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Out of "Office" Notification

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I’m sure you’ve all noticed it’s been a bit quiet around here lately! I promise it won’t last much longer. I greet you today from Charlotte, North Carolina, where I am attending the Southeastern Theater Conference on behalf of the company I work for. The process here tends to be long and somewhat grueling, though I’ve brought plenty of manga to read during slow moments.

Packed in my bags are copies of Yotsuba&! volume six, NANA volume 18, Pluto volume 4, and many more, so you can look forward some (likely) glowing reviews upon my Wednesday return! Meanwhile, keep an eye on Twitter for updates both on-topic and off.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Out of “Office” Notification

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I’m sure you’ve all noticed it’s been a bit quiet around here lately! I promise it won’t last much longer. I greet you today from Charlotte, North Carolina, where I am attending the Southeastern Theater Conference on behalf of the company I work for. The process here tends to be long and somewhat grueling, though I’ve brought plenty of manga to read during slow moments.

Packed in my bags are copies of Yotsuba&! volume six, NANA volume 18, Pluto volume 4, and many more, so you can look forward some (likely) glowing reviews upon my Wednesday return! Meanwhile, keep an eye on Twitter for updates both on-topic and off.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Celebrating Dorrie

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Please excuse this off-topic post but I must take a moment to talk about Dorrie, my beloved friend and companion for the past eighteen years. Today we lost her and though my heart is truly broken, I’d like to share with you all some of what made her so special.

I first met Dorrie when I was working as a waitress at a Mexican restaurant in New York’s financial district. Another waitress was looking for a home for a six month old kitten belonging to her little sister. The girl had stopped caring for the kitten and her mom was sick of dealing with it herself, so she planned to have the kitten put to sleep. Though I already had four cats and was not looking for another, I immediately said, “Bring me the cat!” The next day, she brought me a half-grown kitten named “Princess” in a cardboard box. I re-named her “Dorrie” (though she was occasionally referred to as “The Cat Formerly Known As Princess”), hopped on the subway, and brought her back to my apartment. Dorrie was named for a character in one of my favorite books, B.J. Chute’s Greenwillow. Greenwillow‘s Dorrie was a foundling, taken in and loved by two sisters who raised her as their own. I considered my Dorrie to be much the same.

Though Dorrie had clearly been abused in her former life and it took a lot of love and patience to get her through the trauma that had instilled in her, over the years she developed into the most friendly, loving, unique cat I have ever known. There has never been another like her.

According to legend (and by “legend” I mean “my husband”), Dorrie has been many things over the years, including (but not limited to) a film star, a pitcher for the Red Sox, leader of a nation, a licensed driver, reliable transportation (later upgraded), a presidential candidate, an express delivery service (man, I wish the Dorrie Express website was still up), a donkey, a hardened criminal, burger ingredients, meat pie, a superhero, an artist’s model (that’s actually real–thanks Ellen!), valid currency, an avid writer, omniscient, possibly evil, occasionally flabby, and… okay, I don’t actually remember what this was about, capable of mind-reading, speaking English, teleportation, writing fanfiction, and pretty much anything else you can imagine. She also kept my husband warm. She definitely loved the telephone and the Kitty Kat Komb, was creative about her seating choices, and occasionally felt hurt.

Most of all, though, she was our most dear, beloved cat. I will miss her more than I can possibly express, though I feel very lucky that she allowed me to share my life with her for eighteen wonderful years.

R.I.P. Dorrie 1991-2009

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A Little Morning Link-Blogging

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Various life complications have kept me from posting as much content as I’d like here lately, but there have been some posts out in the rest of the world that have gotten my mind going. First off, Kate Dacey talks about fabulous Boston comic shop Comicopia in her blog this week. Despite living only a couple of hours away, I have only visited Comicopia once, though it honestly blew my mind with its huge manga selection. What’s most heartbreaking about this, is that my single visit was quite early on in my association with manga, so I am sure I failed to appreciate the store fully, even then. Hopefully my life will calm down enough soon to let me take more trips into Boston!

