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Review: Sand Chronicles (Vol. 10)

By Shannon Fay on Monday, February 14, 2011

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Reviewer: Shannon Fay

Manga-ka: Hinako Ashihara
Publisher: Viz Media
Rating: Older Teen (16+)
Release Date: January 2011

Synopsis: “Daigo digs up the time capsule he buried twenty years ago when he was only ten. What message did Daigo leave for his future self? And what does it take to live life fully and without regret?”

There are some manga that continue even after the main plotline has resolved itself, where the series keeps going even after the main conflict is finished. An example of that can be seen here with the final volume of Sand Chronicles. At this point Ann has pretty much worked through her issues and the love triangle between her and her two childhood friends, Daigo and Fuji, has straightened itself out. But while this volume may be superfluous to the main storyline, it still delivers a bittersweet and touching story.

Swag Bag – The Doctor Is In

By Lissa Pattillo on Saturday, February 12, 2011

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Snow, snow and more snow! A warm and wet end of 2010 has definitely seen a cold and snowy beginning of 2011 here in the Maritimes. With less time travelling around to my favourite manga-buying spots, I didn’t get too much this week but there’s definitely something to be said for the quality over the quantity.

New out from Viz Media this week was the new volume of Pokemon Adventures (Vol. 11). I still haven’t completely made my peace with the new artist when it comes to the human designs but I’m really liking the new (for the time being) main character, Crystal. It’s fun following a ‘capturing expert’ and seeing her bombard Professor Oak with her data unlike previous Pokedex owners. Flipping through, it looks like we’ve got a return of Yellow as well – yay!

My other purchase of the week, and the one I had to read as soon as I was handed my reciept for buying it, was Black Jack (Vol. 13). It’s my favourite of Osamu Tezuka’s works that I’ve read and easily one of my favourite manga series ever. Black Jack’s such a fun character, the kind of person you wouldn’t really want to meet under most circumstances in real life but on the page he’s a well-rounded individual with crazy surgeon skills and the attitude to use them for his own means. There’s quite a bit of Pinoko in this volume and aliens, plus Black Jack’s jerkliness is at an all-time low – yup, low. Volume thirteen really feels like a collection reminding us he’s got a heart of gold when sometimes it’s easy to forget.

In anime-purchasing news, I put in an order at RightStuf which included the boxset for the Twelve Kingdoms anime and the new Tsubasa OVA collection from Funimation. I’m really excited to get both of them and now it’s just a matter of waiting for the post office to deliver. I just finished the third Twelve Kingdoms‘ novel and I’m putting off the fourth because it could be the last we’ll see in English – so depressing! I recommend everyone who enjoys good fantasy fiction pick up this series, it’s amazing and I love how Tokyopop adapted it.

That’s it for me this week – time to perch myself in front of the mail box and get to reading!

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Categories: Features, Swag Bag
Tags: Black Jack, Manga, Vertical Inc, Viz Media

ANN Review: Black Bird (Vol. 07)

By Lissa Pattillo on Saturday, February 5, 2011

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It’s more trashy shoujo time (which is not always a bad thing!) as I review volume seven of Black Bird over at AnimeNewsNetwork.

Oh, Black Bird. Seven volumes in and I still keep buying and reading. Rarely reviewing though since I don’t find I have anything new to say past creepy. Sometimes it manages to be endearing, and there’s always that ‘what’s going to happen next?’ vibe to keep you reading, but the voice in my head telling me to give up on it just keeps screaming louder and louder. I can fully admit I can gloss over some non-con in manga (The Tyrant Who Falls In Love was my pick of the month for January after all), but in Black Bird there’s so much emotional and mental manipulation. It actually bothered me more rereading the series again before this review. Watching the lead character get slowly molded into this weepy docile dependent on her demon-‘lover’ is so… geh.

On another note, one of the comments on the Black Bird review also got me thinking how people perceive the way reviewers post things on ANN. While I can’t speak for everyone as,well, I’m obviously not them, I can say that I choose what I want to buy, read and review for ANN so there’s no ‘choosing the right critic’. I read Black Bird, had something to say, and said it – so… yeah? Just thought it was worth clearing up that I’m not assigned books or anything. The more you know!

