17 February 2014 3 Comments

My Week in Manga: February 10-February 16, 2014

My News and Reviews

Not one, but two in-depth manga reviews were posted last week at Experiments in Manga. It wasn’t intentional on my part, though it did make me happy, but both manga deal with queer themes. The first review was for Takako Shimura’s Wandering Son, Volume 6. Even though it can be a somewhat difficult read for me personally since the subject matter often hits very close to home, I’m still absolutely loving this series. The seventh volume of Wandering Son is currently scheduled for release in August, which feels like a long ways off right now. As part of my “Year of Yuri” review project, last week I also took a closer look at Kiriko Nananan’s Blue, the only example of her long-form manga available in English. It’s a sweet and melancholic story of first love which follows the relationship of two young women who are classmates at an all-girls high school. The artwork in particular is very striking.

I’ve come across plenty of interesting reading and news over the last week. Brigid Alverson attended the Angoulême International Comics Festival this year and has been writing several reports on the experience. One of those explores the current state of the French manga market. In other festival news, The Guys with Pencils podcast interviewed Christ Butcher to talk about the fantastic Toronto Comics Arts Festival which he co-founded in 2003. Justin Stroman recently wrote two articles that I found to be particularly interesting: The Great Tumblr Industry Experience for Organization Anti-Social Geniuses and The Legal Manga Reading Sites You Don’t Know About for Manga Bookshelf. Finally, there has been some more movement on the licensing front. Yen press announced three new manga titles (Übel Blatt by Etorouji Shiono, Barakamon by Satsuki Yoshino, and Hiroyuki Aigamo’s adaptation of Accel World), as did Vertical (Gamon Sakurai’s Demi-Human, Ryū Mizunagi’s Witchcraft Works, and Midori Motohashi’s adaptation of The Garden of Words).

Quick Takes

Mister Mistress, Volume 2Mister Mistress, Volume 2 by Rize Shinba. It’s been quite a while since I read the first volume of Mister Mistress, but I did enjoy it enough that I made a point to track down the now out-of-print second volume. (Happily, both volumes are now available digitally from SuBLime, though I don’t believe there are currently any plans to continue the series.) Mister Mistress works best for me when it sticks to being a comedy. Shinba introduces a somewhat tragic backstory for Rei in this volume, but fortunately it doesn’t take too long for this to be turned around and played for laughs. The series’ strength really isn’t its plot, but its humor. Fujimaru is a bit of a goofball who can’t quite decide what to do about Rei. He halfheartedly attempts to exorcise the incubus several times, but on occasion he actually appreciates having him around. Though I’m not entirely convinced by their developing feelings for each other, it can be rather convenient for a horny teenager to have a personal incubus to aid in the realization of his sexual daydreams. As such, the sex scenes in Mister Mistress tend to be a little unusual.

Sherlock Bones, Volume 2Sherlock Bones, Volumes 2-3 written by Yuma Ando and illustrated by Yuki Sato. I wasn’t sure after reading the first volume of Sherlock Bones, but after reading the second and third volumes it appears as though the series will be mostly episodic. Which is just fine and works pretty well. After the basic premise of the series has been established—Sherlock Holmes reincarnated as a mix-breed puppy—the mysteries tend to be fairly self-contained. I was pleasantly surprised by the first volume of Sherlock Bones and, if anything, I think these two volumes are even better than the first. Sherdog seems to always be present when a murder is taking place, so Sherlock Bones isn’t really a “whodunit.” Instead, the series focuses on outwitting the criminals and finding ways to reveal their attempts to cover up what they have done. For the most part this means relying on circumstantial evidence and pressuring the killers into confessing. Although murder seems to be the crime du jour, Sherlock Bones features some more lighthearted and silly investigations as well which take advantage of the fact that Sherdog is adorable.

