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26 December 2012 4 Comments

Manga Giveaway: Shoujo Science Fiction (Please Save My Earth)

The end of the December approaches, as does the end of the year (although it looks like we avoided the end of the world), so it’s time for Experiments in Manga’s final manga giveaway of 2012! This month you will have the chance to win a new copy of the first volume of Saki Hiwatari’s shoujo science fiction epic Please Save My Earth. As always, the contest is open worldwide!

When I was younger, I was constantly reading science fiction. Now that I’m older I read a bit more broadly when it comes to genre, but I still love science fiction. It’s probably not too surprising that my love of science fiction impacts my manga reading as well. I’ve discovered that I have a particular fondness for shoujo science fiction. In the United States, young adult science fiction is generally aimed towards young men. I think it’s marvelous that science fiction intended for young women, in this case shoujo manga, exists and has been translated. When it comes to shoujo science fiction, I personally love the classic manga by Moto Hagio and Keiko Takemiya. (Granted, both of the works by Takemiya that are currently available in English are technically shounen.) But I do enjoy more contemporary works as well. What I particularly like about the shoujo science fiction manga that I have read is the focus given to character development within the context of the stories.

So, you may be wondering, how can you win a copy of Please Save My Earth, Volume 1?

1) In the comments below, tell me about your favorite shoujo manga with science fiction themes. If you don’t have one, or you’ve never read shoujo science fiction manga, just mention that.
2) For a second entry, simply name a shoujo science fiction manga that hasn’t been mentioned yet by me or someone else.
3) If you’re on Twitter, you can earn a bonus entry by tweeting about the contest. Make sure to include a link to this post and @PhoenixTerran (that’s me).

It’s as easy as that! Each person can earn up to three entries for this giveaway. You have one week to submit your comments. If you have trouble leaving comments (Blogger sometimes has issues), or if you would prefer, you can e-mail me your entries at phoenixterran(at)gmail(dot)com. I will then post the comment in your name. The winner will be randomly selected and announced on January 2, 2013. Best of luck, and have a fantastic new year!

VERY IMPORTANT: Include some way that I can contact you. This can be an e-mail address, link to your website, Twitter username, or whatever. If I can’t figure out how to get a hold of you and you win, I’ll just draw another name.

Contest winner announced—Manga Giveaway: Shoujo Science Fiction Winner

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5 December 2012 Leave a Comment

Manga Giveaway: Music Manga Giveaway Winner

And the winner of the Music Manga Giveaway is…Ben Jonas!

As the winner, Ben will be receiving the first four volumes of Harold Sakuishi’s manga series Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad as published by Tokyopop. For this giveaway, I was interested in learning about everyone’s favorite music-themed manga. Check out the giveaway comments for all of the responses!

Music is one of my great loves and so I always enjoy it when music is incorporated into the manga that I read. Sometimes music is a major part of a manga’s plot, such as in Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad. (Also worth reading is Otaku Champloo’s recent feature on Beck). Sometimes music plays more of a minor role, but it always makes me happy when it shows up.

A selection of manga licensed in English which incorporate music:
20th Century Boys by Naoki Urasawa
Age Called Blue by Est Em
Ai Ore! by Mayu Shinjo
Alice the 101st by Chigusa Kawai
Astral Project written by Garon Tsuchiya, illustrated by Shyuji Takeya
Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad by Harold Sakuishi
La Corda d’Oro by Yuki Kure
Detroit Metal City by Kiminori Wakasugi
A Devil and Her Love Song by Miyoshi Tomori
Dragon Voice by Yuriko Nishiyama
Full Moon o Sagashite by Arina Tanemura
Il Gatto Sul G by Tooko Miyagi
Grand Guignol Orchestra by Kaori Yuki
Gravitation by Maki Murakami
Hard Rock by Akane Abe
K-ON! by Kakifly
Me and the Devil Blues by Akira Hiramoto
Mikansei No. 1 by Majiko
Nana by Ai Yazawa
Nodame Cantabile by Tomoko Ninomiya
Pichi Pichi Pitch written by Michiko Yokote, illustrated by Pink Hanamori
Solanin by Inio Asano
Solfege by Fumi Yoshinaga
SOS by Hinako Ashihara
Seduce Me After the Show by Est Em
Tena on S-String by Sesuna Mikabe
Utahime by Aki
Venus Capriccio by Mai Nishikata
Virtuoso di Amore by Uki Ogasawara
Voiceful by Nawoko