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Categories: Reviews
Tags: ANN Reviews, Black Bird, Manga, Shoujo Beat, Viz Media

ANN Review: Peepo Choo (Vol. 03)

By Lissa Pattillo on Sunday, January 30, 2011

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New review of mine up on AnimeNewsNetwork, this time for the third and final volume of Felipe Smith’s Peepo Choo.

“This final volume doesn’t make up for the series’ often slapdash execution, but it does bring Peepo Choo’s stronger points to a predominantly satisfying finish by continuing to explore the culture shock they share.”

In my look back at 2010, I named Peepo Choo as the title I had the most Love-Hate relationship with and that’s definitely accurate to how I feel about it, though leaning more to love than hate. I really loved what Felipe Smith did to tell the tale of culture shock to the extreme but I found the overuse of violence and sex, while not anything much worse than what I’ve read elsewhere before, still too over the top in context of the story. What really got me in this final book though was how quickly the yakzua plot line was wrapped up though. It didn’t feel very satisfying and was too rushed, feeling like the story was forced to a close instead being given the chance to play itself out.

Peepo Choo was memorable for all its own reasons, to say the least, and while I think despite how unfortunately rushed the ending felt, it still did well to end at three volumes. It was definitely a fun ride at parts but one I was good and ready to get off.

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Categories: Reviews
Tags: ANN Reviews, Manga, Vertical Inc

Swag Bag – Pets, Butlers and Students Out of This World

By Lissa Pattillo on Saturday, January 29, 2011

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Websites had some downtime yesterday so apologies for any who came by and were greeted by error pages. We should be back up and running fine now. That said, onwards to manga!

A snowstorm and slow release week kept me away from the comic shop last week but this week I was happy to make up for the short lull with a stack of must-own favourites.

Absolute favourites of the week were definitely the newest volume of Pet Shop of Horrors Tokyo (Vol. 08) and Black Butler (Vol. 04). Both star enigmatic pretty-boys with hidden powers and a whole lot of random happening around them. I was disappointed that the new volume of Black Jack wasn’t shipped here yet but these two definitely did a lot to brighten my mood. Retailers are listing this volume of Pet Shop of Horrors as the last one though – I really hope that’s not the case!

While no new Tezuka to buy this week from Vertical (though hard to beat the news we got instead!), I was able to pick up the fifth volume of the slice-of-life space story, Twin Spica. Purchasing another of what I consider great ‘relaxing’ manga, I was pleased to find a copy of Cross Game (Vol. 02). Unlike the first volume, which was three volumes in one, this second book is only two volumes in one. It’s a good set-up though, as the first omnibus did a good job sucking me in but I don’t think I can handle that much of Mitsuri Adachi’s placid characters every time.

Adding some more Viz Media books to the stack, I got the new volume of Library Wars (Vol. 04) despite my disappointment of prior books. I keep remaining hopeful we’ll get more actual war and library and less cliche romance. Fingers crossed! More promising was my purchase of Arata (Vol. 04) – more shonen-style action from one of the original shoujo-cliche queens, Yuu Watase.

And lastly I picked up a new boys’ love one-shot from BLU – Stray Cat. I’ve already read this one and really liked it. Great release quality from Tokyopop, fun characters with a nice art style and some really hilarious comics about the creator’s pets at the book’s end. BLU books don’t come out often but I’ve been pretty impressed with their selection overall these days.

This weekend I’m putting through a RightStuf order and that means filling up my shopping list with a whole bunch of surprise finds, bargain bin treats and must-have purchases (such as the boxset of Twelve Kingdoms!). Anything you’d recommend? A series new or old that you think shouldn’t be missed? Let me know!

So what were some of your recent purchases?

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Categories: Features, Swag Bag
Tags: Black Butler, BLU, Manga, Tokyopop, Vertical Inc, Viz Media, Yen Press, Yuu Watase

Vertical Inc. Licenses Princess Knight and Drops of God

By Lissa Pattillo on Thursday, January 27, 2011

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Osamu Tezuka fans rejoice and cheer for Vertical Inc. yet again – the long anticipated Princess Knight has been licensed! The acquisition was officially announced on today’s episode of ANNCast.

