If you’re reading your manga one volume at a time, you’re getting the story, but you might be missing some of the art: most translated manga is published in paperback, with black and white interiors, in a standard 5-inch by 7-inch format. In Japan, manga is serialized in larger-format magazines that often include color pages. […]
It’s no mystery why so many novels are about novelists, as the old adage “write what you know” becomes a self-devouring ouroboros. So too do some of the most entertaining manga-ka take themselves as a subject, creating works that provide an inside look at their lives and the workings of the manga industry. It’s not too surprising: If the […]
Even the most dedicated manga fan can feel weak at the knees at the prospect of plunging into a 70-volume series (or even a relatively trim 20-volume one), and forget trying to convince someone unfamiliar with the medium to dive right into the deep end. Not all manga is interminable, however: many manga-ka can tell a […]
No doubt about it, this was a great year for manga, with the return of some classic older series and the debut of some fascinating new ones. While I was thinking about the best new series of 2015, I was looking for stories that push the boundaries of the standard genres—or step outside them altogether. […]