#wish there had been a pop up about the suspension there wasnt anything eyecatching on the site at all yesterday 😭

[jariten]

Roundup-Catch up: August 2024!!

Let's catch up! Looking back at my list of August reads my head spins a bit. Most of this year I got way too eager picking up series from my shelf or the library and was juggling maybe 5 series at once. Which did a huge disservice to the reading experience for some of those series as I wasn't giving them my full attention. It wasn't until August I managed to wrap up most of them and enter the more focused way of following or reading through a series that I had previously. But in the frenzy I still had some great reads.

I had always heard whispers of No Longer Heroine by Momoko Koda but I'd never crossed paths with it. But when the english run of My Love Mix-up ended I had a huge contemporary High School Romance shaped hole in my heart and this is one of the titles that's filled it (I will get to the rest). I love mess, I love stories of teenagers learning to navigate the minefield that is human relationships so I can be the opposite of nostalgic for a time that, praise be, I will never have to relive. But I also read titles like this wondering how a constructive conversation around it could be had among young readers who from my experience can come off very frustrated and unsympathetic to the type of drama it depicts where the heroine and hero's feelings and decisions are extremely irrational and reckless. I really like the Yen Press, but as a license acquisition it feels kinda random? And in my honest opinion if you're 10 years late to a title you kinda have to make it an omnibus or collectors edition because waiting for individual volumes for, again, an over 10 year old series is pretty frustrating. But I will stick around to the end.

Yumiko Ōshima's Sava series was one of my favorites of 2022. The way she captures me with stories where honestly "nothing" really "happens" just floored me and made me optimistic for Goo Goo Datte Neko de Aru. A diary comic that begins with the passing of the cat Sava and her purchase of the cat Goo Goo (Short for Good Good). But Goo Goo isn't the only cat that enters her life. In rather rapid succession stray kittens begin entering her life. We follow for over a decade her journey rescuing, rehoming, and caretaking of countless stray cats (the latter to the dismay of her neighbours). Reading it today it highlights the challenges of clashing attitudes over stray cats and how these populations should be taken care of if at all. Famously it is also a chronicle of her cancer survival journey but its a rather short part of the whole but nonetheless maintains the Ōshima charm.

I want to make a gift recommendation for the upcoming holiday season: Your Letter by Hyeon A Cho. While I've had some really really good encounters with Korean Manhwa, Webtoons is still a world unknown to me. I think the Ize Press initiative bringing Webtoons to print in english is extremely cool, but the lineup just hasn't had any titles that caught my eye. Until Your Letter. A 10 chapter single volume story that I liked so much for its artistic presentation and the story it was telling about bullying and finding your place in a new environment that I immediately was overcome with the need to pass it along, which I did. Really think it would make a great gift for anyone 5th grade and up who are interested in comics. OR it can be read for free in its entirety on Webtoon!

Satou Gashi no Ie by Kyoko Fumizuki was a title picked up a bit at random. I'd gotten a taste of her work in the Suki Desu, Kono Shoujo Manga anthology and was one of the more memorable entries in an already extremely well curated collection. Satou Gashi no Ie is a 5 story one-shot collection with to meeee back to back hits. The titular story centres on a teenage boy named Richard who suddenly appears at his childhood's friend Elsie's school with a baby in his arms, that he claims to be his, and that he's a widower. But there are too many holes in his story. Who exactly is the baby's mother and how did he come to care for her at the end of her life? And how does this change Richard and Elsie's relationship? There's a warmth to Fumizuki's artistry in this era and the way that she hits all the story beats that really drew me in and augh I honestly have no words for it. This collection really stood out and among her peers I've yet to read anyone who could compose manga exactly like this. And you know what's cool? You can (In Japanese) read this and a handful of her other work from the same era for FREE on Manga Library Z!! (JP only) NOTE: crazy enough, on this very day (Nov 26) Manga Library Z suspended services but diligent users of nyaa have made sure that the works available there live on