Stone, Volume 1Stone, Volumes 1-2 by Sin-ichi Hiromoto. In 2004, the editor of the English edition of Hiromoto’s short manga series Stone called it a “tribute to all of the fantastic sci-fi/action/fantasy films of the past thrity-odd years.” That seems to be a fairly accurate description of Stone. Hiromoto borrows and remixes elements from many films and franchises along with his own creations to devise something entirely his own. I was frequently reminded of Waterworld and to some extent Dune, and I definitely caught nods to Hellraiser and Star Wars. I get the feeling that there were references that I completely missed, too. Stone is a quickly paced manga with plenty of action set in a post-apocalyptic world in which the planet has been covered in a literal sea of sand. My favorite parts of Stone are the nightmarish sand creatures that Hiromoto has designed. Zizi, a fiesty young woman and the series’ lead, is also pretty great. I did prefer the series’ beginning over its end. As the manga becomes increasingly chaotic as the story progresses. The artwork remains visually interesting and engaging, but the plot makes less and less sense as it goes along.

Two Flowers for the Dragon, Volume 5Two Flowers for the Dragon, Volumes 5-6 by Nari Kusakawa. I have now reached the point in this series where I must lament the fact that the final volume wasn’t able to be released in English before CMX folded. These two volumes form the climax of Two Flowers for the Dragon and include some extraordinarily significant plot developments and betrayals. The direction the story has taken was definitely foreshadowed, but that doesn’t make it any less heart-wrenching to see play out. I thought it was all very well done. One of the things that I like the best about Two Flowers for the Dragon is how well-developed and complicated the main characters are. They all have their strengths and their weaknesses, flaws as well as redeeming qualities. The supporting cast is likewise well-rounded, though at this point the series’ true villain unfortunately seems to be less so. The characters and their interactions are a highlight of Two Flowers for the Dragon, but I’m really enjoying the story as well. I like the mix of action, fantasy, romance, and intrigue. So much so, that I’m tracking down a copy of the last volume in Japanese. I want to know what happens!

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14 February 2014 Leave a Comment

Blue

BlueCreator: Kiriko Nananan
U.S. publisher: Fanfare/Ponent Mon
ISBN: 9788493340971
Released: 2006
Original release: 1997

I first discovered Kiriko Nananan’s work while reading Secret Comics Japan: Underground Comics Now. Two of her short manga—”Heartless Bitch” and “Painful Love”—were included in the volume. I was quite taken by the pieces and so was determined to find more of Nananan’s manga in English. Sadly, very little has been translated. Another of her short manga, “Kisses,” was collected in Sake Jock: Comics from Today’s Japanese Underground, an early English anthology of alternative Japanese manga. Nananan debuted in the avant-garde manga magazine Garo in 1993, which is one of the reasons her work is found in these “underground” collections. She is particularly well-known for her short manga; Blue is her only long-form manga to have been released in English. Originally published in Japan in 1997, Fanfare/Ponent Mon published the English edition of the manga in 2006 after releasing a Spanish-language edition in 2004. Blue has also been translated into French and German. The manga was also popular enough to receive a live-action film adaptation directed by Hiroshi Ando in 2002.

“The sky that stretches out above the dark sea. The school uniforms and our desperate awkwardness. If those adornments of our youth held any color it would have been deep blue.” Thus begins Kiriko Nananan’s Blue. Kayako Kirishima, a senior at the Hijiri all-girls high school, is fascinated by her classmate Masami Endō, the young woman who sits directly in front of her. Endō was suspended from school the previous year. Because of that and her general attitude, many of the students at Hijiri find her difficult to approach. But Kirishima eventually musters up the courage to finally talk to Endō. Her fascination becomes friendship and eventually love. But their relationship isn’t an easy one. Uncertainty, worry for the future, and past regrets all have an impact on Kirishima and Endō and how they relate to each other and to the rest of their friends. Love can be a wonderful thing, but it can also be painful. As high school draws to an end, they must face the inevitable changes in their lives either together or alone.

Nananan’s artwork in Blue is very simple, almost minimalistic, and yet it is also incredibly arresting. There is very little shading employed. In fact, the use of negative and white space is just as important to the manga’s composition as the deep black of Nananan’s ink work. It has a distancing and cooling effect. The fragility of Kirishima and Endō’s relationship is reflected in the fragility of Nananan’s lines. At times the pages are nearly empty, giving a sense of loss and contemplativeness, as if the feelings of the two young women are in danger of disappearing altogether. Body language is especially important in Blue. Hands in particular are a recurring motif and are very expressive—they reach out to grasp someone or to push them away, they hide a face in shame or frustration. Nananan shows intimacy of varying degrees in Blue through the characters’ actions and touch. It can be extremely sensual, but it can also be very chaste.

