Posts Tagged ‘manga’
not only was yesterday National Buy a Book Day, but I also had it as a vacation day from work. Which meant hubby and I had plenty of time to make it to two bookstores and the library before realizing that maybe we had indeed picked up enough books to hold us for a little while. sleeping in + buying tons of books? Sounds like the perfect day to me!
here’s what we got:
Diviner, by Melanie Rawn – looks like an epic fantasy that doesn’t take place in fantasy-Europe. Sign me up!
Fool Moon, by Jim Butcher – hubby really liked the first book, and i’m interested in reading more in this famous serious too.
Embassytown, by China Mieville – one of my favorites is finally in paperback! I’d hoped Embassytown would take the Hugo for best novel, but alas it wasn’t to be.
The lifecycle of manga objects
Posted on: April 16, 2012
I don’t always read manga, but when I do, it’s usually Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa. I got my first taste of this way back in the early 2000’s, and I’ve been following it ever since.
Ten years and 27 volumes later, two anime series, a movie and more t-shirts and fake tattoos than I want to think about, my journey with the Elric Brothers has come to an end. Nearly my entire adult life, a small part of my mind has constantly been revolving around this series: waiting for the next issue, getting frustrated when the story moved too fast or too slow, masochistically smiling when every issue ended in a cliffhanger and I had to wait 6 months (at least!) for the next one, my shifting character crushes, losing my squeamishness towards prosthetics and amputation, etc. And unlike the jerk at the grocery store who insisted on telling me what happens at the end even though I asked him not to, this post has no spoilers. Just lots and lots of background.
More than you ever wanted to know about:
The Story
Once upon a time, there were two brothers, the elder named Edward and the younger named Alphonse. They lived with their mother and were happy. Sometimes she got this sad look on her face, especially when she thought about their father, who had abandoned them. The two brothers would do anything to make their mother smile. They studied the alchemy book their father left behind, using their new found science based magic to fix things around the house, make new toys, and make their mother smile. Alchemical transmutation was so easy, all you needed was the parts of the whole – a broken toy, a bowl of sand, a lump of metal, and you could make anything of equal element and mass – a fixed toy, a piece of glass, a new frying pan.
And then she got sick. And when she died, the brothers blamed her illness on their absent father. If only he had been there, they could have afforded a better doctor. If only he had been there, her sadness and loneliness wouldn’t have led to illness. In the alchemy books of their father was the secret and dangerous answer. Human transmutation: take all the elements and pieces of a human body, salt and carbon and phosphorus and blood and water and everything else, and transmute the pieces into the whole. Bring their mother back, see her smile again.
But there is a reason human transmutation is forbidden, a reason it is hidden in code words and secret symbols in the alchemy texts. Edward and Alphonse were too naive to realize why it should never be attempted. I won’t go into the details of the disaster, but the alchemical accident left Edward missing an arm and a leg, and left Alphonse as nothing but a soul attached by blood rune to a suit of armor.
The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, by Ranmaru Kotone
published in 2009
where I got it: purchased new
why I read it: loved the movie
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Makoto is a relatively normal high school girl, she gets decent grades, she helps her Mom and her Aunty, she hangs out with her friends after school. Too bad she’s got the worst sense of timing ever. She burns food in cooking class and does badly on an exam because she can’t figure out how much time is remaining to finish the questions.
while helping to clean up a classroom one afternoon, she thinks she sees a flash of light in the next room. But of course, it was nothing. On the way home, she loses control of her bicycle and falls into the path of an oncoming train.
And then wakes up as if nothing happened.
Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad
Posted on: July 3, 2011
I’d gotten interested in the Anime BECK for one reason: the anime was directed by Osamu Kobayashi, who also directed my favorite anime series ever: Paradise Kiss. Yes, Paradise Kiss was a manga first (reviewed here), created Ai Yazawa, and it was her characters plus Kobayashi’s graphic detail style that made the Paradise Kiss anime better than anyone could have expected. Kobayashi has this habit of putting in buckets of detail at the right moments, things like funny bumper stickers on cars, funny t-shirts, unexpected sound effects, and excellent intro and end credit sequences.
confused? don’t be. Just know that if Osamu Kobayashi has anything to do with it, I want to see it.
