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By Ayuko; Original Concept by Mizue Tani
Publisher: Viz Media – Shojo Beat
Age Rating: Teen
Genre: Fantasy/Romance
Price: $9.99

I first heard of The Earl and the Fairy when the anime was announced in 2008, but didn’t give it much mind until Viz announced the license last year. The way the premise for the anime was presented didn’t sound too interesting to me, I decided to give the manga a try. I’m glad I did. It’s a story filled with plenty of action, but what really makes this volume shine is the characters.

The story follows Lydia Carlton. She’s a strong-willed young woman determined to make it as Fairy Doctor despite living in an age when few people, if any, believe in fairies or other magical creatures. She is also kind, and soft-hearted, as she holds no ill-will towards those who think she’s a little off. Lydia makes a good female lead. Her strong personality keeps her from being a wilting flower, though she does try to keep out of the more physical altercations. She doesn’t back down from Edgar’s challenge to find the Treasure Sword, despite being abducted twice in the volume. She’s got spirit, which makes her fun to read.

As much as I like Lydia, I like Edgar even more. He is so enigmatic. His expression is always neutral, so it’s hard to tell when he is being serious and when he is joking. It’s this mysterious nature that makes it just as hard to tell if he really is an Earl or born of the Blue Knight line. I really like that about him. He fits the legend just well enough to keep Lydia (and the reader) from knowing for sure if he’s lying. Raven and Ermine, his two faithful servants, contribute to the uncertainty by helping Edgar fit the legend further.

It’s just as hard to tell though whether or not to feel any sympathy for him. His experiences in the American South in the 1800s probably has more of an impact on US readers that Japanese, as it is a dark part of our history, so after hearing about his past, it’s easy to want to feel sympathetic towards him. But then there’s his darker side, that makes no bones about want to just use Lydia, and the lingering doubt that he just wants to use the Treasure sword to gain prestige even though he may not be the heir to it. Or maybe he just wants the sapphire. I love all the ambiguity!

I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention the one fairy in the cast, Nico. He is Lydia’s constant companion. He can make himself invisible, or if he wants to be seen, he appears as a gray, fluffy cat. But he has a lot of un-cat traits. He likes to wear string neckties and cuffs, and is more comfortable on two legs. He also really enjoys his liquor. He helps Lydia, and gives her advice, solicited or not. I also really liked Nico, and not just because he looks like a cat.

This first volume is filled with lots of action, as Edgar and Huxley fight over Lydia for her fairy knowledge. She is (technically) kidnapped twice, and is nearly taken for a third time, when Huxley catches up with them. While Edgar, Raven and even Ermine do most of the fighting, Lydia isn’t afraid to try to defend herself in whatever way she can. I liked th art as well. The men are all mostly bishonen, while Lydia has a more down-to-earth beauty.

The Earl and the Fairy is off to a great start. It’s a story with lots of action, and a quest as well as the hint of romance brewing. I like that it’s delving into more of the celtic myths and mythical creatures. It’s rarely done it either US or Japan, so I’m looking forward to seeing more about that as well as seeing more of these characters. The Earl and the Fairy is going into my keep pile, for now.

By Peach-Pit
Publisher: Yen Press
Age Rating: 16+
Genre: Supernatural/Action
Price: $11.99

I was surprised to hear that volume 13 was the final volume of the series, when the end of volume 11 started a new arc. Apparently it wasn’t a just new arc but the beginning of the end. But its an arc that feels rushed and slapped together rather than thoughtfully planned out.

I’m sure Peach-Pit had the ending to this series all planned out. Some groundwork was laid as scenes from previous volumes that are referenced, such as Hakka telling Michiru about her true nature. But the overall feeling going into these volumes is one of rushing. After Kanro’s attack, it’s just one mad dash after another to try to find and save the other members of Z-Loan; to find Michiru; to save the world. It’s just one thing after another thrown out at the reader who barely has time to process what’s happening before the next problem is thrown at them. The information overload is made worse by the sudden references to “Elizabeth’s Children” and Christian mythology that is thrown in. These references seem to come out of nowhere and go in the same direction.

The whole “turning everything into data” and Chika and Shito becoming stuck in a video game comes off really gimmicky. The streams of characters that float around after “deletion” calls up images of The Matrix, a movie that was more gimmick than story in the first place. The video game bit was more interesting in general. It was at least handled humorously, with Chika and Shito starting out as 8-bit characters, and have to play in a video game called “Zombie Paradise” to rise up to 16, then 32, before regaining their proper appearance.