Blue has a reflective, poetic, and lyrical quality to it. The manga is a fairly simple and straightforward story of first love which is both sweet and sad. However, Nananan is adept at capturing the realistic complexities of love and all of the feelings associated with it—the jealousy and heartache as well as the happiness and joy. Kirishima is constantly thinking about Endō. Even when she isn’t immediately present on the page Endō is the focal point of the manga and always on Kirishima’s mind. The two of them obviously care deeply about each other and so it is particularly unfortunate that they seem unable to be completely open and honest with each other or with themselves. They are both young and don’t always make the best or most mature decisions. Blue is told from Kirishima’s perspective as she looks back from some point in the future to her high school days with understandable sentimentality. Although the manga is frequently melancholic and intensely emotional, it never comes across as melodramatic. Blue is a beautiful and striking work; I would love to see more of Nananan’s manga translated.

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12 February 2014 10 Comments

Wandering Son, Volume 6

Wandering Son, Volume 6Creator: Takako Shimura
U.S. publisher: Fantagraphics Books
ISBN: 9781606997079
Released: January 2014
Original release: 2007

Wandering Son is currently the only manga by Takako Shimura to have been released in print in English. Although I would love to see more of her work translated and published, I am particularly grateful that it is Wandering Son that has been licensed for print release. (Fantagraphics’ large format hardcover edition is simply lovely, too.) Wandering Son is a beautiful series that explores the young protagonists’ search for personal identity and addresses issues of gender and sexuality in a very sincere, sensitive, and accessible way. Wandering Son often hits incredibly close to home for me which is one of the reasons that I personally hold the series so dear. I’m not sure how popular the series is in general, but it has been well-received by critics both inside and outside of Japan. The sixth volume of Wandering Son was initially published in Japan in 2007. Fantagraphics’ English-language edition of Wandering Son, Volume 6 was released in 2014.

As the school’s cultural festival approaches, the students are hard at work preparing for their classes’ projects. Chiba and Shuichi are trying to put the final touches on their script for a gender-swapped version of Romeo and Juliet despite some of their classmates’ well-intentioned interference. To Chiba and Shuichi the play is much more than a simple seventh-grade class production. It’s also a very personal expression of their desires: Chiba wants to see Shuichi in the role of Juliet and Shuichi wants to be seen as a girl. In some ways their version of Romeo and Juliet is a reflection of Shuichi and Takatsuki as the two of them are faced with challenging society’s established gender roles and expectations. Shuichi and Takatsuki’s bonding over the play is a source of immense frustration for Chiba. She’s in love with Shuichi, and Shuichi has feelings for Takatsuki, but Takatsuki isn’t interested in pursuing those feelings. The result is that there’s quite a bit of drama both on and off the stage.

For my part, I’m glad to see Shuichi and Takatsuki becoming close again after their relationship was disrupted by Shuichi’s confession of love. Thankfully, they were able to work through that and are once again able to lean and rely on each other as friends. This is particularly important for the two of them since they share so much in common. The additional support is something that Shuichi especially needs. At the beginning of Wandering Son, Shuichi was a very meek and hesitant person. However, as the series has progressed, Shuichi has grown, becoming much more assertive and confident and is now able to begin to express in words needs and desires. In a very touching scene with Takatsuki, Shuichi sums it up quite nicely, “It’s my wish. You as a boy…me as a girl…a happy ending for everybody.” It’s really the first time that Shuichi has been able to be so clear and forthright about the their situation. Happily, it’s not the last time that it happens, but it is a very formative and noteworthy moment.