“Taking place in a medieval fairy-tale setting, Princess Knight is the story of young Princess Sapphire who must pretend to be a male prince so she can inherit the throne (as women are not eligible to do so). This deception begins as soon as she is born, as her father the King announces his baby is a boy instead of a girl. The reason for this is that the next-in-line to the throne, Duke Duralumon, is an evil man who would repress the people if he were to become king, and because of this the King will go to any length to prevent him from taking over.” – Excerpt from Wikipedia: Princess Knight

Osamu Tezuka plus “medieval fairy-tale setting” and a snappily dressed cross-dressing Princess out to save her kingdom from an evil duke – yes, please! I had the fortune of reading a neat learn-Japanese-esque bilingual edition put out by Kodansha International some years ago (alas my college library would’ve give it up for sale…) and I really liked it. I think many readers will find Princess Knight more easily approached than some of Tezuka’s darker works too.

In many ways this license was a given – Vertical Inc. has long since become the go-to publisher for Osamu Tezuka titles and they were open with fans that they were looking at the license. No less exciting to finally hear it’s happened though and if there’s one thing I’ve never questioned with Vertical, it’s the quality of their English releases. The company does top-notch work and I’m eager to see what they have planned for such a beloved title.

A purchase page for part one of Princess Knight appeared on Amazon.ca where the book is listed at 382 pages and with a release date of October 4, 2011. Pre-order, fellow Canadians! Part two of the series will be released shortly after in December. Both books will be printed at the same trim size as Vertical’s releases of Osamu Tezuka’s Black Jack.

But wait – there’s more! Vertical announced the license of Drops of God by artistic team Tadashi Agi. The series is about a man who must find 13 wines outlined in his deceased Father’s will in order to earn his inheritance. Thus he begins his quest to drink for the first time and use his genetically gifted talents for taste and smell to discover the wines he needs in rivalry against his Father’s adopted son.

I’m not a wine-fan myself but I’ve seen this manga requested by a number of fans so it’s great to see something seemingly so ‘unlicensable’ get a chance at the North American market. Not to mention it offers something else to the growing market of adult-targeted series. What really shocked me though was that the series is 27 volumes in Japan and still running! Wow! Vertical will be releasing omnibus volumes as 2-in-1.

Two exciting licenses with books I’m eager to get my hands on!

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Manga, Vertical Inc

Digital Manga Adds Stack of New BL Titles for New Year

By Lissa Pattillo on Saturday, January 22, 2011

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A bit of an unexpected short hiatus for Kuriousity this past week but leave it to Digital Manga to surprise us with a bunch of new license announcements to start off the new year with a pleasant jump-start.

Originally these titles were announced through their Facebook page, a bit of an inconvenience as it requires you to be a Facebook user to see the news. Folks were quick to point manga fans in the direction though and soon enough Digital Manga’s Sales Manager, Yoko Tanigaki, was linking to the titles via her Twitter account. Impressively, and always a huge brownie point winner with me, was that within hours all the new titles were posted to Digital Manga’s website with covers, info and release dates. This all before the titles were posted to retail sites for an assortment of unconfirmed speculation as well. Thumbs up for being so on the ball!

That said, the new titles, predominantly boys’ love one-shots, announced were:

An Even More Beautiful Lie – Kei Kanai (July 2011)
Warning! Whispers of Love – Puku Okuyama (July 2011)
Sky Link – Shiro Yamada (July 2011)
A Liar in Love – Ueda Kiyo (June 2011)
A Fallen Saint’s Kiss – You Higashino
Tonight’s Take Out Night! – Akira Minazuki (June 2011)
I Give To You – Maki Ebishi (June 2011)
This Night’s Everything – Akira Minazuki (June 2011)
Entangled Circumstances – Kikuko Kikuya (June 2011)

… and some future volumes of continuing series:

Seven Days: Friday to Saturday – Rihito Takarai (August 2011)
Yashakiden: The Demon Princess Omnibus (Vol. 04) – Hideyuki Kikuchi (June 2011)
Angelic Runes (Vol. 02) – Makoto Tateno (June 2011)
Dog x Cat (Vol. 02) – Yoshimi Amasaki (June 2011)

It was an eye-opener to me when I learned (a while back now) that many manga series are licensed book to book and not as a whole series upfront. I really like seeing that Digital Manga has started announcing their x-number volume acquisitions as they happen, even if they don’t seem as exciting to most as a brand new title. It’s always good to see the series we’re already attached to getting continued attention from the company even with their newer titles coming in.

