A manga about a man who failed to become a professional shogi player who begins playing again in hopes of achieving his dreams.
I’m a fan of various shogi manga, such as 81 Diver and March Comes in like a Lion, and this new one is becoming a quick favorite. The setup is very much an comeback story with the protagonist remembering his love of the game and realizing his own lost potential. It’s an easily enjoyed tale because the main character is very positive and likable as well.
A manga about a tomboy who wishes her childhood friend would see her as a girl and not his best friend.
This is a cute and funny series. I feel like comedic timing always shines with 4-panel style manga because of the format. Both Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun and Tsuredure Children, that also use 4-panel style, are equally hilarious.
A manga where a hero who saved the world from the Demon Lord is reincarnated into modern Japan and must now travel back to his original world to defeat the evil once more.
I checked out this series because I wanted to see Haruto Umezawa’s take on the fantasy genre but I think he should’ve stuck to his usual slice of life stuff. On all counts it was unremarkable besides the fact that the hero’s weapon was a shield. Not surprising to see that it’s only 2 volumes long.
If you want to check out a Haruto Umezawa series I really liked Countach so check that out.
A manga about a transfer student who is so clumsy that he destroys everything he touches.
It’s pretty funny that this series is like an exact opposite of Haven’t You Heard? I’m Sakamoto. While Sakamoto makes everything he touches into something elegant, Takakura can’t even hold chalk without it crumbling to pieces.
The problem here is that in comparison, I feel like Haven’t You Heard? I’m Sakamoto does this gimmick way better with it’s jokes along with making some good characterization for it’s side characters.
A manga about an office lady who loves to eat food while mountain climbing.
Love the mix of food with an outdoor activity. I seems like hiking/climbing has been a booming genre for manga in the last 5 years with titles like this one.
I’m always up for good food manga and definitely recommend this one for it’s nice art and lovely meals.
A comedy manga about the stupid problems that a genius pilot in an interstellar space war struggles with on a daily basis.
This series falls into a category I like to call “serious comedy”. It’s where the characters are being 100% serious about their problems but from the reader’s perspective it comes off as lunacy and thus hilarious.
While I enjoyed the mix of everyday problems into the world of sci-fi mecha battles I got pretty bored with this series after the first volume. It felt like the gimmick wore out too quickly for my tastes.
221 – Guest Gaiden 3 – Interpreting with Jocelyne Allen
This week translator extraordinaire Jocelyne Allen returns to answer our questions about working as an interpreter and how it differs from translating books!
A manga about a young idealistic doctor who must battle against the harsh realities of the current medical system of Japan.
I love Shuho Sato’s Tokkou no Shima and always wanted to read this one. We checked out volume 1 for a recent episode. This book really shows how much Sato has improved his artwork as this earlier work is more rough around the edges. The subject matter seems pretty standard fare for any medical based drama but I did like the main struggle of the protagonist as he clumsily tries to fight against the modern medical machine.
You can read the entire series for free in English on Sato’s website Manga on Web by clicking here. Warning, the site is only in Japanese.
A manga about a group of young adults trying to survive on a remote island ruled by vampires and hidieous monsters.
I personally love Higanjima but this series is not perfect by any means. First of all, the story doesn’t even start getting interesting until around volume 10. It’s asking a lot of a reader to trudge through a generic and mediocre for that long before you get to the good stuff.
Second, Koji Matsumoto is really terrible at drawing character faces. If you look closely, you can see that almost every character has the same face because he’s incapable of drawing them differently and it actually becomes worse the longer the series lasts.
Lastly, the grotesque designs of the monsters range from original to borderline stupid. There’s a lot of vile sexual violence thrown in there to boot and Matsumoto really seems like he’s leaning into trying to shock and awe the reader. Since the franchise has been serialized for so long and now entered it’s third run I feel like Matsumoto himself is struggling to up the ante now.
That said, there is something unique with the monsters and bad artwork in this book that continues to keeps my interest, along with it’s many fans.
A manga about a shut-in who’s teleported to a fantasy world by selfish goddess who promptly discards him for being weak. He swears revenge and beings his quest to return to his home world by making a pact with another goddess for the power of the “God’s eye”.
It’s another typical isekai manga based on a light novel so it’s filled with typical male empowerment fantasies of female harems and ridiculously overpowered abilities. I will say that making the weapon of choice a log is both stupid and hilarious in a way almost made me wonder if the author is poking fun at a lot of fantasy light novel tropes. However everything else about this is pretty standard so I doubt that.