One of the things that Shimura captures remarkably well in Wandering Son is the natural development of the characters and their relationships with one another. Wandering Son is a story about growing up and determining not only who you are as an individual but who you are in relation to other people; how people see themselves in addition to how others see them. Life itself could be said to be a performance. It’s particularly interesting then that in Wandering Son, Volume 6 so many parallels are made between Shuichi and Takatsuki’s real life and the very deliberately crafted Romeo and Juliet production. Through it they are able to reveal a part of themselves for everyone to see. It may not be a particularly subtle narrative technique on Shimura’s part, but it is a very effective one. The play echos their experiences, emphasizing specific aspects of their lives and relationships not only for the characters, but for the readers as well. Wandering Son continues to be an absolutely wonderful series. As always, I am very much looking forward to the next volume.

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10 February 2014 2 Comments

My Week in Manga: February 3-February 9, 2014

My News and Review

Last week I announced the winner of the Vinland Saga manga giveaway. The post also includes a list of the manga with memorable snowy scenes that were mentioned during the contest. (Just in case you haven’t had enough snow where you are this winter.) And speaking of Makoto Yukimura’s Vinland Saga, I also reviewed the second omnibus of the manga. I’m really loving the series and enjoyed the second volume even more than I did the first. Over the weekend I reviewed Mieko Kanai’s award-winning novel Oh, Tama! which I greatly enjoyed. I know quite a few people who find it to be a boring work, but I found it to be delightfully low-key with a quirky sense of humor.

As for news and interesting reading seen online this week: The fourth issue of the international edition of Monkey Business will be released later this month. I quite enjoy Monkey Business, so I’m looking forward to it. Seven Seas answered a question about some of the decisions that go into licensing manga for omnibus release over on its Tumblr. At Organization Anti-Social Geniuses, Justin posted a great List of Where You Can Buy Anime/Manga in 2014. Hooded Utilitarian’s Ng Suat Tong writes about some of the best online comics criticism of 2013, including some great articles on manga that I hadn’t previously come across.

Quick Takes

Dictatorial Grimoire, Volume 1: CinderellaDictatorial Grimoire, Volume 1: Cinderella by Ayumi Kanou. I have a feeling that Dictatorial Grimoire may very well be one of those manga that is so bad that it’s good. The story is admittedly a bit of a mess and sometimes doesn’t even make a whole lot of sense. However, I can’t deny that I had fun reading the manga. It’s all sorts of ridiculous. (I’m not sure that all of it is entirely intentional, though.) Otogi Grimm is the descendant of the Brothers Grimm which turns out to be a rather dangerous thing to be. The Brothers made a pact with demons offering up the lives of their descendants in exchange for the stories that formed the basis of their famous fairy tales. Many of those demons—such as the progenitor’s of Cinderella and Snow White—are now after Otogi in one way or another. He does seem to maintain some control over them, though it’s never explained how he learned, developed, or perhaps inherited this power. I did love that Cinderella is a complete masochist, although that fact is used mostly as a gag rather than for any meaningful characterization. I was, however, amused.

Fairy Tail, Volume 34Fairy Tail, Volume 34 by Hiro Mashima. The thirty-fourth volume of Fairy Tail gets off to a good start with the conclusion of Natsu’s confrontation with the Saber Tooth Guild. Then it’s back to the Grand Magic Games for the third day of competition. After a nice buildup to the day’s challenge event, called Pandemonium, Erza’s epic battle is largely reduced to a two-page spread. More time is spent on what basically amounts to target practice for the other teams than on what could have been a glorious combat sequence; it was extremely disappointing. Some of the other fights in this volume fare better, but others are completely rushed through. I’m more interested in the plots going on behind the scenes than I am in the tournament itself, but it seems that to some extent Mashima has given up on the Grand Magic Games. Even the event challenges, which were initially interesting because they required some actual thought and strategy to be put into them in addition to magic and martial skill, have become little more than all-out brawls in this volume. That, too, was a rather disappointing development.

Manic LoveManic Love by Satomi Yamagata. Manic Love is a prequel of sorts to Yamagata’s Fake Fur; it delves deeper into the back story of Maki Sonoda, an important side character. Yamagata jokes in the afterword that she had challenged herself to write a manga that was half nude scenes, so there’s quite a bit of sex in Manic Love. But it’s actually handled quite tastefully and the sex scenes are an important part of the manga and the themes with which Yamagata is working. As was the case with Fake Fur, Manic Love explores the relationship between romantic love and sexual desire and how they can influence each other. Sex is used as a form of communication and connection between the characters in addition to being something that they enjoy. One of the things that I particularly liked about Manic Love is that each chapter it told from a different characters’ point of view. Maki is in what is probably best described as a sort of love triangle, but it’s one without hard feelings or anger. It’s interesting to be able to see that unusual relationship from multiple perspectives, including one from someone who is outside of that triangle entirely.

