to the Buffy/Angel song from my singer-songwriter days, I’ve always felt the impulse to interact with fictional universes by finding ways to create within them.

With that in mind, I must embarrassingly admit that what actually pulled me into writing real fanfic was the world of LOTR RPS (Lord of the Rings Real Person Slash aka “Lotrips”), where the “canon” was basically movie industry gossip, blown up into a fully-fledged fictional world by the fanfic writers themselves. My friend Jaci lured me in with her own wonderful writing, and before I realized what I was doing, I was participating regularly in the LJ multi-fandom slash community contre la montre, which offered up weekly speed-writing exercises for anyone who cared to join.

For a while, I felt too intimidated by real fictional canons to try writing publicly in them, but reading the fifth Harry Potter book got me over that, and thus my proper fanfiction career began. Though my heaviest writing years were spent in Harry Potter fandom, I also dabbled as a writer in fandoms like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly, and then much later in manga fandoms like xxxHolic, Hikaru no Go, and Banana Fish.

For me, writing fanfiction was mainly a means for participating in what I perceived as an ongoing meta discussion between writers, as well as a vehicle for interacting with the text in a very personal way. Though as I say that, I realize that a huge percentage of my fanfiction was written for either organized challenges or as gifts, some of which certainly seemed impossible or at least difficult at the outset (Neville/Oz, anyone?) so apparently I liked that aspect of it too. Fandom was a tricky place for me at times, partly because I was an omnivorous reader, with an interest in slash, het, and gen, and partly because my concept of an OTP is very, very… loose.

That last point, Sean, reminds me of something you said in your “thoughts on fandom and shipping,” specifically item two: “You can ship more than one contrasting couple at the same time, and not be betraying anyone.” In fact, both of your first two points there made me think, “Aaaaah, here’s someone I can actually talk to about fanfiction.”

MICHELLE: I’ve now gone to that link of Sean’s and returned, feeling rather illuminated about various fanficky conventions that have puzzled me. I must say I haven’t got much of a passion for “shipping,” but there are definitely a few pairings here and there where I think they’re genuinely in love with each other (Remus/Sirius in Harry Potter, Fai and Kurogane in Tsubasa RESERVoir ChroNiCLE) even if I don’t believe they’re actually getting it on.

I think I thought that fanfic writers all did genuinely believe these characters were getting it on, and part of the reason I’ve opened my mind lately is the realization that, for some (perhaps many), it’s a kind of writing challenge or, as Sean puts it, a “what if.”

MJ: Actually, Remus/Sirius is one of those pairings I feel strongly that the author actually wrote into the story and then hurriedly covered up later on when she realized what she’d done. And I stand by that, because clearly Alfonso Cuaron agreed with me on the first bit.

But yes, though there is sometimes generous subtextual support, generally I think non-canon pairings are pulled from our imaginations.

SEAN: As I’ve noted, I don’t WANT shipping in One Piece itself, but love it in the fandom. For one thing, the lack of canon romance leads to less yelling in the fandom. Sure, there’s some arguments between shippers and non-shippers, and the occasional rare slash v. het thing, but it’s mild and easily ignorable. Compare this to Bleach, where you simply CANNOT ignore the shipping. It was fine for about 25 volumes or so, but then Orihime told a comatose Kurosaki that she loved him. (As if this wasn’t obvious before.) FOOM! Made even worse that the two lead females are of almost complete opposite personality type, and you have a situation that simply cannot resolve easily. As a result, even in chapters where neither character appears, the debate tends to rage about them. (Let’s not mention Hinamori right now, that’s another kettle of fish.)

Some worlds are fun to read about, but I wouldn’t write in them, simply due to wanting to avoid arguing. Harry Potter is an excellent example. My ship of choice, Harry/Luna, is a fun one, and I can give you endless reasons why I think it’s best. But one of the biggest would be: “It doesn’t get into the H/Hr vs. H/G wars”. H/L fans tend to sit on the side and eat popcorn while those go on. Before Book 5, I didn’t really ship Harry with anyone, as Ginny was poorly fleshed out, and while I liked Hermione, her fans were insane. This has not changed with the release of Books 5-7 and the movies. :)

MICHELLE: Is there much fic written anymore where there isn’t boffing? I’m fairly smut-averse, myself…

SEAN: There is, but no one reads it. :) Seriously, lots of people write what is called “gen fic,” but with FFNet now providing sorting by pairing, many folks never see it as they sort for the ships they like and it floats by. It also gets far less reviews and attention than a hardcore shipping fic does. A lot of what writers want, especially young writers, is other people reading and saying “You are correct, that is awesome that you wrote that!” It’s easier to get comments if you write romance. Sadly, this is the nature of the Internet Beast

Another problem with fandom being “serious business” is that people start to take their own writing seriously. Yes, many fanfics were written for a need to see deeper characterization, or an epic that spans generation. But other folks wrote a fic as they thought “Wow, those two would be really hot if they screwed each other.” And that’s EQUALLY valid. I can pick apart your characterization, spelling, or lack of attention to basic anatomy, but I can’t attack your desire to write porn. That’s a valid choice, and I approve of it. God knows I’ve done it. A Phoenix Wright fic I wrote was a deliberate attempt to write a ludicrous porn story, with the title “Turnabout Orgy”. It’s not remotely my best work. Hell, it doesn’t even have much detailed sex. But it achieves what I wanted.