The ending was a little too pat for my liking. There really wasn’t any tension about what would happen. Michiru’s actions were obvious. And while the ending wrapped up most of the loose ends, it just restarted. I know this was probably supposed to give the feeling of a happy ending, but to me it just came off as cliché. It just didn’t do anything for me.

Zombie Loan was a series that never really impressed me. It started out slow, with characters that didn’t impress, and while it had some interesting moments in the middle, they weren’t enough to overcome the problems. The ending was sadly much like the beginning; unimpressive. While I’m sure Zombie Loan has its fans, I’m not one of them.

By Osamu Tezuka
Publisher: Vertical, Inc.
Age Rating: 16+
Genre: Medical Drama
Price: $16.95

Like the rest of the volumes in the series, these two volumes feature stories of Black Jack showing up licensed doctors, performing impossible operations and helping the less fortunate, though without the credit. In general, I liked volume 16 more than 17. “Miyuki and Ben” is a typical tragic love story that ends as only a Black Jack story could. “The Nekogami Clan” is a nice homage to horror mystery stories with that Black Jack twist. “I Want My Brother Back!” was my favorite as it mixes tokusatsu shows with Black Jack’s kind nature. In “Cancer Hunter”, Black Jack helps a mother teach her Doctor-son some humility, which I liked, but I was bothered that the son still only did the right thing begrudgingly. But I guess that was also the point. “A Passed Moment” is the longest story in the volume at nearly 100 pages, but really seemed to miss its mark. The story starts out as looking at infantile memories, but then drifts away from this and becomes about Black Jack’s pride and his search for a doctor as talented as him. It’s a real shame too, since the story was off to such a fascinating start, but it ends flat.

It took some thought for me to figure out why I didn’t like Volume 17 as much. None of the stories really stand out, good or bad. I’ve never really liked Pinoko, but her stories in here are especially weak. I understand why “Pinoko Is Adopted” was necessary. There had to be a reason for the cold Black Jack to keep a little girl around, but the story really felt forced. And there are so many unlikable characters in this volume. Usually, that’s not such a problem, since the story would carry the weight of the story, and the unlikable characters were just part of it. But because the stories weren’t as strong this time, the unlikable characters stood out more. The people hunting the girl in “A Girl Who Became A Bird”, the father who wants his daughter to become his supposedly dead son in “Two Shujis” and the boys in “Test of Courage” all do terrible things, but the stories resolutions don’t really make up for them.

There were a couple of good stories, though. “Pure Chinese Restaurant” is another story where Black Jack shows his good-hearted side, and “Money! Money! Money! is the kind of Black Jack story I like, where there is a change of heart. “After the Typhoon” ends the volume and the series nicely, despite Pinoko inclusion. She causes a bit of trouble for Black Jack’s client, which he deserves, but the final panels are a nice reminder that home is where the ones you care for are.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading Black Jack these last three years. Tezuka created  something unique as he informed as well as entertained. While Black Jack’s abilities were exaggerated, many of the conditions shown were not. And many of his observations of doctors and the medical industry are as relevent today as they were when he wrote them. Black Jack can be funny, sad, serious and silly, but it’s always poignant. No fan of manga or Tezuka should go without reading at least the first few volumes of this series.

By Osamu Tezuka
Publisher: Vertical, Inc.
Age Rating: 16+
Genre: Medical Drama
Price: $16.99
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

I love stories that have anything to do with Dr. Homna, the doctor that saved Black Jack as a child, and inspired him to become a surgeon, so I really enjoyed “Full Moon Disease.” Black Jack’s interest in a waitress at a cafe near Dr. Homna’s grave seems odd at first, but makes for a touching ending. “Suggestion in the 20th Year” show a glimpse into part of Black Jack’s recovery as well as the power of the mind as an idle comment by one of Dr. Homna’s collegues comes back to haunt Black Jack. It takes both men to discover the answer, and has an ending that leaves smiling as broadly as Black Jack.

I also enjoy stories that knock the pride out from under Black Jack. “Urashima” and “Black Jack Disease” both do a good job of this. “Urashima” has the added bonus of taking down Dr. Kiriko, Black Jack’s nemesis as well. I liked seeing both men defeated by nature when their pride made them compete so much over on patient’s fate. With “Black Jack Disease”, Black Jack’s own pride forces him into action, as he won’t stand for an incurable disease to bear his name. Fortunately in this story, his pride works to the benefit of those afflicted.