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9 February 2014 1 Comment

Oh, Tama!

Oh, Tama!Author: Mieko Kanai
Translator: Tomoko Aoyama and Paul McCarthy
U.S. publisher: Kurodahan Press
ISBN: 9784902075670
Released: January 2014
Original release: 1987
Awards: Women’s Literature Prize

Oh, Tama! is the third volume of Mieko Kanai’s work to be translated into English. The first was The Word Book, a collection of her short stories from the 1970s, while the second was a short novel called Indian Summer. Both Oh, Tama! and Indian Summer are a part of Kanai’s Mejiro Series—a group of novels tied together more by location and characters than by an overarching plot (though some events do cross over from one novel to another.) Indian Summer is actually the third volume in that series while Oh, Tama!, even though it was translated later, is the second. Oh, Tama! was originally serialized between 1986 and 1987 before being collected and released as a single volume which went on to win Kanai the Women’s Literature Prize in 1988. The English-language translation by Tomoko Aoyama and Paul McCarthy, released by Kurodahan Press in 2014, is based on the 1999 Japanese edition of the novel. I was very pleased to receive a copy of Oh, Tama! through LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers program.

Tsuneko is pregnant. No one except for her and maybe her half-brother Alexandre (if he really is her half-brother) is entirely sure who the father is. Natsuyuki was one of the candidates, but for various reasons instead of being given the role of “father” he has had the responsibility of caring for Tama—Tusnkeo’s pet cat, also pregnant—thrust upon him by Alexandre. It’s a rather strange turn of events, especially when Tusneko leaves the country and Tama becomes one of the only remaining links to her left in Tokyo. The other potential fathers-to-be are trying to find or at least contact Tsuneko, which eventually leads them to Natsuyuki and Tama. In yet another bizarre twist of fate, one of them, Fuyuhiko, actually turns out to be Natsuyuki’s very own long-lost half-brother, making for a rather odd meeting.

There’s actually not much of a driving plot to Oh, Tama!. Instead, Kanai focuses on the mundane lives of the characters. Even the novel’s setting is unremarkable—almost the entire story takes place within the confines of Natsuyuki’s small apartment. Tama provides a focal point from which Kanai explores the interpersonal relationships between Natsuyuki, his friends, family members, and neighbors. The characters in Oh, Tama! aren’t particularly exceptional people although they’re all slightly quirky, eccentric, and offbeat. Their relationships also follow that same pattern of being just a little peculiar and unusual. I actually quite like Natsuyuki and the others and find their interactions, though fairly low-key, to be delightfully amusing as well as realistic. According to one of Kanai’s afterwords, the characters in Oh, Tama! are actually based on real people, so perhaps it shouldn’t be too surprising that their relationships, in all of their strangeness, should also feel so natural.

The translators’ introduction to Oh, Tama! describes the novel as “a treasure chest of rich and varied parody, allusion and intertextuality.” Since I haven’t actually read many of the works being alluded to, many of the references (even when pointed out) were a little lost on me. However, I could appreciate what Kanai was doing. Personally, what appealed to me most about Oh, Tama! were the characters themselves. Natsuyuki is a fairly laid back sort of guy, but this tendency (mostly because complaining or actually trying to change things would take too much effort) puts him into some odd situations. Alexandre, who seems to delight in messing with people, is often more concerned about Tama and the kittens than any of the people around him. I found their slightly antagonistic friendship and their interactions with Fuyuhiko and the others to be highly entertaining. I greatly enjoyed Oh, Tama! and its quirky, understated humor. So much so that I plan on reading the next novel in the Mejiro series, Indian Summer, in the very near future.

Thank you Kurodahan Press for providing a copy of Oh, Tama! for review.

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