As for the new titles, based on the pretty covers, I’m most eager for Warning! Whispers of Love thanks to the unique looking design layout. It looks like it’d have more of a story than your standard love-you-love-you-more romance. But it looks to be another assortment of short stories, which tend to be more miss than hit for me, but I can remain optimistic! Going by just pretty-levels of artwork though, I’m intrigued by Tonight’s Take-Out Night!. So nice looking!

Going by those release dates, there’s going to be a big surplus of new boys’ love in the summer. There isn’t a lot of information listed just yet but with what we have, are there any here you’re most looking forward to checking out?

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Boys' Love/Yaoi, DMP, June, Makoto Tateno, Manga

ANN Review: My Bad!

By Lissa Pattillo on Saturday, January 15, 2011

1 Comment »

New review of mine posted over at AnimeNewsNetwork for a one-shot boys’ love called My Bad!, published by June manga:

“This book’s title speaks for itself like an apology from the artist. Either stagnant and predictable, or unnerving and unpleasant, there’s little to recommend about this boring batch of tropes that falls short of even making fun of itself.”

I’ve often found boys’ love one-shot collections mediocre but this one took it to a new level because even when it did try to step out of BL-bounds and be quirky, it was just gross or poorly executed. And some of the artwork, on the chapter illustrations in particular, were so disproportionately drawn! I get to wonder how those make it past editors sometimes. I’ve heard good things about the manga artist, Rize Shinba, so I hope My Bad! is an anomaly.

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Categories: Reviews
Tags: ANN Reviews, Boys' Love/Yaoi, June, Manga

Swag Bag – Finding One Thousand Nights in the Twelve Kingdoms

By Lissa Pattillo on Thursday, January 13, 2011

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Thursday again already? Where does the time fly! Under a few feet of snow in some places it seems. We got a good blizzard here but not as much snow as some places, that’s for sure. None the less it was a great time to settle back with some good books and I was happy to finally get an Amazon order with just that in it.

While I haven’t gotten to pick up this week’s new manga releases yet, I nabbed a few titles on my ‘must-have’ backorder list thanks to Amazon.ca. First to be pulled from the box was the eleventh and final volume of One Thousand and One Nights. I love this series so the fact it’s taken so long to get the last book still boggles my mind; perhaps I was just avoiding the end! I adore the cover on it, that dress-vest and collared shirt looks fantastic on Sehara.

Also criss-crossing time and fashion-space is the second book of the light novel series, The Twelve Kingdoms. The first book blew me away as a detailed and believable fantasy story about a girl ripped from her world and dropped into one of demons, Gods and people hatched from egg-fruit.

Lastly, I bought the first two volumes of Ayano Yamane’s Finder series. I have what was released in English already by BeBeautiful but I’d heard too many good things about Digital Manga‘s version to pass up a revisit. While I like to think I’d care enough to check the differences between the two editions, I’m sure I’ll just be enjoying the eye-candy and the shiny new design work on the covers.

Oh, and though not a new volume of anything, I did finally purchase a one-year Got Anime? membership. A couple purchases a year from RightStuf at at least $150 a piece and it seems more than worth it to me.

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Categories: Features, Swag Bag
Tags: June, Light Novels, Manga, Tokyopop, Yen Press

Review: Crimson Hero (Vol. 14)

By Shannon Fay on Thursday, January 13, 2011

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Reviewer: Shannon Fay

Manga-ka: Mitsuba Takanshi
Publisher: Viz Media
Rating: Teen (13+)
Release Date: November 2010

Synopsis: “In an attempt to stop the vicious rumors spreading at Crimson Field High School, Nobara ended her relationship with the boys’ team captain Yushin. But when she runs into Haibuki, a talented boys’ team player who mysteriously left school when he found out about Nobara and Yushin’s romance, Yushin is the first person she calls. Can Nobara and Yushin convince their heartbroken teammate to return to Crimson Field?”

A good sports manga makes it so that the game scenes and character development go hand in hand. As the characters play they are growing and changing and finding out about themselves and others through how they play the game. In this volume of Crimson Hero, the balance is a little off. There’s a lot of the characters interacting, but not enough of them playing volleyball. While character development is never a bad thing, Crimson Hero has always worked best for me when the characters work things out on the court. Any scene where they’re just hanging out slows down the manga.