While Black Jack shows some of his more generous side in stories such as “The Fog,” and “Homesickness”, it’s when his darker side mixes with it that t he stories are more interesting. In “Captain Satan”, Black Jack allows the survivors of a village massacred in Viet Nam watch the surgery of the man responsible. Even though the children think they want revenge by killing the American Captain, the greater revenge turns out to be letting him live with his crimes. “Treasure Island” has thieves kidnapping Black Jack to find out where his money is stashed. Black Jack takes them to an island, but the truth isn’t what they expected, and Black Jack’s reaction to their plight is less than sympathetic. I do like this dark side to Black Jack. It’s interesting to see some of Tezuka’s views about the Viet Nam War and the environment come through Black Jack.

Black Jack remains an uneven read for me in these later volumes. While there is at least one or two stories per volume that I like, some volumes just outshine others. Volume 14 was definitely the better of the two this time. Not that there has ever been a volume of Black Jack I didn’t like.

Written and Illustrated by Doton Yamaki
Publisher: One Peace Books
Age Rating: Older Teen
Genre: Seinen/Medical Drama
Price: US $16.95
ISBN-13:978-1935548072

It was this same sort of trepidation that I came into my reading of Breathe Deeply, a hefty volume of manga written by Doton Yamaaki, the pen-name of a husband and wife creative team who have been serialized in Kodansha‘s Morning, among other titles. This particular title seems to have been published by Sanctuary Publishing in Japan, which is a publisher I don’t have much information on; according to the One Peace Books website, the English publisher is a joint international venture of Sanctuary Publishing.

Regardless of the source of this piece of fiction, Breathe Deeply is a deep and sometimes dark look at one of the great medical debates still plaguing the medical community; the use of stem cell research to save lives.

Sei and Oishi are two young men in love with a sick girl named Yuko, a girl with an incurable heart condition that requires she receive a heart transplant in order to survive. She does not receive the necessary treatment in time, and passes away. The story of Sei and Oishi is one of heartbreak and stubbornness as each of them try to find their own way to a solution to Yuko’s illness after her death. Each of the men has a different outlook on the use of stem-cell research based on their interactions with Yuko. Sei, a brilliant chemical engineer, has created a polymer that can mimic heart cells and be applied to the failing heart to help massage it and keep it working, while Oishi struggles to have his research accepted as a major mode of inquiry into stem cell research (he has potentially discovered a unique way to create a new heart out of stem cells). The battle between them is one that weaves through the convoluted issues surrounding stem cell research – is transplant medicine ethical, is stem cell research murder to save future lives, and other modes of a morality vs. scientific progress argument.

Even when each character is at their highest point in the volume, each has to deal with the guilt and sorrow they’ve been grappling with for the past 15 years. It makes their struggles and fights more personal, their victories more bitter, and sets the stage for one of the most well-written “friendships” in manga for 2011. The way that Sei and Oichi play off of each other makes Breathe Deeply into a real interpersonal drama, where it otherwise could have been a sermon. Doton Yamaaki have an excellent eye for dialogue, and interactions in the lab seem very true to life, while the interactions between Sei, Oichi, and Yuko are a convincing mix of hormones, anxiety, and longing.

Doton Yamaaki have done an excellent job presenting both sides of the argument in this book, and it is clear that the only agenda the pair has is to write compelling fiction. In this area, they succeed, and do so with aplomb.  Breathe Deeply is a brilliantly written and illustrated piece of fiction that allows the reader to be drawn into personal fights and relationships while simultaneously asking the deepest questions and expecting no answers.

While I would not recommend Breathe Deeply to every manga reader (its often sketchy visual style and some adult scenes will not suit some readers), I do think that it is an excellent medical drama. The relationships are complex and human, and moments that could have been preachy or despicable are cast in that same human light. Overall, Breathe Deeply is a surprise success, and one of the better manga published in 2011.

A copy of this work was provided by the publisher for this review.

By: Susan Fox, Toyo Issiki
Publisher: Digital Manga Publishing/Harlequin K.K./SOFTBANK Creative Corp.
Age Rating: Older Teen
Genre: Romance
Price: 499 emanga points

The manga adaptation of Susan Fox’s “An Arranged Marriage” is a tale of how financial struggles cause a young woman to marry a man for the sake of saving her tyrant uncle’s business. The somewhat naive and modest Allison strives to persevere when she agrees to enter a loveless marriage with the wealthy Blue Summer. Blue Summer has had his sights on Allison for a long time but after becoming wealthy he uses his new-found power to convince Allison’s uncle into trading off financial aid for the hand of his niece.