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28 November 2012 13 Comments

Manga Giveaway: Music Manga Giveaway (Beck)

The end of the month approaches, which means it’s time for another manga giveaway here at Experiments in Manga! Keeping with tradition (it’s happened twice before now, so it totally counts as tradition!), November’s giveaway is for multiple volumes. In this particular case, I will be giving away a set of the first four volumes of Harold Sakuishi’s manga series Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad as published by Tokyopop. As always, the giveaway is open worldwide!

Although I currently work as a librarian, my background is actually in music. Music continues to be one of my great loves. And when it is combined with another of my great loves, namely manga, I can hardly resist. When manga incorporates music into the story, it earns bonus points with me, even if the rest of the manga leaves something to be desired. I’m always on the lookout for music-themed manga. I like it all, from classical to rock and everything in between. Beck is an example of a music manga done well; the series even won a Kodansha Manga Award in 2002. Sakuishi knows his alternative and indie rock and uses his knowledge to the series’ advantage. Unfortunately, only twelve of its thirty-four volumes were ever released in print in English. But it’s still a series worth checking out.

So, you may be wondering, how can you win the first four volumes of Beck?

1) In the comments below, tell me about your favorite music-themed manga. If you don’t have a favorite music manga one or you’ve never read a manga that incorporates music, just mention that.
2) For a second entry, simply name a music manga that hasn’t been mentioned yet by me or by someone else.
3) If you’re on Twitter, you can earn a bonus entry by tweeting about the contest. Make sure to include a link to this post and @PhoenixTerran (that’s me).

And there you have it! Each person can earn up to three entries for this giveaway. You have one week to submit your comments. If you have trouble leaving comments (Blogger sometimes has issues), or if you would prefer, you can e-mail me your entries at phoenixterran(at)gmail(dot)com. I will then post the comment in your name. The winner will be randomly selected and announced on December 5, 2012. Rock on!

VERY IMPORTANT: Include some way that I can contact you. This can be an e-mail address, link to your website, Twitter username, or whatever. If I can’t figure out how to get a hold of you and you win, I’ll just draw another name.

Contest winner announced—Manga Giveaway: Music Manga Giveaway

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7 November 2012 Leave a Comment

Manga Giveaway: Nausicaä Giveaway Winner

And the winner of the Nausicaä manga giveaway is…Stephanie!

As the winner, Stephanie will be receiving the first seven issues of the original English translation of Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. Over the years, Nausicaä has been published in English in five different formats, which got me to thinking about the various ways that manga is released. And so for this giveaway, I asked entrants to give me their opinions on the different formats of manga. I’ve excerpted some of the responses here, but there’s plenty more in the Nausicaä Giveaway comments. I enjoyed reading about everyone’s preferences—there was a nice variety—so thank you for sharing!

Magazines!
The magazine format was nice while it lasted (since it introduced me to a number of titles I otherwise would’ve ignored), but with Shonen Jump‘s demise and Viz’s rush to make everything popular digital (good luck with that), there’s no manga magazine currently in existence stateside, which means, sadly, this format is now obsolete.
~Ben Jonas

Single Issues!
For some reason I’m very partial to English single issues of manga, such as Sailor Moon and the Pokemon manga, but I’ve never been a fan of collecting the monthly Japanese “phonebooks,” really.
~apricotsushi

Individual Volumes!
I prefer individual volumes of my favourite manga so that I have a choice of beautiful cover art to show off in my room, almost like an accessory to the overall design! […] However, I don’t just let the volumes sit around for looks… I find sitting down with an actual physical copy of a book so much more relaxing and easy on my eyes than viewing manga in digital formats.
~T. Gantt