MICHELLE: Well, you can do romance without boffing! :) I should note that I don’t, in principle, object to people writing explicit stories or anything. I just don’t particularly want to read them. :)

MJ: Very little of mine involves boffing! Though I will always love a love story. And, y’know, I’m not averse to smut. Some of the most fun writing I ever did was for the recurring multi-fandom challenge, “Porn Battle,” and though even my smuttiest writing tends to be tamer than most, it can feel very freeing and, yeah, sometimes genuinely erotic.

Sean, I have to say if there’s one thing I’ve never understood about fandom, it’s shipping wars. Fortunately, it’s less of a big deal in slash fandom, where I spent most of my time, even when I was reading & writing non-slash. I think maybe because slashers never expect their favorite pairings to turn up in canon, they’re less likely to fight over it. At least that was my experience in Harry Potter fandom. I do recall knowing about some massive flamewars related to Prince of Tennis slash ships.

Also, Sean, to comment on your Harry Potter preferences, I think I tend to be partial to Neville/Luna more than Harry/Luna, but then, I pretty much ship Neville with everyone, so it’s not much of a stretch for me. Even back when I thought I ‘shipped Harry/Draco, my heart always belonged to Neville. ;)

SEAN: I do wonder how xxxHOLIC fans felt about the one or two threesome fics I saw that involved Himawari with the two guys.

Most likely, “Who is she again? Oh right.” :) It’s easy to not have a shipwar when your ship has a monopoly.

MJ: Actually, I think that’s a pretty popular OT3! True, though, there’s only one major pairing in xxxHolic fandom, though I’ve seen some Yuuko/Watanuki fic out there.

SEAN: How did xxxHOLIC fans react to the ending, out of curiosity? I know I had one experience with a fandom, School Rumble, where the manga ended SO badly that the fandom basically completely died. It was stunning to see. Everyone stared, bitched for about 2 weeks, then… stopped. And then the silence. And it never recovered (which is likely why Kodansha hasn’t picked up the remaining books).

MJ: Honestly, I don’t know. I’ve been waiting for the US releases, so I stopped hanging around xxxHolic fandom so as to not get spoiled. I will say, though, that I think Harry Potter fandom has never fully recovered from the Epilogue. It’s still alive—fandoms that big never die—but it’s not what it was.

MICHELLE: Aside from Remus/Sirius, which might as well be canon as far as I’m concerned, I can’t imagine shipping anybody in Potter, really. Like, I love Snape very much. I mean, really really love him. But I don’t want to read about him hooking up with anybody.

SEAN: Remus and Sirius are up in Heaven shagging right now. With Tonks. (runs away fast)

MJ: I can go with that.

MICHELLE: Ugh. :)

SEAN: Part of the reason I’ve always associated fics with shipping is my initial fandom: Ranma 1/2. In many ways, it was the perfect breeding ground for fanfic writers. The series was popular and dubbed in the mid 90s. The manga was coming out in Japan till 1996, but we had no access to Japanese volumes at that time, so theorizing was king. The characters were highly interesting types who were nevertheless two-dimensional, so they inspired fanfics that ‘deepened’ their characterization. The basic premise had implications almost entirely ignored by the author. Again, perfect for fanfics. (What would pregnant Ranma be like? What if Ranma gets a period?) It was an action-oriented comedy harem series, perfect for male writers, with strong female characters and hot guys, perfect for female writers.

So if you wrote Ranma in the 1990s, and you weren’t trying to simply duplicate the series with your own plot, you tended to write continuations (providing your own ‘resolution’ to the romance), the genre ‘For Want of a Nail’, where you change one plot point and see what happens (what if it was Kasumi who was cursed?), darkfics (what if Akane had a genuine mental illness and start to seriously injure Ranma?), or lemons (what if everyone finally got it on?). All of which either involve the romantic pairings, or in some ways are biased towards one or the other.

There was an entire GENRE of Ranma fics circa 1998 called ‘The Bet’, the basic premise of which was similar to For Want of a Nail but with the proviso that Akane was treated poorly or written out. The creator hated her, and said anyone could play in his pool, basically, if they observed the rules and did not pair Akane with Ranma. Likewise, I believe Sailor Moon had many, many ‘Mamoru must die’ fanfics written in the late 90s as well. Which just goes to show, I guess, that the more things change the more they stay the same.

And before anyone asks, no, I was never in the Pokemon fandom, so missed ALL of that.

MJ: Despite my deep enjoyment of gen fic, I admit I tend to associate fics with shipping, too, and for similar reasons, actually, since the bulk of my writing was done in Harry Potter fandom. Romance is one of the things JK Rowling writes the least well, so it’s hard to write in that fandom without wanting to do better, no matter what characters you’re writing about. I think, too, as an adult writing in a universe created for kids, there’s a real impulse to want to grey up some of its more black-and-white concepts, if that makes sense.

MICHELLE: There certainly was lots of adultifying and greying up of Potter going on on the RP game I played. Of the genres Sean mentioned (I admit that “For Want of a Nail” sounds really cool to me, by the way) our game was like a continuation. Everything up through Goblet of Fire (the latest book at the time) was canon, and then we went from there. We defeated Voldemort in our own fashion, and it was fun to see what we actually got right when the official books came out.

MJ: One thing I feel like I should say here is, that in my experience, almost any romantic pairing can work in fanfiction, if it’s written well enough. That’s one of the reasons I never understood shipping wars. Sure, I had my favorite ships, but a good writer could make me like almost anything. I have a couple of issues that are non-negotiable, but for the most part, I’ll give myself over to any writer who can make me believe, even just in the moment.