Most Harlequin manga titles for me are a quick afternoon read or a nice light trashy romance to delve in for an hour or less. But the lack of development on the behalf of Blue Summer’s character irked me a bit as a reader. Typically for a character of his type, poor background but oh snap gets either an inheritance from a long-lost forgotten relative or strikes it rich, they tend to be more sympathetic to a female lead coming from a hard-pressed financial standpoint. Though it could be that the story was so lackluster that as a reader I was looking for more than what was presented. Allison’s perseverance to get to know Blue Summer more despite his attempts to dodge her inquisitions into his life holds throughout the entire story.

Though “An Arranged Marriage” is not one of my favorite Harlequin manga adaptations I do recommend for those seeking a quick mindless read, which after a busy day at work or school at times is much welcomed.

Reviews are subjective things. A reviewer is drawing on many things when they write their review. Besides technical things such as story structure, character development and art, a reviewers personal preferences and experiences can affect their feeling about a book. And sometimes, even their gender can make a difference as to whether a book gets a good score or bad. In the following discussions, reviewers Alex Hoffman and Lori Henderson will look at different books and examine the similarities and differences they have over each of them.

High School of the Dead Volume 1-3
Story by Daisuke Sato; Art by Shouji Sato
Publisher: Yen Press
Age Rating: Mature
Genre: Horror
Price: $13.99
ISBN: 978-0-316-13225-1/13239-8/13242-8

Lori: It’s been a while since we’ve been here, eh Alex? The holidays and RL hit me pretty hard. How did it go for you? Are you ready to get back to work?

Alex: The holidays and even the entire month of January has been crazy for me, but I am glad to get back to our talks about manga. Let’s get right down to it with a synopsis of the series.

High School of the Dead is the story of a zombie apocalypse. An outbreak occurs at the local high school, and the two main characters, Rei and Takashi have to survive the onslaught of the undead as the horde grows with every passing second. We have all seen the premise before, so I will spare the full details of the books, but Rei and Takashi team up with a group of resourceful students, including a sword-wielding upperclassman, a nurse, a self-proclaimed genius, and a gun otaku. While many zombie classics use the idea of zombies as a representative of the consumer vs the individual, I don’t think High School of the Dead has such high aspirations. What are your thoughts, Lori?

Lori: Really? There are zombie movies that have taken that stance? While I don’t see High School of the Dead leaning that way, and I wouldn’t argue that it’s aspirations are high, I do see some potential. This series is more about how flimsy the foundations of society are. In a mere twelve hours, not only does society break down, but in the name of survival, the main characters can go from civilized to savage. I find this commentary interesting not only for its implications on modern society, but also human nature itself. Are we just animals bound by society’s rules, or is there really something fundamentally different about the human race?

Alex: It’s an interesting argument, to be certain, and I would say that High School of the Dead could argue that society shackles the animal that is human, to some extent, but that there are those who can overcome their base desires to do what is right. I use the word could to explain what is going on here because I don’t think that is the intention of High School of the Dead as a work of fiction. I feel that High School of the Dead refuses to make any statements at all, actually. Instead of creating  substance to reflect on or debate, I feel that the series instead panders to a hormone-engorged hunger for battle and sex in its target reader base – the junior high and high school male.

Volume two is a great example of this: on one hand, we have this gritty, brutal violence, and all the politics of a world in crisis, with some really basic concept work on figures of authority, the idea that might makes right, and all the things that make martial law interesting for a 14-year old boy. Kill or be killed! Live by the power of your own hands, et cetera, which is to say, it’s all fairly mind-numbing machoism.

And served up as a side to our main course of machoism is as much T&A you can cram into 160 pages of comics. If there is a page without some form of perky breasts or long-shot images of one of the girl’s thighs or butt, I haven’t stumbled across it yet. Volume 2 contains 4-5 pages of full frontal nudity and “shower games” with all the girls in the series, and even when clothed, the artist makes sure that skirts and shirts rip at the appropriately sexy places.

