There’s some fascinating discussion of manga in libraries going on over at Love Manga. (Brigid at MangaBlog was the first to spot the news item in question, and offered her own insights.) David Taylor pretty much says it all:
“Already my mood is blackening, I do not need to see another story where some wily kid manages to get their hands on material not suitable for them.”
It’s a twisty issue, as demonstrated by the thoughtful comments following David’s post.
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I love it when a plan comes together. The inimitable Dr. Scott at Polite Dissent is going to take an in-depth look at Naoki Urasawa’s Monster (Viz Signature), a psychological, neurological thriller.
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The highlight of the weekend’s manga reading was the third and final volume of Chikyu Misaki (CMX). I really enjoyed the first two installments, and the conclusion is just as good. Don’t let the super-cute covers fool you: this is a smart, complex mystery-adventure with lots to say about good and evil and the vast gray area in between. (The occasional use of vertical lettering is annoying, I admit, but it’s worth enduring for a story this satisfying.)
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In this week’s Flipped, I gush shamelessly over Fanfare/Ponent Mon’s Japan as Viewed by 17 Creators. There’s some breathtaking work on display in this anthology from some of the finest creators from the worlds of nouvelle manga and bandes dessinées. Jog wrote a wonderful review of it here.
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Absolutely unrelated to anything else in this post, but does anyone out there like onion dip? Because I made the most awesome onion dip in the world over the weekend from this recipe, and I can’t recommend it highly enough. (A warning: just reading the recipe is enough to raise your cholesterol levels, so proceed with caution.)