SEAN: I’d take that further: almost anything can be used in fanfic if it’s written well enough, romance or no. You want to write hot hot fic showing the forbidden romance between Remus Lupin and a potato? Is it well-written and reasonably in character? Sure, I’ll go with it. (Also, the potato totally tops.) If you’re writing a crossover between 270 series, and can make readers keep track of it all without the need for huge charts? Congratulations. Want to kill off the entire cast in a plausible, believable way that’s not just an excuse for gore? Knock yourself out. Want to write a self-insert where you become immortal and end up in Crystal Tokyo running a radio station and married to Sailor Saturn? Well, OK, that one’s been done.

The difficulty, of course, is in making it good. Which is why one needs pre-readers/betas. Sadly, they’re harder and harder to get these days. But they can, if they’re good prereaders and not just “Looks good, write more!” types, tell you when you’ve lost the reader. Why are you quoting your entire record collection in this fic? Why are you devoting 20 pages to saying how horrible this person is? Why is Hermione using an iPod at Hogwarts? For the last time, it’s you’re, not your! That sort of thing. A good spellchecker is not the same thing.

MICHELLE: I get where all of those things you mention would be fun to write and even an admirable accomplishment. I’m just not sure I’d want to read any of them, except the killing the cast one, perhaps. Personally, I still balk at things that challenge canon too much. Like, the first fanfic I ever saw was on a Battle of the Planets mailing list. So I am, like, “Oh, what’s this? Is it a story? What’s going… oh my god! Ken and Joe, noooo!”

SEAN: One other type of fanfic I forgot about, mostly as it’s a fairly recent development that wasn’t around when I was really active, is the Peggy Sue fic. No, not Mary Sue – those have been around much longer. In Peggy Sue fics, the characters go back in time and inhabit their earlier bodies, usually reliving their lives to ‘do things properly’ this time. Yes, this usually involves shipping too, but it doesn’t have to – there’s a fantastic Harry Potter fic called Oh God Not Again where a happy and content Harry in the future accidentally goes back in time – a one-way trip. He decides to simply screw around with everything for his own amusement. No ships whatsoever. This genre is especially prevalent in Harry Potter and Naruto, but I’m starting to see it elsewhere too. (It’s highly variable, as much of the time it’s an excuse for character bashing – ‘if only I’d known Ron was a pedophile rapist wife-beater, I’d never have befriended him!’ etc etc etc.)

MICHELLE: Oh, that sounds like fun. Having some kind of construct like that in play would probably nullify any canonicity issues by virtue of it technically being a continuation. Happily wedded to Ginny, Harry goes back and time and thinks, “Hm, what would’ve happened if I’d invited Luna to the ball that year?”

MJ: I agree with Sean on all points here (including the potato), and I think Michelle, where our view of fanfiction really differs here, is that I don’t actually consider any of this stuff to necessarily be a challenge to canon, or at least that’s not at all the way I think about my own writing. Sure, there are times when one might write a fic specifically with the purpose of “righting” canon, but most of the time, even when there’s a strong urge to diverge wildly from canon or just to seek out nuance the original author didn’t take time with, it’s about exploration, not contradiction.

Often, I’ve taken the smallest detail about a character and formed an entire universe around it, not because I think that’s what should have been in canon, but because it allows me to examine that aspect of the character more fully. For instance, I once basically created an entire piece of fanfiction based on the fact that Remus Lupin once encouraged Neville Longbottom to fight a boggart. I thought about how important that moment might have been for Neville, who generally was treated like a squib, and how that might have affected his feelings and actions over a long period of time, even into adulthood. None of what I wrote actually happened in canon, of course, but I didn’t write it to challenge canon. I wrote it to more deeply explore the potential ramifications of something that was already there. On one hand, it’s sort of an abstract exercise, but on the other, it also serves as way of expressing my thoughts about that one moment to a whole slew of other people more effectively than I could by any other means.

This is where, for me, fanfiction serves as an ongoing discussion between the people who read and write it. Since most of us are doing both, reading and writing, we’re constantly listening to each other and responding in one way or another, even if the conversation itself is completely unconscious.

MICHELLE: I am realizing more and more than “exploration” is the key here, but I spent a lot of time believing that fanfic writers believed what they were writing was true, or at least better than canon, which is the fuel for a lot of my lingering hesitancy. I mean, I’m sure there are people who would argue that The Doctor really is schtupping his companions off-camera, but perhaps they’re not the norm?

SEAN: I don’t. In fact, I was in Who fandom from almost since I could walk, and didn’t even realize there was a possibility of sex in the TARDIS till 1994 or so when I got on the Internet in college. And even then, there was very, very little of it. The sex came with the new series, and in particular the new fans, who saw 9/Rose (and 10/Rose) and had no preconceptions of “The Doctor has no sexuality, he’s above such petty human things” the way old-school fans had. I ship 10/Donna, but not canonically – I just think it’s fun and that they’d be hellaciously sexy in bed (10/Rose not so much, though I get the hurt/comfort value there.)

Another thing to note is that we three are, in Internet years, senior citizens. When I got into fics, most were college age writers and above – they started writing when they got the ‘net at college. Now that everyone has the internet, the age level of fic writers has dropped drastically, and you do sometimes see ‘Sorry, AFF readers, had to delete all my 10/Master porn, my mom found it.’ Not to mention the 12-year-olds writing fics at 7th grade grammar level (or well above, to be fair, but…)

MJ: Also, fandom as a whole is gigantic, and it’s spread all over cyberspace. I was already in my thirties when I started writing fanfiction, but because I had friends from other parts of my life who had already been writing for a while, it was pretty easy on Livejournal to find myself a fandom community of other likeminded adults who wrote thoughtfully and were interested in fanfiction for the same reasons I was. We were all on each others’ friends lists, and we tended to use the same community spaces, so we basically made our own subsection of fandom that worked the way we wanted it to. And there were probably a million other fandom corners on the internet just as specific.