The other thing that makes me feel as though this comic was written exclusively as a service to the egos of 14-year-old boys is the rampant sexism throughout the first three volumes. Even the most powerful female figure in the books is prone to saying things like “The man’s word is final” and “protecting a man’s honor is the very source of pride for a woman,” while she slices zombie heads off with a katana. Obviously, I find this disgusting.

Where stories like The Walking Dead are written to explore the ideas of crisis and survival amongst the most dangerous of enemies, they also can celebrate human life and dignity amongst the backdrop of that human crisis and ask deeper questions. High School of the Dead is content to roll in the muck of sexism, voyeurism, and violence.

Lori: It’s hard to argue many of your points, mainly because I agree with you completely, especially about the pandering and T&A. There is so much of it that it becomes overwhelming at times. I really wanted to disagree with you about the portrayal of females. On the surface they appear to be strong and independent, for the most part. All of them, save the nurse, take up weapons and get right into the fight. There aren’t any shrinking violets among them, who whine and hide behind the men. Even the scene you mention didn’t bother me, as I chalked it up to her being raised in a traditional household, where those values would be taught. Being a character from a well-known dojo, I would almost expect her to have that attitude. Though I will point out, even though she exposes about “protecting a man’s honor”, it’s still a woman doing the slicing.

But as I think about it more, there are small scenes that nag at me, but can be easily explained away. Is Rei really dependent on Takashi, or can it be that she’s still likes him, since they had gone out previously? I think it’s obviously Takashi still likes her. Saya does spend a lot of her time hiding behind Hirano, the gun otaku, but she’s more of a brains than brawn type, though she’ll fight when she has too. I can’t completely see these things as being sexist. I see a lot of it being natural reactions of characters thrown into an impossible situation. One thing that really did bother me was how it looked like this might turn into a harem story, with Saeko and Saya possibly starting to have feelings for Takashi as well. Rei makes sense. The other two not so much.

But I want to be an optimist and believe that there really is a story here, and all the pandering is just to get those 14-year-old boys who wouldn’t normally care about a story with social and political commentary to read it.

Alex: I do think you have a point when it comes to how all the female leads seem to be falling for our hero (or, maybe more appropriately, our reader stand-in). I think that this again is a good supporting point to my argument that the series is mostly designed to feed the ego of that 14-year old reader.

I don’t believe that High School of the Dead has a point (other than to titillate), but it certainly does have a story. The plot lines are fairly standard, but well executed. One section in the second volume that I think resonated with me the most is when Takashi sentences the thug with braces to an untimely demise. This is when we get a good dose of the “premise” of High School of the Dead, that, in the destruction of the normal society, those with power (i.e. mind control or weapons) will quickly make the new rules. This could be said to be the case in any catastrophic situation, such as a plague or bombing, but High School of the Dead explores this idea to a much greater extent than other manga in the same genre.

Lori: And it’s that potential that will keep me reading for at least another volume or two. I want to see if the story has the strength to keep a non-14-year-old, non-male reader engaged.This series has been such a strange one for me. I should be repelled by all the pandering and bloody violence, but instead, like a train wreck, I’m strangely drawn in. For every bath scene that pushes me away, there seems to be a scene such as the teens banding together to reaffirm their humanity and save a young girl. The scales are still balanced for now, and that merits the series at least a few more volumes before a final verdict from me.

Alex: And I think you can kind of assume where I stand with the series. While there are some small elements that could have made High School of the Dead an interesting read, overwhelmingly I feel it is one of the worst reads of the 2011 season.

Lori: And you are certainly not alone, and I would agree with you 100%. Maybe it’s my love of bad movies that makes this series easier for me to stomach. I have some of the worst movies ever made sitting proudly on my DVD shelf, so it shouldn’t be too surprising that I can keep reading really bad manga.

By Kazue Kato
Publisher: Viz Media
Age Rating: Older Teen
Genre: Supernatural/Action
Price: $9.99

I bought the first volume of this series on a whim at the VizManga.com webstore and read it on a combination of my iPad and iPhone and at first, was struck by how… terrible the first chapter was. I had read the first piece of the story and had attempted to give it up, when I read a review of the first volume from David Welsh, who praised the volume after he trudged through the first chapter, and decided to finish the first volume. After an abysmal first chapter, I was surprised at how great the story turned out to be. Blue Exorcist manages to turn itself around and get on its storytelling feet in a matter of pages, and it’s a change that makes this story go from cancelled in 10 chapters to a long-term success with its own anime.