Secondly, fantasy author Sarah Rees Brennan made a post in her livejournal recently regarding readers’ views of women in fiction that really struck a chord with me. A quote from her post:

Let us think of the Question of Harry Potter. I do not mean to bag on the character of Harry Potter: I am very fond of him.

But I think people would be less fond of him if he was Harriet Potter. If he was a girl, and she’d had a sad childhood but risen above it, and she’d found fast friends, and been naturally talented at her school’s only important sport, and saved the day at least seven times. If she’d had most of the boys in the series fancy her, and mention made of boys following her around admiring her. If the only talent she didn’t have was dismissed by her guy friend who did have it. If she was often told by people of her numerous awesome qualities, and was in fact Chosen by Fate to be awesome.

Well, then she’d be just like Harry Potter, but a girl. But I don’t think people would like her as much.

Having read numerous posts on the evils of Ginny Weasley (Chosen by The Author to be both awesome and loved by the awesome hero), I would be honestly shocked if anyone could present a believable argument against Sarah’s point here. I would also be surprised if anyone could believably argue against the fact that the great bulk of those who dislike female characters in fiction are women themselves! Sure, there are women (I like to think I’m one of them) who love awesome female characters in fiction. Maybe there are even a lot of us. But I am constantly disturbed by the evidence suggesting just how many of us actually despise female characters, both the fabulous, kick-ass ones and the ones who are deeply flawed, which is not, by the way, mutually exclusive (see both of the main characters in NANA, for instance). Misogyny among women is probably my single greatest ISSUE with certain subsets of fandom. It makes me cry. And you can go on and on about how poorly women are written in fiction but there are plenty of fantastic female characters receiving hate from female readers at any given moment, so that argument really doesn’t fly with me.

Anything I could say on this subject, however, is better said by Sarah. Witness her conclusion:

My point is, people will enjoy books and movies and shows more if ladies are in them being awesome. (I know I will.) And people will enjoy them more if they maybe take a step back, examine their prejudices, and relax into accepting that they’re awesome. Even if some girl characters are missteps, even if some of them you just will never personally like because tastes are subjective, it’s worth doing to have them, and it’s worth trying to love them.

Amen. Read her full post here. Please. Especially the section in which she talks about readers’ reactions to the characters in her own books.

There were more links in the works, but I’m out of time! Later, friends!

Girls Only Week Recap!

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Last week, I reviewed series only by female mangaka. Here’s a quick rundown!

Sunday: Volume six of Peach-Pit’s insightful take on the magical girl genre, Shugo Chara!
Monday: The second volume of Yun Kouga’s RPG-like shonen fantasy series, Gestalt.
Tuesday: Both volumes of Mikase Hiyashi’s quiet tale of a young girl raising her nephew alone, March on Earth.
Wednesday: A day off at PAD, but the Girls Only spirit was alive and well at CSBG, where Danielle Leigh, Michelle Smith, and I discussed volumes 3 & 4 of NANA!
Thursday: The fifth volume of Yuki Obata’s delicate shojo series We Were There–one that is especially personal for me.
Friday: Volume 19 of my favorite long-running shonen series, Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist.
Saturday: For the grand finale, the full series (5 volumes) of Ai Yazawa’s gorgeous tale of love, fashion and self-discovery, Paradise Kiss!

I had a wonderful time reading these books and I will definitely repeat the theme again in the future. I hope it was enjoyable for everyone!

The new week begins with yesterday’s guest review from Megan M. of the first volume of CMX’s manga adaptation of light novel series Ballad of a Shinigami. Much more to come!

CSBG NANA Project Continues!