The sprawling nature of the internet can seem overwhelming and unnavigable if you’re just trying to find one good Snape fic, because there isn’t any single, central depository for it all (though plenty of sites have tried to be that), especially in a big fandom like Harry Potter. But there are also real advantages to building small communities with their own group standards, because it means that once you’ve found your community, you can be pretty sure that you’ll enjoy the majority of what it produces.

MICHELLE: Yeah, the “sprawling nature” issue has been another discouraging factor for me. Like, I really don’t want to read something crummy if I can help it. The stories you two have sent me have been works you’ve been proud of (and deservedly) and therefore I enjoyed reading them ‘cos they were legitimately good. I don’t relish the idea of wading through a bunch of dreck. Maybe I am a “private corner” sort of person, too, who will just write my little Buffy things off by myself somewhere. :)

MJ: Of course, one way to pretty much ensure yourself a small fandom corner is to write in a very small fandom. On one hand, you’ll never receive the amount of feedback you might in a big fandom, but small fandoms tend to attract interesting, experienced writers who aren’t in it just for the squee. One of my favorite fandoms to write in was Banana Fish, which I think has something like five people participating in it at any one time. Actually, five may be a very generous estimate. It can be hard to handle the fact that your friends outside the fandom might have little interest in reading your fic, and you won’t get pages of feedback, but what you do get will be really heartfelt. And you have the opportunity to provide that in turn.

That said, big fandom does offer some rewards that small fandom can’t provide. My initial entry into Harry Potter fandom was via Harry/Draco, which was at the time by far the most popular slash pairing in HP fandom (and thus, the wankiest, but that’s another story entirely), with a huge catalogue of fic already written, including a hefty number of established “classics,” and thriving communities on Livejournal, FF.net, and FictionAlley, among other places. The whole thing was a bit intimidating, so when I decided to attempt writing in H/D fandom, I spent over two months planning and piecing together my fic with feedback from four beta readers (including one UK reader to specifically check my Briticisms) and three H/D-loving friends, finally posting it on Livejournal with the pessimistic subject line, “The dreaded HP fic.” I was completely unknown in that fandom, but thanks to a rec from one popular HP writer on my friends list, the thing spread like wildfire, and before I knew it, I had a couple of pages full of comments and recs popping up everywhere. That can never happen in small fandom, even for an experienced, well-known writer. To this day, that “dreaded HP fic” is the most popular I’ve ever written. And while I’d never say that I wrote fanfiction for the feedback, it can certainly be gratifying, especially for a new writer.

Sean, I’d be interested in your thoughts on big vs. small fandom, especially since we ran in completely different fandom circles, from what I can tell.

SEAN: It can help, but it depends on how much you’re looking for an audience. The most responses/reviews I’ve ever gotten were for a) A Kodomo no Omocha fic which I wrote in 1 hour for a contest, which was basically a ‘hit the giant emotional button’ fic, and b) my Sailor Moon self-insert, which is mostly along the lines of “I can’t believe you wrote a self-insert I didn’t hate!”. So one small-ish fandom and one large there. To be honest, though, most of my major writing was in the pre-LJ, pre-FFNet days, so most of my C&C came from mailing lists or on USENET. Remember them? :)

To a degree, we all want our fic to be read and praised (or panned), but a lot of the time when I write a fic, the primary audience is me or my close circle of friends. So while I do appreciate the larger number of reviews I get for, say, writing Sailor Moon or Buffy, I’d argue I feel even better when I get the 1 or two responses I get for my Sol Bianca The Legacy or Ichigo Mashimaro fics. I’m not expecting any audience for those.

So the question them becomes, are you writing primarily to satisfy an urge to write, or for the enjoyment of others? I’d argue most of us do both, but then how do you find a balance? I’ve sometimes taken good honest criticism and not listened to it, simply as while I see the point I want my story to go this way because it’s what I want.

MJ: I agree that I think we mostly do both (writing for ourselves and for the enjoyment of others), and honestly I’ve found some people’s insistence that there’s something wrong with seeking an audience to be pretty disingenuous. If we were truly only writing for ourselves, there would be no reason to post our work publicly, or even just to our friends. But I think do think people who get into fanfiction primarily for the feedback often end up disappointed. And to your last point, I also agree that while there is a lot of value in constructive criticism, it really is okay to listen to it and then still go your own way.

Ah, mailing lists… I think I pretty much missed the peak days of USENET as a means for fanfic distribution, but I was a member of a few mailing lists, particularly in my Lotrips days. Overall, I’m glad online archives and journals moved a lot of fanfic away from mailing lists, partly because I’m one of those writers who never feels finished with anything. I frequently go back and edit older stories, or at least I used to do that when I was writing actively. But also, mailing lists are so transient. It’s hard for someone new to fandom to access older works that way.

MICHELLE: What is “C&C”? Actually, there’s been a bit of lingo bandied about that I’m not very familiar with. “Hurt/comfort,” for example. Does that mean “You are hurt, therefore I shall comfort you?” Or is it, like, I hurt you then I comfort you? What’s an “AFF reader”? Are there more terms I should know?