One of the things I really enjoy about Blue Exorcist is its fully realized fictional world, something we don’t often see in shonen manga, where things are often made up on the spot, chapter by chapter – in the world of Blue Exorcist, there are two realms, Assiah, the human realm, and Gehenna, the demon realm. Exorcists protect Assiah from the influences of demons. The demons of Gehenna seem to have a sort of taxonomy that the author, Kato, has constructed that makes it much more cohesive. Our main character, Rin, wants to become an exorcist after his adoptive father, Shiro Fujimoto dies at the hands of Satan, the most powerful demon of Gehenna.

This is complicated by the fact that Rin is the son of Satan. Oddly, Rin has a twin brother, Yukio, who knows of Rin’s demonic nature before he does and vows to protect him by becoming an exorcist. At Shiro’s funeral Rin encounters another exorcist, Mephisto Pheles, who helps Rin enroll at the True Cross Academy, a school for exorcists. The relationship between Rin and Yukio adds an interesting twist to this otherwise straight-forward battle manga, where the protective and studious Yukio tries to prevent Rin from being consumed by his demonic powers.

As Rin joins the Academy to become an exorcist, the cast of supporting characters grows larger and we meet other students and teachers for Rin to interact with, and things get a bit sketchy when they all find out he is a son of Satan. This development is very organic – growth and trust in the students in the class leads to fear and misunderstanding of Rin’s purpose and background, and it’s very “Shonen Jump” but it’s a little softer, and less forced than other series that have pulled this trick before.

Another positive for this series is its fantastic artwork. Kato’s character designs remind me of D. Gray-man, a series written by another female Jump writer, Katsura Hoshino. Both of these ladies do fantastic work in illustration, and their backgrounds, settings, and landscapes transcend the traditional shonen aesthetic. Having a well-written storyline to go with the gorgeous illustration never hurts, and Kato moves at a pleasant clip, neither irritatingly slow nor blisteringly fast.

Overall, I think that Blue Exorcist is one of the sleeper hits of 2011. The series has a lot going for it – beautiful illustration, dynamic characters, and a slick fantasy world to let them play in. It’s a battle manga that transcends the battle manga ethic in a fun way.

With 2011 in the rear view mirror, the Villagers look back at some of the titles, publishers and events that made the past year good (or bad).

What was your favorite new title(s) of the year?

Connie: There are a lot of different titles, so picking, say, Lychee Light Club over Sakura Hime is tough, since I like them both, but one ran in Ribon (for little girls) and the other in Manga Erotics F.  Lychee Light Club was probably my favorite one-shot this year, a great and very shocking book full of violence and objectionable content, but with amazing art and a manic, intense plot.  Sakura Hime was probably my favorite general audience title, if general audience can mean people who read magical girl series.  I’m a fan of Arina Tanemura, and while I’m not an instant convert on all her books, Sakura Hime was quite good, and I’m enjoying the setting and mythological ties so far.

But my favorite title this year was probably Wandering Son.  I have a hard time talking about Wandering Son, because I feel anything I say won’t do the story enough justice.  It’s simply a nice, quiet book about pre-teen classmates exploring their gender identities, and beginning to question why they don’t fit in.  The age of the characters is the perfect place to start in a story like this, and I’m so happy to see that Shimura Takako handled the subject with such attention to detail and emotion.  I can’t wait to see where this story goes.

Alex: I think of all the titles that have come out this year, I have three that really stick in your craw, which has more and more become my definition of “favorite” when it comes to these end of the year type things. I could gush about manga series that I really enjoyed reading in this space, but I want to focus on the comics that really forced me to think – at the end of the day, these are the titles I will keep throughout my life.

While it may not have been the most pleasant read, Lychee Light Club was a stellar book that really forced me as the reader into places I didn’t want to be, and it did so with an unnatural grace and poise. It was terrifically, frantically destructive in its purpose, and managed to deliver on almost every front.

In contrast, Kaoru Mori’s A Bride’s Story was a fantastic, beautifully constructed slice-of-life story set in the 19th century Silk Road. Mori, a stickler for research and gorgeous, intricate drawing, shows off her skills as an illustrator as well as the consummate storyteller we know her to be in this series, and the books are gorgeous hardcovers. Yen Press has done a bang up job with this series, and I am looking forward to the next volume in 2012.