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nana-4Fitting very nicely into my Girls Only Week, part 2 of the Comics Should Be Good NANA Project featuring Danielle Leigh, Michelle Smith, and me is up this morning! In this installment, we discuss NANA volumes three and four, focusing on Nana and Hachi, Hachi and Shoji, and finally addressing some of the less fantastic aspects of the series’ English adaptation.

I mentioned recently on Twitter that I think a good English adaptation has a real sense of place so that the sensibility of the original language comes through for the reader. The early volumes of NANA really fall short in that area, and we talk a bit about why. Perhaps the most surprising aspect of this round of conversation for me, however, is that I found myself actually defending Shoji, which is not something I’d have ever expected, especially considering my strong identification with Hachi.

So head on over and join us in comments! (Or click here for our discussion of volumes one and two if you missed it!) Can’t wait to see you there!

PAD Introduces New Guest Reviewer & Girls Only Week!

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First off, I’d like to introduce our new guest reviewer, Megan M! To quote her bio, “Megan M. is a customer service representative for an evil credit card company who lives in Texas. She would be a single English major living alone with a cat if her apartment complex allowed pets, and has compensated for the lack of a cat with far too many books. She has read so much that it has turned her brain and her shelves are overflowing with romance novels, fantasy novels, mystery novels, american comics, and, of course, manga. If one looks closely, one may spot the rare volume of Serious Literature valiantly gasping for air, struggling to survive in the sea of popular fiction. Her fictional preferences for women with weapons and attractive, often roguish, male accessories were firmly established at a very young age due to early exposure to Star Wars and Willow.”

Megan starts things off with a fantastic mini review of CMX’s Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth and Sea. Please give her a warm welcome!

Secondly, today marks the beginning of Girls Only Week, a week-long focus on female mangaka here at There it is, Plain as Daylight. Inspired by the recent controversy over SDCC, the creation of the Women Make Comics t-shirt, and the re-launching of Girlamatic, I’ve decided to spend the entire week featuring works solely by female writers and artists. Something I think is important to point out here, in terms of just how many “women make comics” is that I don’t have to reach to do this. I’m not going back to my shelves and digging through to find female-created manga. I’m just glancing at what’s in my review stack, throwing in a couple of features I’d already planned to do anyway, and there it is, a full week, easy.

Today begins with a review for the most recent volume of one of my favorite shojo series for young girls, Shugo Chara! by female mangaka duo, Peach-Pit. Please note that though the creators may be “girls only,” the manga definitely won’t be. I’ll be covering works in a range of styles and genres this week, so stay tuned!

Viz Licenses Bakuman, Reviewer Collapses From Glee

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bakumanIt was inevitable, I suppose. As long as a Weekly Shonen Jump title continues doing well, it is probably going to be picked up by Viz eventually. Still, I can’t deny that my heart leapt with joy over the news today from Comic-Con that Viz is licensing Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata’s Bakuman for serialization in Shonen Jump here in the US.

In general, I am a bigger fan of Obata than Obata/Ohba, and I had very mixed feelings about their earlier collaboration, Death Note. What is fantastic about Bakuman, however, is that it retains some of the best aspects of Death Note and chucks most of the rest. …

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Robot Six Roundtable, Women Make Comics T-shirts and More!

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Time for a little link-blogging!

First of all, it’s probably obvious that I enjoyed the Girls and fandom roundtable with the Good Comics for Kids folks over at the Robot 6 blog, considering that I’ve been commenting up a storm. I wanted to be sure to pass on the link, though, because it’s important and exciting discussion. Sparked by the recent spate of fanboy hostility towards teen girl fans of Twilight, the discussion continues and expands in comments to adult perception of the novels and more. Many thanks to everyone at Good Comics for Kids for speaking out on behalf of young female fans.

Speaking of girls and women in comics fandom, thanks to Deb Aoki’s efforts, the Women Make Comics t-shirt is available now (in many shapes and sizes!) at Cafe Press. Profits go to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, the Cartoon Art Museum, and Friends of Lulu. Buy them for all your friends!