SEAN: C&C is ‘Comments and Criticism’, as you would get from a beta reader. They read your fic before you publish it and give you advice, which can range from spelling/grammar to telling you to scrap everything as it makes no sense and treats the characters poorly. Ideally, the C&C is pointed and useful without being cruel. And is more than just “Wow, this rocks!”.

AFF is AdultFanFiction.net, which is pretty much what it sounds like. The fanfics there are of a much lower quality than most archives, though there are scattered gems, as always.

As for Hurt/Comfort, just go here. Your first choice is essentially correct.

You know about self-inserts and Mary Sues, right?

MICHELLE: Yes, I know what those are. And also what OTP means. :) Thanks for defining the rest.

MJ: On the topic of self-inserts and Mary Sues, I’d like to state my conviction that they are totally valid and occasionally even awesome approaches to fanfiction. Also, I think most people write one at some point or another, even if they can pretend they haven’t. Any one of us who has written a character we identify with strongly will eventually write something that’s essentially a self-insert, and actually I think those can often be people’s very best work, because they connect with it so strongly. Most of the original authors did this, too, after all. People write what they know.

MICHELLE: In a way, the Potter game I played lent itself to self-insertion. Players could apply for a Feature Character (involving answering a series of questions about the character and their background followed by an audition) or they could create original characters of their own devising who would (when Harry and crew were still young enough) get to attend Herbology lessons alongside the main characters or just otherwise inhabit the wizarding world.

It occurs to me, too, that I made a few crossover characters in my time there, since I had some based on manga characters, like the one who started off based on Minako from Sailor Moon but eventually grew to act more like Harmony from Buffy.

MJ: So, one of the topics I’ve been eager to get back to here is the plight of gen fic. I love gen fic (when it’s great, which it often is), and I’ll agree that not only is it difficult to find an audience for it as a fanfic writer, but it’s sometimes even difficult to get people to agree what the term really means.

One of the types of fic I used to write a lot, was the sort that focused on relationships (sort of) but wasn’t romance. For instance, one of my early HP fics featured a version of Draco Malfoy who was obsessed with maps. He was a little obsessed with Harry Potter, too, but though the two interacted in the fic in ways that might be said to contain homoerotic subtext, there was no overt romance or sexual content involved. Still, given its “universe of two” feel, I figured it read closer to slash than gen, so I originally posted it as slash… only to have quite a number of people complain that it clearly wasn’t. Later, I changed it’s genre to “gen,” only to be told by another batch of readers that it wasn’t that either.

So tell me, in your opinion, what exactly is a gen fic?

SEAN: In general, I regard ‘gen’ fic as being what used to be called, back in the day, ‘Original Flavor’, which is to say it’s using the canon universe to tell a story without resolving or changing much. So, for example, if you write a fic set during OotP which involves a day in the life of Harry going around being angry at everything, that’d be gen. If he thinks about Ginny and his awkward feelings about her, still gen. If he decides to go shag her in a broom closet to do something about it, you’re into het. Likewise, If your fic *technically* doesn’t have any romantic resolution, but the entire plot is Harry realizing that Ginny is a horrible person and that Hermione is the one he has awkward feelings for, that’s het as well, as you’re changing the canon to match your ship.

To sum up: Are you using the universe as close to canon as you judge possible? Are you not resolving anything? If so, I’d call it gen. But, as you noted, many will disagree with me and say gen should have no romantic feelings whatsoever.

It’s especially difficult with the Potterverse as so many people have not only their own biases, but also biases they try to avoid. If you say a fic is gen but it has Weasley bashing, Dumbledore bashing, and the ever popular dark!grey!independent!Harry, even if you don’t pair Harry with Hermione, Luna or Fleur, it’s not gen in my eyes, but an AU. If I see gen, I want a fic that’s sort of what J.K. Rowling could have written (only with deeper characterization, better plotting and thinking out her ideas more).

MJ: Actually, Sean, your response here reminds me that we should talk about… “community standards” (for want of a better term) and how drastically they may differ from one fic community to another. I’ve definitely seen the term “gen” used exactly as you describe it here, yet, within the fanfic communities I most often was a part of, “gen” tended to be a term slapped onto anything that didn’t contain sex or romance, regardless of whether or not it was AU or speculative in nature (which would describe a great many of the Harry Potter fics from my day, since the books were unfinished at the time). Truthfully, I prefer your definition, but in a way, it doesn’t matter what definition I like best, since what really matters in terms of labeling your fics for readers is whether or not the community you’re writing in will get what they expect when they click.

Now, I’ve never quite understood why it’s so horrible to go into a fic without knowing half the story first, but as I’m sure you know, reactions can be downright violent should should readers encounter such horrors as an unexpected ship or, say, character death that wasn’t warned for ahead of time. And while I do recognize the importance of some of these labels (yes, non-con can be a really damaging emotional trigger, I totally get that) others seem… really kind of silly.

SEAN: Tags can be very, very tricky, especially ship tags. If you’re writing a fic that’s all about Orihime’s love for Ichigo, but it ends with her seeing Ichigo married to Rukia, is it an IchiRuki fic? Rukia wasn’t in it except at the end, and it was all about IchiHime. But if you label it IchiHime, you’ll have a lot of angry shippers.

I wrote a Maison Ikkoku fic years ago (I reposted it during the Takahashi MMF as an old shame), where I avoided tags as they gave the game away. If you want to surprise the reader, tags are automatic spoilers, so tagging it ‘Darkfic, multiple characters deaths, OOC’ would have led to a) no one reading it, and b) it losing any impact it had.

