Out now is the super-sized Death Note All-in-One Edition. That’s 12 volumes’ worth of manga, 2400 pages, in one binding and a matching silver slipcase. Death Note was first released in English from 2005-2007. It’s the story of a high school student who meets a shinigami, a god of death, and so anyone whose name he writes in a special notebook (the “death note”) dies. It’s written by Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata, a team who also worked […]

Isn’t this just the perfect giveaway item to promote Delicious in Dungeon, the manga about eating what you kill in a dungeon crawl? It’s a set of chopsticks in a promotional wrapper! As they say, for the manga, “it’s eat or be eaten… literally!” (And yes, this first volume came out in May, but it’s been a long summer and I’m still catching up.)

Fanfare/Ponent Mon puts out some great, unusual manga, from an exploration of the Japanese prison system (Doing Time) to the contemplative works of Jiro Taniguchi (The Walking Man, A Distant Neighborhood). It was their publishing the works of Taniguchi that made me realize how skilled something so simple could be. Not that that describes his art style — it’s insanely detailed, as you can see from the preview pages at the publisher’s website. No, that’s a statement about how quiet […]

The Voices of a Distant Star by Makato Shinkai and Mizu Sahara was one of my best comics of 2006, which is when Tokyopop released the translated single volume in the US. Now comes word that Vertical will be bringing the book (based on an anime) back into print. No date announced yet. The touching story of two young friends irreversibly separated when one is sent away to pilot a robot fighter is full of nostalgia, unspoken feelings, and thoughts […]

While flipping through the February 2017 issue of Glamour magazine (the one with the pantsless women of Girls on the cover), I was surprised to note the following one-page article: That’s right, a recommendation page of makeup products for those who love Sailor Moon. (Which apparently means things that sparkle, make eyes look big, or come in cute packages. And cost anywhere from $6-$240.) The intro also name-drops Miyazaki, Peach Girl, and Pokemon. It seems the manga and anime fans […]

To celebrate the fifth anniversary of the digital magazine Weekly Shonen Jump (which collects various manga chapters on the same day as their release in Japan), Viz has announced a special offer and live event. Congrats on the anniversary! * On Monday, January 30 (for 24 hours only), a yearly subscription (48 issues) will be $9.99 instead of the usual $25.99. * On Friday, January 27, a live streaming event will take place beginning at 6 PM Pacific time. I […]

I know a number of manga fans who were really disappointed by Bunny Drop by Yumi Unita. They liked the early part of the series, about a young man raising an orphaned little girl, but they disagreed with the direction the series took near the end. (The dislike means, for some, any series that features an older man/young girl interacting, such as Sweetness & Lightning, now causes fear that it’s going to take a creepy turn. It’s unfortunate that Bunny […]

Earlier this month, Viz released the first volume of a new Rurouni Kenshin 3-in-1 omnibus series. The book contains the first three installments of the series about a wandering ronin by Nobuhiro Watsuki at a suggested retail price of $14.99 a volume. The series will continue quarterly. Rurouni Kenshin was first serialized in English beginning in 2003. The 28 volumes originally were published in Japan from 1994-1999. There have been anime and film adaptations, as well as a previous oversized […]