Finally, I would be ignoring a great gem of a series if I did not mention Wandering Son, the Fantagraphics hardcover written by Shimura Takako, and translated/edited by Matt Thorn. Thorn would only allow his name to be attached to a project like Wandering Son, and I think his attention to detail and activism for these comics has really done Fantagraphics a lot of credit. Shimura Takako is a name in manga that I hope becomes as widely popular as Fumi Yoshinaga and Naoki Urasawa – she has shown with just one volume of manga that she has what it takes to deliver a fantastic story.

Justin: A Bride’s Story is one of the few new series I’ve enjoyed. It is so effervescent and honest and engaging, it really has come to sit in a rare pantheon of titles that I recommend without hesitation to anyone interested at all in the least in any form of comics. There’s more to be said about this in the digital section, but I was so happy to see Taiyo Matsumoto’s epic No. 5 released in English in full. I’ve also liked Drops of God and No Longer Human, from Vertical. Meanwhile, my daughter has had her mind blown by Sailor Moon.

John: The new MPD-Psycho volume made my year.

Lori: I was surprised by some of the new titles I enjoyed this year. Sakura Hime really surprised me, especially since I had yet to find a Tanemura title that I liked. Psyren is one of the few shonen titles I’m enjoying right now. It and One Piece are the only titles I really look forward to in Shonen Jump anymore. Kodansha had a good line up with their new titles. I liked Monster Hunter Orage and Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex more than I probably should have, but they were fun reads and that’s what really matters to me. My biggest shock though was two Vertical titles that I was sure I wouldn’t like. Book of Human Insects and No Longer Human were two titles I wasn’t going to read, but did anyway, and they were both very compelling reads.

What title(s) are you going to miss most that ended?

Connie: I’m almost ashamed to admit that I looked forward to Detroit Metal City as much as I did.  Every volume was basically the same jokes over and over again, but it made me laugh every time, which probably makes me a bad person.  I’ll miss it’s filthy mouth quite a bit.

I’ll miss Black Jack quite a bit, too.  I’m a big fan of Tezuka, and the bimonthly dose of crazy that Black Jack has been delivering for the last few years is something I’m going to miss.  Where else can I read stories about someone delivering a baby on a rickety raft during a flash flood via C-section in the same volume with a story about euthanasia?

John: Black Jack is an ambitious long series that I am sad to see end. Although it isn’t as heady as some of Tezuka’s other works, it isn’t as heady as some of Tezuka’s other works.

Justin: As a series, Black Jack is that one highbrow pulp entertainment I’m going to have trouble replacing. The big losses, of course, aren’t titles so much as the big blows to the industry: the collapse of Tokyopop and Borders. It’s hard for me to talk about what I’ll miss from 2011, because this has been a rough year – it seems like much of the manga I read was suspended, cancelled, or ended in 2010.

Lori: I liked Black Jack, but I won’t miss it as much. It’s going to be hard to replace Full Metal Alchemist. It’s a title that’s been with me since 2006, and while it’s gratifying to finally see it’s conclusion, it’s also a title I don’t want to say goodbye to. I loved the characters, the world, everything about it so much! It’s a hard series to say goodbye to. Another series I’m sad I’ll never see the end of is Secret Notes of Lady Kanoko. A title that was cut off in it’s prime by Tokyopop’s sudden demise, it will sit sadly unfinished on my shelf for years to come.

Any titles you won’t miss?

Connie:  I finally, finally gave up on Bleach this year.  Good riddance!  I’m tired of eternal fight scenes with a thousand characters I couldn’t care less about.

Justin: I don’t know that they’re ended, but I’m glad there hasn’t been the huge response to Yen’s YA novel adaptations that I feared. I’d much rather see more manhwa from them.

Who did digital manga right in 2011?

Connie: DMP and eManga.com!  Honestly, I’m not that interested in digital formats, and don’t read them unless I have to, but from a content perspective, as a fan of romance and BL manga eManga gets my vote.  I’ve had a lot of fun with that site this year.  I was reading a good number of the Harlequin manga earlier in the year, before the price went up, and I’ve been consuming the DMG BL series quite frequently lately, despite the high price tags.  I also like how regularly their new content comes out, and how easy the site is to navigate.  I do like the variety of content on Jmanga.com, but I find that new releases for things I want to read are infrequent, and the site isn’t as friendly as eManga.com.  I’m also still a big fan of Netcomics.com, who recently started digital releases of Korean romance comics again a few months ago.  I’m happy to see Full House come back!