That said, as I grow older my reading habits are far more conservative. I have my ships, and like them, and don’t always like being forced out of my comfortable little box. In that case, sorting by pairing or length is something I do quite a bit. (I do wish that FFNet would allow single character search, so that you could search for ‘Harry P.’ without a second person and get fics with only Harry as the character tag.)

Oh, in case Michelle doesn’t know about interro!bangs, from Wikipedia: ‘In fandom and fanfiction, ! is used to signify a defining quality in a character, usually signifying an alternate interpretation of a character from a canonical work. Examples of this would be “Romantic!Draco” or “Vampire!Harry” from Harry Potter fandom. It is also used to clarify the current persona of a character with multiple identities or appearances, such as to distinguish “Armor!Al” from “Human!Al” in a work based on Fullmetal Alchemist. The origin of this usage is unknown, although it is hypothesized to have originated with certain Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures, for example, “Football Player! Leonardo”, “Rockstar! Raphael”, and “Breakdancer! Michelangelo”.’

MICHELLE: I encountered interrobangs used thusly in the RP world, so I’m familiar with them. I feel like I have probably busted out some interrobangs in at least one Off the Shelf column, too.

I’m not qualified to give any definitions of gen fic, but I must say that Sean’s interpretation of “original flavor” fic sounds exactly like the sort I’m most drawn to and how my few drabbles could be classified.

MJ: So, I think I’ve mentioned that I don’t write fanfic anymore, and it’s really for lack of time than anything else. The more serious I got about manga blogging, the more it became clear that in order to be able to successfully maintain my (very) full-time job, my private teaching, and my marriage, I pretty much had to choose between Manga Bookshelf and fanfiction (even reading it), and Manga Bookshelf won. I don’t actually regret that decision, but it’s interesting to note the differences in my “fandom,” now and then. Now, of course, I spend a lot of time engaging with fiction by way of reviews, roundtables, essays, and other types of straight-up meta. Yet there are ways in which I feel that fanfiction is a more effective (and certainly more immersive) form of criticism than any of those things, or at least a form that comes out of a deeper interaction with the text. When I was writing and reading fanfiction, I carried the canon with me in my mind all the time, turning it over and over, considering its strengths and flaws, examining every crevice, and discussing it all through my writing, generally from multiple angles. And while straightforward discussion is certainly simpler to digest, I’m not sure it’s as thoughtful.

Sean, I know you’ve expressed a distaste for people taking their fanfic too seriously, and I don’t mean to suggest that I think my own fanfiction was the most brilliant criticism known to humankind. But if I don’t necessarily take the product seriously, I do highly value the process. Any comments on this?

SEAN: It will come as no surprise to find that my own most active period of fanfiction was when I was either unemployed or working a non-time intensive job. Real life tends to take over, doesn’t it? As for fanfiction as a criticism, I definitely agree. Sticking with good old Harry Potter as an example, I have a lot of issues with Rowling’s books. One of my biggest is the lack of any example of a ‘good’ Slytherin – at the end of the day, I still don’t think Rowling gave any good reason that they shouldn’t imprison them right after sorting for life. And given that’s a horrible prospect, I certainly approve of fanfics that explore ‘good Slytherins’ and the value of ambition.

The difficulty is when criticism becomes ‘bashing’. Disliking Ron and wishing he hadn’t ended up with Hermione is fine. Saying that Ron has all the hallmarks of a future wife beater is another (and yes, I’ve seen writers say that). And while one might blame some of this on the youth of the writers (the trouble with all ‘teen’ fandoms), I’ve seen just as many rabid 40 and 50 year olds saying such things. Finding a balance between analysis of a work and OVERanalysis of a work is a difficult thing to do, and can especially become hard when you’re not arguing a point but lecturing or harping on it instead. And it’s even worse on the anonymous Internet. When does analysis or criticism become an ATTACK on the work or a character?

At the end of the day, if you argue with someone who disagrees with you, can your mind be changed? If not… why are you arguing at all? (Yes, I know, because THEY’RE STILL WRONG. Welcome to the Internet.)

MJ: Poor Ron! I’m happy to say I haven’t had the displeasure of reading any such fic.

As you say, Sean, there’s always the risk of over-analysis, particularly when there’s a pet theory involved, though I’m not sure that risk is mitigated by engaging in only standard modes of criticism. I’ve seen arguments I consider just as wrongheaded from prominent critics in the comics blogosphere, many of whom I expect would consider fanfiction beneath them.

Don’t get me going on Rowling and Slytherin, though. This roundtable might drag on forever.

MICHELLE: Seriously. But know that we both agree with you, Sean. :)

MJ: Speaking of dragging on forever, I suppose we’ve talked everyone’s (virtual) ears off by now. Any final comments you’d like to make on the subject?

SEAN: Just that I’m always surprised when I learn how few reviewers and bloggers in our ‘manga sphere’ are heavily involved in fandom. Leaving aside fanfics and fanart and the bias they can lead to (I try to avoid obvious shipping in my reviews, as I’ve noted), this may also explain another reason (besides the ethical correctness) that bloggers are so anti-scans – they aren’t reading fanfics based off of last week’s chapter, they aren’t getting spoiled constantly in newsgroups/LJ groups/forums, they don’t care that they have to wait 15 months for the chapter to come out in the States. Being involved in fandom means either a) you learn to love spoilers, b) that you avoid reading ANYTHING that’s not marked as being safe to read if you haven’t read ‘xxx’ yet (and still get accidentally spoiled constantly), or c) that you quietly read the scans and simply don’t tell the other bloggers about it.