Thus, BECK went on the netflix queue, with me knowing nothing about it except it’s about a bunch of high schoolers who start a band, and it’s directed by Kobayashi. Just for kicks, I got the first few manga (known as Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad) out of the library as well.
A coming of age story in a working class town, Beck stars Koyuke, a bored and uninspired 14 year old. Not the best student in the world, the only thing Koyuke likes about school is that he gets to talk to the girl he has a crush on, Izumi. Most of these interactions go horribly wrong, thanks to Koyuke’s buddy Tanabe, who doesn’t understand that peeping at girls at swim practice isn’t a great way to make friends with them. Hilariously awkward, to say the least. Koyuke and Tanabe’s after school activities tend to be hitting up the arcade and avoiding the bullies who hang out in the rough neighborhoods around the school. and Koyuke can never seem to avoid the bullies, both on school property and off.
So many Japanese stories starring teenagers focus on their obsession on getting into a good college and exams and grades and such. Not this one. it was quite refreshing.
The manga for foodies
Posted on: June 9, 2011
- In: food | Manga | Manga/Graphic Novels
- 6 Comments
Time for something completely different! Work has been nuts lately, so I read something quick and easy. it had lots of pictures.
Oishinbo, volume 1, by Tetsu Kariya and Akira Hanasaki
Where did I get it: the library
I’d been hearing about this title for a while “The manga that’s all about food!”, “a bestseller in Japan!”, “everybody is reading this!”, so when I saw it at the library, of course I had to get it. The title, Oishinbo, means Gourmet, so this had to be for a food lover like me!
The first few pages of Oishinbo are character profiles, and with a large cast, you will want to take the time to read these. The main characters are Yamaoto Shiro, a young man who was trained in the traditional culinary arts and now works at a news agency, and his father Kaibara, one of the city’s foremost experts in traditional cooking techniques.Yamaoto had originally trained at his fathers school, but the two had a falling out and are now barely on speaking terms. The rest of the cast is rounded out by Yamaoto’s friends and co-workers, and Kaibara’s business associates.
Yamaoto’s newspaper is working on an “Ultimate Menu”, and each chapter in Oishinbo covers a different aspect of traditional Japanese cooking from Dashi, the chopsticks, to the basics of sushi, to knife use and treatment to tea ceremony to the connection between environment and meal enjoyment. This isn’t so much a plot centered story as it is a discussion of the beauty of Japanese food culture. The food culture and culinary traditions of Japan focus around presentation, and the time, energy, and love that went into creating and preparing the food, the utensils used to eat it, the plates it is served on, even the environment it is served in.
I can’t believe it’s the end of November!! When did that happen?
It happened sometime after we talked about over 20 graphic novel and manga series here on the Little Red. twenty series? more than 25 posts? Personally, I think that’s pretty cool. And it sure blew up the words “manga” and “graphic novel” in my word cloud. I wonder how long it’ll take everything else to catch up.
Does that mean this is the end of graphic novels and manga here on Little Red? Hell to the no! Thanks to discussing graphic novels with other bloggers, I’ve got copies of Maus II, Blankets, Persepolis and a bucket of other goodies screaming READ ME!! And they will be read! I’ve got more Phil Foglio and Ai Yazawa to publicly drool over! I’m just not going to torture you with it every day. Links to discussions of graphic novels, comics, manga, and all things visual will always be able to be found under the Manga/Graphic Novels tab at the top of the page.
As much as I love graphic novels and all their iterations . . . I am very excited to back to the business of novels. scifi, fantasy, steampunk, weird stuff, speculative stuff, more weird stuff. You know, the good stuff. Reading a quicky graphic novel nearly every day in November actually freed me up to read more speculative fiction, so I’ve got some treats lined up for you! In the next week or so you can look forward to reviews of novels by Lavie Tidhar, Joe Abercrombie, George R R Martin, Mary Doria Russell, Ursula K LeGuin and more.