Deb has also posted her 20 Manga Must-Sees / Must-Do’s at San Diego Comic-Con 2009 at about.com, which I am linking to mainly out of envy. What a great lineup of events! Special mention must be made of item #3, the Women in Manga panel with JuYoun Lee (Yen Press), Lillian Diaz-Pryzbyl (TokyoPop), Leyla Acker (VIZ), Becky Cloonan, Robin Brenner, and Deb herself. Oh how I wish I could attend!

While I’m making impossible wishes, I’ll also add (in the category of Jobs I Wish I Was Qualified For) Viz Media’s advertisement for a Brand Manager. Check it out for yourselves, especially if you live in the San Francisco area.

As a little post-script here, I’d just like to mention how much I enjoy and appreciate the manga blogosphere as a whole. The bloggers are seriously fantastic and discussion is almost uniformly thoughtful and invigorating. I’m constantly impressed by this community and immensely grateful to be a part of it. I think I’ve expressed things along these lines before, but it bears repeating. Thanks, manga bloggers!

News: Welcoming Lorena Nava Ruggero!

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Please give a warm welcome to new guest reviewer, Lorena Nava Ruggero! I first encountered Lorena’s writing at her blog, i heart manga, and I’m thrilled that she has agreed to become a contributor here.

To quote her bio, “Lorena Nava Ruggero is a professional writer and editor in Southern California. She loves nothing more than reading manga with her French bulldog, Rocky, at her side. When she’s not writing reviews or reading manga, she enjoys cooking, hiking and watching movies, including anime. Each year since high school, she has saved up all her nickels and dimes to head to San Diego Comic-Con International, where she immerses herself in all things “nerd” for an all-too-glorious four and a half days. In addition to writing for There it is, Plain as Daylight, she also contributes to MangaCast and writes daily reviews for her own blog, i heart manga.”

Please enjoy Lorena’s first review here, for volume one of Sesuna Mikabe’s Tena on S-String from Yen Press, and make her feel at home!

Also, don’t miss other reviews posted here over the weekend, for the final volume of beloved shojo series Fruits Basket and for the first volume of CMX series Venus Capriccio! Happy Monday!

News: Manga Recon 2009 Midterm Report Card

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9781421521923Today is Midterm Report Card day at Manga Recon, where we each list what we think were the best volumes of manga released in the first half of 2009. This was an incredibly difficult question for me, and there are so many titles I would like to have listed and didn’t have room for.

The volumes that made the top five for me were Hikaru no Go, Vol. 15, Future Lovers, Vol. 2, Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei, Vol. 1, We Were There, Vol. 4, and Pluto, Vol. 3. Check out the full report to find out why and to read everyone else’s fantastic lists!

A few volumes I wanted to mention, but couldn’t: xxxHolic, Vol. 13, One Thousand and One Nights, Vol. 7, NANA, Vols. 15 & 16, Mushishi, Vol. 7, Fullmetal Alchemist, Vol. 18, Fruits Basket, Vol. 22, and Age Called Blue.

One title I hadn’t read yet, but might have included if I had: Venus Capriccio, Vol. 1.

It’s been a fantastic six months for manga! What have been some of your favorites?

News: Children of the Sea, NANA contest, & more!

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Beginning with a bit of link blogging, here are a few items for the day:

First of all, Kate Dacey is holding a NANA contest over at Manga Critic! Click here for details on how to win a copy of NANA volume seventeen! If you’re unaware of how fantastic I think this series is, check out my post, Why You Should Read NANA. Then go get yourself a book!

Secondly, my cohorts over at Manga Recon have a new Roundtable up for your reading pleasure: The Manga Kingdom. The conversation is awesome and it’s already continuing in comments, so don’t miss out!