Fandom means being INVOLVED. It means that you love to talk about things, and argue about things. Hopefully with an open mind. You can’t be in a fandom for something that you only think is pretty good. If you’re outlining an idea for a fic, or chatting on a forum about whether a character is too powerful… you’re there, whether you admit it or not. It’s only a short hop from that to your awesome epic Doctor Who/Stargate/Bleach/Harry Potter/My Little Pony/Elric/Huntley-Brinkley Report crossover, where the tortured spirit of Chet Huntley returns from the grave to demand blood and souls.

MICHELLE: As someone who only recently made a conscious effort to be open-minded about this whole fanfiction thing, I would simply urge others to do the same—turns out it’s not all pr0n.

MJ: … and sometimes when it is, it’s still awesome.

SEAN: So you don’t want the link to my Sailor Moon 10-senshi lesbian orgy fic, then? :)

MICHELLE: Well, I have been considering also making a conscious effort *not* to be so smut-averse, but I don’t think I’m quite ready for that. :)

MJ: Thanks, both of you for indulging me in this roundtable! I secretly hope we’ll continue in comments.

Seiho Boys’ High School!, Vol. 7

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By Kaneyoshi Izumi. Released in Japan as “Men’s Kou” by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Bessatsu Comic (“Betsucomi”). Released in North America by Viz.

We’ve almost finished with this short and enjoyable shoujo series. As we hit the penultimate volume, the main boys (well, the main straight boys) all have girlfriends of some sort or another. So we’re left with doing plots on side characters we haven’t seen much of till now, and working on seeing how well those relationships with the girls are being maintained. As always, communication is the key.

The first chapter shows us a girl who goes through guys like kleenex, and her platonic best friend who has tried going to Seiho to get away from the drama that is her life. Of course, ‘platonic’ in this case turns out to be as platonic as most other shoujo manga cute friendships. Maki manages to step in and show the two what everyone but them can see (and honestly, the girl gets it too), with that special blend of being a complete jerk for the right reasons that he does so well. Given that it’s all too easy to peg Maki into the ‘sweet’ hole, I like seeing him when he’s a bit of an asshole.

Next we’re back to Kamiki, with what was likely my favorite chapter of the volume. He’s come down with a bad cold, and is starting to lose the image that he projects so hard under a feverish glare of ‘you know what? I just don’t care anymore’. We see some shots of him as a child dealing with his somewhat scatterbrained mother. He acts the strong, always in control boy so he can please her… but then she worries he’s too stoic. Finding a happy medium is tough, especially when you’re busy burying most of your emotions. (Suddenly it’s easier to see why he might have fallen for his stepsister.)

It’s even harder when your girlfriend is acting a bit too clingy, and your best friend is trying to get a bit too involved in your life as always. Kamiki and Maki’s brief fistfight is not as startling as what he says, and despite it being due to a fever, I think Kamiki with the filter off is great at telling those little annoying truths. Maki’s dating a girl with the same name and a similar personality as his dead crush. Why wouldn’t anyone be wary of that? Heck, I’ve mentioned myself I keep waiting for it to blow up in my past reviews. Still, Maki’s rationalization is a good one, and I’m starting to think I may not get the full confession I was hoping for.

There then follows a weak chapter with a student teacher inspiring Maki to be an idiot. The chapter after that, however, tells Miyaki and Erika’s side of the Kamiki chapter, and shows how the two, despite being dissimilar, have become such good friends. It shows both of them not at their best – Miyaji overreacts to everything, and is constantly fretting, which Erika’s ‘I don’t need anyone or anything’ persona sometimes blinds her to when Miyaji needs a hug more than a kick in the pants – but the dynamic is excellent. I like that Miyaji, during their fight, can immediately tell that she hurt Erika, and how it gnaws at her. It makes her less of a giant flake, which she’s had a tendency to be in this series.

There’s another cliffhanger ending, this time playing on Miyaji’s insecurities, but given Vol. 6’s ending didn’t apparently do much I’m not sure if this one will either. Still, it’s another great volume of an underrated shoujo series, and with the next volume being the final one I hope that all our leads find some measure of happiness. Bittersweet endings can be nice, but I like sugary sweet better.

Manga the Week of 8/17

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After the huge pile of the last two weeks, I was waiting for a quiet week, and thank goodness that’s what I get. Only Viz is shipping this week (yes, not even any invisible Kodansha releases this time around), so we have far less to talk about.

First off, somehow coming out a week late, we have Vol. 3 of Itsuwaribito, a Shonen Sunday series about deception. Then we’ve got the elite Viz Signature titles. Vol. 4 of Bokurano: Ours, which is heartwarming and soul crushing all at once, I hear. Vol. 4 of the awesome Dorohedoro, which I will ramble on about more when Pick of the Week comes around. A new 20th Century Boys, which will no doubt have plot twists (though surely it must be up to the point of tying things together by now…). And the 2nd omnibus of Tenjo Tenge, which will have lots of fighting and fanservice. And possibly plot. But probably not much.

So what are you getting?

Otomen, Vol. 11

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By Aya Kanno. Released in Japan by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Bessatsu Hana to Yume (“Betsuhana”). Released in North America by Viz.

Well, in my review of Volume 10 I asked for an end to these ‘minor villains’ coming in to try to de-Otomen our hero, and do a degree I got that. But that’s because the series main villain makes her big return. Asuka’s mother is back, and she is not about to let her boy do anything girly whatsoever. But that’s not till 2/3 of the way through this volume. First we have to finish off the cycle of teachers who were brought in to clean up the school.

