MICHELLE: Welcome to the November edition of Let's Get Visual, a monthly column in which Manga Bookshelf's MJ and I attempt to improve our understanding of manga art! We don't have any particular theme this month, but that hasn't stopped us from assembling some interesting pages to talk about! MJ has chosen a two-page spread from the fourth volume of Children of the Sea, … [Read more...] about Let’s Get Visual: Of Sakura and the Sea
TOKYOPOP
BLAME! 1-10 by Tsutomu Nihei: B+
While I do my best to appreciate manga art, I generally do not choose to read a particular series solely because of it. The exception to this is BLAME!, a ten-volume series by Tsutomu Nihei that boasts “an endless labyrinth of cyberdungeons filled with concrete and steel.” Thinking that sounded pretty durn awesome, and prepared to encounter an occasionally incomprehensible … [Read more...] about BLAME! 1-10 by Tsutomu Nihei: B+
Maid Sama! 1-4 by Hiro Fujiwara: B
When I started reading Maid Sama!, it was with the goal of catching up on the series so that I could cover the review copies I received of volumes five and six. I planned to give my personal copies of volumes one and two—as far as I ever got in actually buying the series—to my (awesome) local library when finished. Volume one went into the to-donate box as planned, but … [Read more...] about Maid Sama! 1-4 by Hiro Fujiwara: B
The Dreaming Collection by Queenie Chan: B+
From the back cover: Where dreams turn into living nightmares... Behind the gates of the exclusive Australian boarding school, Greenwich Private College, wait beautiful Victorian architecture, an excellent education, and a terrible secret: students have been known to wander into the surrounding bushlands and vanish... without a trace! Mysterious forces are at work, and as the … [Read more...] about The Dreaming Collection by Queenie Chan: B+
Planetes 1-3 by Makoto Yukimura: B+
Planetes is the story of Hachirota Hoshino, dubbed “Hachimaki” by his crewmates for his propensity to wear a headband (hachimaki), who dreams of earning enough fame and fortune to buy his own spaceship and achieve complete freedom. As the series begins, however, he’s part of a crew of “extraplanetary sanitation workers” who clean up space debris. The first volume introduces … [Read more...] about Planetes 1-3 by Makoto Yukimura: B+