Oversized!
I personally prefer my manga in as close to the Japanese release as possible, so standard sized graphic novels/collections are best…but I also kind of like slightly oversized ones because you get to see all of the artwork larger and more close-up. (I’d much prefer oversized than the teeny pocket-sized books some companies have released over the years.)
~Dawn H

Omnibuses!
Personally, I prefer my manga in omnibus hardcover format. A hardcover lasts much longer and feels much better to hold and read, and omnibuses allow for getting series faster and cheaper too.
~

Box Sets!
I definitely have a soft spot for box sets and hardcovers, though those aren’t as common, so I don’t have as many of them. I also love volumes that have a slipcover or colored pages. The fancier, the better, I guess.
~KenshinGirl

Digital!
I’ve found digital manga sites like J-manga to be another regular haunt and why not – with the sheer volume of titles coming out in japan on a yearly basis, it simply wouldn’t be possible for manga companies to release all of them in the west and get any kind of return from them […] and so for me the only way to legally see many of these titles with out learning the language is via this route.
~Chou Dori

And that’s it for the  Nausicaä Giveaway! There was a great turnout this time around; I hope to see you all again for November’s giveaway!

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31 October 2012 20 Comments

Manga Giveaway: Nausicaä Giveaway

It’s the last day of October, so I guess it’s about time I get around to this month’s manga giveaway! This month I have something for you all which I think is pretty neat: the first seven issues (out of twenty-seven) of the original English-language release of Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. The first issue even includes a poster by Mœbius! These comics are a cool manga artifact. The larger page size means Miyazaki’s artwork has plenty of room to breathe, too. As always, the contest is open worldwide!

(Apologies for the poor image quality…)

Nausicaä has had an interesting publishing history in English. It first showed up as a twenty-seven issue comic series beginning in 1988. Later, Viz would collect the story in seven graphic novel volumes and then again in four “perfect collection” volumes before once again publishing the series in seven volumes, but this time unflipped and with a smaller trim size. Finally, in November 2012, Viz will be releasing Nausicaä in a two-volume, hardcover box set.This got me to thinking about the different formats in which manga has been released in English.

Early on manga was often published similarly to American comics, first as individual floppies before being collected into larger volumes. Sometimes the individual issues were never collected and the comics are the only format in which they were released. Except in those cases (such as parts of The Legend of Kamui), I personally never collected manga in the comics format. I like my manga in book-sized chunks. But book-sized collections that I can actually read—I’m not a big fan of Dark Horse’s tiny Lone Wolf & Cub volumes, for example. For longer series, I appreciate multi-volume omnibus releases. Actually, I like shorter series collected as a single volume, too. Box sets are also fun and often come with additional content and artwork. At the moment, my favorite manga format is Fantagraphics’ oversized hardcovers. Yen Press and Vertical both have some nice hardcover manga, too. And while I’m glad to see digital manga becoming a more viable option, I still prefer my manga in print.

So, you may be wondering, how can you win the first seven issues of Nausicaä?

1) In the comments below, simply tell me which formats of manga you prefer to read and why. (Magazine serialization, individual volumes, multi-volume omnibuses, box sets, hardcover, digital, etc.)
2) If you’re on Twitter, you can earn a bonus entry by tweeting about the contest. Make sure to include a link to this post and @PhoenixTerran (that’s me).

So there you go! For this giveaway each person can earn up to two entries. As usual, there is one week to submit your entries. If you have trouble leaving comments, or if you would prefer, feel free to e-mail me your entry at phoenixterran(at)gmail(dot)com. I will then post the comment in your name. The winner will be randomly selected and announced on November 7, 2012. Good luck to you all!

VERY IMPORTANT: Include some way that I can contact you. This can be an e-mail address, link to your website, Twitter username, or whatever. If I can’t figure out how to get a hold of you and you win, I’ll just draw another name.

Contest winner announced—Manga Giveaway: Nausicaä Giveaway Winner

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