When we left our heroes, they were on a field trip to learn to become perfect samurai and geisha. Unfortunately, a landslide has destroyed the only way out to get food and supplies, and trapped them. Luckily, our heroes are not content to let gender stereotypes get in their way! Asuka creates festival decorations to distract the class, while Ryo goes hunting for giant fish, having earlier proven that she can’t be trusted with mushroom gathering. She also rescues an injured Tonomine, and in general is pretty badass. (Given I’ve whined about her so much in the past, I will grant her this.) She also cleans up nicely when she goes dancing with Ryo later.

The best chapters in the manga are the ones back at school dealing with Valentine’s Day, which naturally leads to another Otomen challenge, this one disguised as it’s based around punishing an anonymous person who wrote soppy romantic poetry. Asuka steps in to stop the punishment, and finds himself battling the school nurse, Oji, who is not only handsome and sexy, but also exudes pheromones to make all the girls fall for him. Asuka has merely his natural charm, handsomeness, and politeness to fall back on.

It’s a tough battle, especially as Ryo has seemed distant and keeps brushing him off. (If you’ve guessed what she’s doing, you’re right – this is Otomen. Surprises in the plot are for other manga.) But in the end, Asuka realizes that the shallowness of this competition is not for him, and throws it by giving all the chocolates back (notes he grabs each chocolate from a huge pile and remembers who gave it to him exactly), as the only ones he can accept are from Ryo, who of course has spent the last few days making her lethal chocolate for him. Awwwwww.

Unfortunately, after this we hit our Worst Case Scenario – Asuka’s mother is back, taking over the school as Kasuga and his squad of teachers failed. So Asuka is back to desperately hiding everything, which is even more unfortunate given there’s a class in teaching men how to bake cakes going on! This is the most cliched of the chapters, but does continue to lean on some heavy foreshadowing, and of course I can’t hope for his mother to give in right away, as otherwise where would the plot tension be?

The manga ends with a sample of the first chapter of Love Chick, Juta’s manga based on Asuka and Ryo only gender reversed. It’s a good thing it’s only fictional, as I found it quite dull. Oh well. More importantly, Otomen has now caught up with Japan, which mean we won’t get another volume for 6 months. So I hope you didn’t mind the cliffhanger. As ever, I want slightly more out of Otomen than what it gives, but an reasonably happy with it regardless.

Pick of the Week: 13th Boy & More

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It’s a Yen-heavy week at Midtown Comics! See how the Manga Bookshelf blogger picks stack up below!

MICHELLE: Although VIZ Media and others make a decent showing on this week’s release list from Midtown Comics, the majority of the titles hail from Yen Press. Unfortunately, most of them are the latest volumes in series I don’t personally follow, but there is one shining gem, the eighth volume of the quirky and fun manhwa, 13th Boy. I recently indulged in a binge and got caught up on the series, so I’m looking forward to keeping current with new releases. When we left off, Beatrice, heroine Hee-So’s talking cactus, was stuck in his human form and living with his creator lest he burden his beloved owner with his troublesome presence. I never thought I’d be rooting for a cactus to win the girl of his dreams, but it’s to 13th Boy‘s credit that this seems like an entirely rational thing to do.

SEAN: I already pimped Book Girl and the Captive Fool on my Manga The Week Of post, so will stop myself doing so again, even though it’s a fantastic novel series that everyone should be getting. Instead, I’ll go for the 4th and last of Higurashi When They Cry: Eye Opening Arc, which concludes the ‘Shion’ arc of the manga based on visual game series. This particular arc has a reputation of being one of the bloodiest and most off-putting, and therefore I expect getting through the last volume will be quite a haul for me, as generally speaking I tend to avoid gore. As always, though, Higurashi’s intense plot and taut emotions pull me in, and if it upsets me too much, I’ll remind myself of the reset button and Rena’s arc beginning in October.

MJ: I’d like to say that I’m torn this week, with the latest volume of Blue Exorcist on the way, but I’m not. I’m with Michelle, all the way. 13th Boy is one of my favorite girls’ comic series being published today, and one of the few series I’ll put aside everything to read the moment it lands on my doorstep. It’s just that charming. SangEun Lee has managed to create a heroine who really is just an “ordinary” girl, while reminding us how idiosyncratic and genuinely relatable “ordinary” can be. Also, as Michelle mentioned, it’s the first time ever I can recall actively ‘shipping someone with a cactus. I wholeheartedly recommend 13th Boy.

DAVID: I’m going to be predictable and take up the Blue Exorcist mantle. You can see my specific opinion of the third volume in this week’s Bookshelf Briefs, but I will note that Kazue Kato becomes more assured with this material with each new volume. It’s not perfect fantasy adventure, but it’s certainly the best example to debut lately, and it’s got some great, root-worthy characters.

KATE: Though I also share the group’s enthusiasm for Blue Exorcist and 13th Boy, I’m going to recommend the latest omnibus of InuYasha. Readers familiar with the anime will want to pick us this particular volume, as it features the beginning of the series’ best-loved story arc: The Band of Seven. There’s also a plotline involving Sesshomaru — always a plus in my book — and a memorable showdown between InuYasha and a faceless demon. And if you still need persuading, let me praise VIZ for giving InuYasha the deluxe treatment it deserves, printing it on good quality, over-sized paper, retouching the artwork, and reproducing the original Japanese covers in full color.

Readers, what looks good to you this week?