Speaking of Manga Recon, I had a review in this week’s Minis, for volume four of Del Rey’s series Kamichama Karin Chu, a trippy, over-the-top magical girl drama I had a lot of fun reading. For something completely different, check out my review of volume two of Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei: The Power of Negative Thinking here at PAD. I loved the second volume at least as much as the first, and something I didn’t get to mention in the review is that there is even a tiny Hikaru no Go reference in this volume! Warmed my heart, it really did.

Thanks to everyone for your thoughtful, revealing comments on Getting Our Geek On: What Our Symbols Mean to Us! I’m really enjoying the discussion.

…

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News: CSBG NANA Project Debuts!

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First, a quick link to a review of mine in yesterday’s Manga Minis, for volume six of Nora: The Last Chronicle of Devildom from Viz Media.

Today’s real news, however, is the debut of the Comics Should Be Good NANA Project! Inspired by an unexpectedly passionate exchange in the comments of one of Danielle’s recent reviews, CSBG’s Danielle Leigh, Michelle Smith, and I have started a monthly roundtable in which we will discuss the manga in-depth. We’ll tackle two volumes a month with Danielle at the helm (no spoilers for future volumes!) and if this first installment is anything to go by, it is guaranteed to be fantastic fun, at least for us. :) Please come on over and join us in comments!

If you are not yet one of the converted, check out my post, Why You Should Read NANA for additional information on the series.

Site News!

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I did some redesigning over the weekend, but most importantly, I added several new categories to the blog:

News: As you can see, this post is categorized as “news” which will apply to site news, linkblogging, and anything else that is not a review or feature article/essay. The front page will always display the most recent news post on top of the left-hand column.

Short Takes: In an effort to be able to cover more manga each week, I’ve started writing mini-reviews for some releases, especially later volumes of continuing series. The front page will always display the two most recent of these, below the regular “Review” section on the right-hand column (not the sidebar). My first two Short Takes are for Legend, Vol. 5 and Hikaru no Go, Vol. 16. Check them out!

Yaoi Corner: Since I’m going to be reviewing more yaoi in this blog, I thought I’d create a section just for those books. As you can see, the latest yaoi review will always be displayed at the bottom of the right-hand column, just below “Short Takes.” Please check out the first of these reviews, for the fantastic DokiDoki release, Color.

ETA: To make it easier to find what’s new, I’ve also added a “Recent Posts” widget to the top of the sidebar.

This week’s upcoming reviews include Kimi ni Todoke, Otomen Vol. 3, Hey, Class President! and more!

Monday links

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A few quick links for today! First off, I have a review in today’s Manga Minis, for the first volume of Tokyopop’s KimiKiss. This was a fairly depressing read and the best I can think of to say about it is that it is too bland to be offensive. It breaks my heart that this is the kind of manga Tokyopop is putting money into nowadays, while more deserving works languish in cancellation limbo. I realize that sales are (and must be) the driving force behind it all, but really, this? I read the story synopsis of the game it is based on, and it sounded more interesting than the manga. That’s pretty sad.

Secondly, don’t miss my reviews from the weekend! Yuri Monogatari is a fantastic look at lesbian comics from across the globe and a must-read for female comics fans, and Children of the Sea is a gorgeous, thoughtful supernatural mystery story nobody should miss out on.

Looking at this week’s shipping news (thanks, Kate Dacey), I see we have yet another adaptation of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time coming our way–this time of the animated film. I must admit I’m fan enough of this story to be interested in more, so I’ll probably be looking to pick that up. It might be interesting to compare it to CMX’s The Girl Who Runs Through Time, which I own but have never reviewed.

Lastly, please read Erica Friedman’s post at Ozaku where she discusses the “Girls Read Comics” project that was developed recently via Twitter as a response to some of the deeply sexist press revolving around Comic Con this year. This is a very exciting project and I’ll be advertising it more here when there is more to advertise, but if you’re interested in participating, especially as an artist, please read Erica’s post and contact project organizer Deb Aoki ASAP!