I haven’t tried a lot of other publishers platforms, just because I’d rather not read digital versions of stuff I can get in book form, but I do like that digital offers a cheap alternative to titles that might not be feasible in a print format, and I’m curious to see if more publishers take that route in the future.

Justin: I think digital is the one place where you don’t end up sampling across the board as much as you do in-store. I pretty much stuck to Viz’s output and a smattering of other works. I really like their sigikki page. One of the most fascinating things for me was to see the No. 5 app that Matsumoto released. Not only is it gorgeous, but I’m fascinated by the idea of an individual artist releasing work to an international audience. I don’t see this as supplanting publishers, so much as a way to deliver quirky, personal, and more niche material directly into the hands of an audience hungry for it, without a publisher risking money to print it.

Lori: Until manga is available on all platforms freely and without restriction, I don’t think anyone is really doing it right, but of all the publishers, I think Viz comes the closest. They have put a lot of effort into getting manga into the most hands. They have a wide selection across their catalog and are always adding more volumes and titles. If they made their manga available offline for everyone, they would be prefect! I would give DMP and emanga.com a close second except I don’t read BL, so their extensive catalog is mostly useless to me. Jmanga has a lot of potential, and I think the coming year will be a make or break for them. If they keep their prices down and actually add to their catalog, they could give Viz a run for it’s money in the selection department.

What titles are you looking forward to in 2012?

Connie:  Usually I look forward to the Tezuka that Vertical releases regularly, but this year I’m a little disappointed since it’s a series that was previously released by Viz.  A Message to Adolf is still one of my favorites though, and very much worth reading.  I am happy it’s being made available to an audience who isn’t as insane as I am about tracking down out of print books.  I am really looking forward to Sakuran by Moyoco Anno, also coming from Vertical this year.  It’s a beautiful one-shot, both art and story-wise, and I can’t wait to read it in English.

Also, I’m a little ashamed to admit how excited I am about Viz’s new BL line.  There’s quite a few titles coming out from SuBLime that I’m looking forward to, including titles from You Higashino and Toko Kawai.

Lori: 2012 is already shaping up to be a good year. Seven Seas and Yen Press will be getting more of my money this year with Young Miss Holmes, Witch Hunter and Lizzie Newton from Seven Seas and Soulless, Until Death Do Us Part, and the Alice in the Country of… from Yen Press are all titles I’ll be checking out. I can sate by pretty-boy hunger with Starry Sky from DMP, and I’m looking forward to Vertical’s Sakuran.

Winners and/or Losers of 2011? (Publishers, successes/failures of year, etc.)

Connie: One of the stories that I think had the most potential was the DMP Kickstarter drive to fund the reprinting of Swallowing the Earth.  I was happy to see that it was successful, and I am eager about the possibilities that print-on-demand on that scale opens up to other publishers.  I heard rumors that such a drive might be questionable license-wise, but seeing what fans want and will actually put up money for themselves opens the door for quite a few titles that might not see print otherwise.  In addition to reprints, I’d love to see it work towards getting something like, say, niche classic material published in English.  But then again, I don’t know how that works.

Justin: I’ll talk a little about Tokyopop: they were never a great company, but they were a good publisher. And some of their greatest achievements occurred despite themselves, but it’s a big loss to the manga market, as well as a great loss to many a OEL artist. Where would James Stokoe (King City), Svetlana Chmakova (Nightschool), Felipe Smith (Peepo Choo) or even somebody who’s found success outside comics like Eric Wight (Frankie Pickle) be without Tokyopop?  Also Kodansha looks to be a big winner, having picked up where Del Rey left off, and rereleasing Sailor Moon to the market. If anybody has a question about whether or not there’s any demand for it, just ask my 8-year-old daughter, who’s never seen or heard of SM before, and absolutely loves it.

Lori: The biggest loser this year as I see it was Tokyopop. They shut down just as they were putting out titles that could make them relevent again, disappointing their legions of fans, and then come back a few months later to tease them with a “well, maybe we’ll start publishing again…” They’re like an abusive boyfriend who beats you and then comes back trying to say they didn’t mean it. An epic fail in my book. My winner will have to be a tie between Kodansha and Vertical. Everyone had doubts about Kodansha but they came out strong, releasing good titles and on a timely basis. If they updated their website more often and had a good presence on Twitter, they could have taken it all! Vertical had some really strong titles come and go this year. Their continued strategy as a boutique publisher that cherry picks their titles really paid off this year, and next year is looking just as strong.