December is gonna be an awesome month.
How about you?
What did you think of Graphic Novel November? success? epic fail? somewhere in the middle?
What reading goodies have you got on deck for December?
At first glance, I wasn’t sure what to make of Masahiro Totsuka’s Bamboo Blade. An abnoxious, impulsive, selfish Kendo coach? A diminutive high school girl who beats up bullies? Slapstick comedy? Sports?
Was this going to work for me? Talk about genre mixing!
Welcome to the manga genre called “Slice of Life”. We do it in American comics and literature too, but maybe not to the same extent. Slice of Life manga usually follow the day to day lives of young adults. Sometimes there is comedy, sometimes drama, sometimes relationships, sometimes all or none of the above. They are typically modern day pieces, with emphasis on everyday Japanese culture. Slice of Life stories push the boundaries of shonen (manga designed for a male audience) and shojo (manga designed for a female audience), and are often appreciated by a wider audience.
When Kojiro was high school, he was a Kendo star (Kendo is a Japanese sport, somewhat similar to fencing. The sword is made of bamboo. Kendo is very popular with young adults). These days, he barely makes ends meet as a high school teacher. He runs the laxest after school Kendo club in the country, lives on instant Ramen, and dreams of his glory days. The members of the club barely show up, and when they do, they are usually beaten up by the two school bullies, who are also in the Kendo club. Sounds a little serious, but this is pretty much a slapstick comedy.
We can’t finish out Graphic Novel November without a traditional historical Samurai tale. Ok, so maybe Blade of the Immortal isn’t super traditional. Or very historical. But it is damn good.
Manji has a problem. He can’t die. Infected with bloodworms, he recovers from injuries nearly instantly. After years of mayhem, and thieving, Manji finds himself directly responsible for his brother-in-law’s death. His little sister loses her mind in grief, and Manji vows to take care of her. When she is killed, Manji vows the only way to make up for having killed one hundred “good guys” is to kill one thousand “bad guys”, starting with the gang members responsible for killing his sister. Once he has killed one thousand bad guys, Manji will finally be able to die in peace.
But how to tell the good guys from the bad guys? Everyone suddenly wants to hire the bodyguard who can’t be killed, and Manji turns everyone away. Eventually he is approached by Rin. Rin was only fourteen when her swordsmaster father was killed right in front of her by the members of a rival dojo. She wants revenge and is a pretty good swordswoman herself, but even Manji can tell she’s no match for highway bandits that prowl the countryside. He agrees to help her, joking the whole time that he needs to protect her so she’s in good shape to sell to a Geisha house later.
This review only covers the first 6 or 8 volumes of Deathnote, because that’s how far I have read.
Light Yagami is a normal high school student with a normal life. His father is the chief of police , his little sister drives him nuts, and he’s worried about exams. Depressed by what he sees as a rise in corruption and crime, he idealistically wishes he could something about it, and that something should be done about it.
Meanwhile, in the spirit world, Ryuk realizes his deathnote is missing. He must have left it on earth last time he was there! If a human touches the notebook, Ryuk won’t be able to get it back until the human dies or voluntarily gives it back! If the other Shinigami in the spirit world find out he’s lost another notebook, he’ll really be a laughing stock! Ryuk decides it’s time for an extended vacation in the human world. (Shinigami are death spirits who gain strength from the deaths of the living, be it a natural death or not)
And who should find the notebook but Light? In the manga, each chapter starts with another “Rule” of the Deathnote. Early on, we learn if you write someone’s name in there and a time of death, that’s when they will die. You also have to know what the person looks like, and you can add in other details as well, such as how they die. Ryuk tells Light much of what the Deathnote can and not do, and although Light keeps waiting for Ryuk to be all judgmental, Ryuk just says he’s there to watch, to see what will happen. Light immediately pays much more attention to the local and national news. Someone arrested for some horrific crime and the person’s photo is shown on tv? They mysteriously die of a heart attack in jail.
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