So what’s coming out this week? I’m glad you asked!

Slave Labor Graphics offers the fourth issue of Andi Watson and Simon Gane’s Paris, which has been a real treat. The Pulse has a preview here.

Speaking of treats, Oni delivers the fifth issue of Ted Naifeh’s absolutely delightful Polly and the Pirates. It reads awfully well in chapters, but I suspect it will be just as much fun in collected form.

Not being a big fan of stories where powerful women get brutalized by creepy nebbishes, I wasn’t all that crazy about the last issue of X-Factor (Marvel). We’ll see if Peter David can turn it around this month. It’s looking like a Layla Miller-centric issue, and she’s my second-favorite character after M, so that’s promising.

For the morbidly curious, Tokyopop answers the hypothetical question I don’t recall anyone asking: What if Chuck Austen wrote manga? The cover of the first volume of Boys of Summer suggests a sensitive examination of the character-building power of sport in a young person’s life. And bikinis. Woooo!

I already got my copy of Shinsuke Tanaka’s Wings from Amazon, but it arrives in comics shops tomorrow. I really enjoyed this sweet, beautifully drawn book.

Svetlana Mintcheva, director of the Arts Program of the National Coalition Against Censorship, has written a letter to the San Bernadino County official who ordered the removal of Paul Gravett’s Manga: Sixty Years of Japanese Comics from local libraries. ICv2 posted the letter here. This is my favorite passage:

“The book is now unavailable to all readers, including adults. Whatever arguments might be advanced to justify denying minors access to non-obscene sexual content are inadequate to deny adults access to legal materials. As the Supreme Court has repeated on numerous occasions, ‘The level of discourse reaching a mailbox simply cannot be limited to that which would be suitable for a sandbox.’”

And over at Publishers Weekly (registration required, though hopefully it will appear in this week’s PWCW), Calvin Reid reports that there’s some admirable collaboration of like-minded organizations underway:

“Mintcheva said the NCAC is collaborating with the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and the American Library Association to create a brochure offering guidelines for librarians to build comics and graphic novel collections and to deal with censorship issues. The brochure is almost complete, she said, and will include illustrations by top comics artists like Phoebe Gloeckner, whose A Child’s Life and Other Stories has been censored by some libraries.”

This sounds like a terrific resource.

(Thanks to Gina Gagliano for pointing these out to me. Can someone convince her to blog?)

Tom Spurgeon has a meaty, marvelous interview with Mark Siegel of :01 Books at Comics Reporter. It’s the first of two; the second will follow the launch of :01’s first wave of books at the end of this month. I really agree with this bit from the introduction:

“I think people are hopeful First Second’s experiment works, not just because the books are of a high quality, but because First Second’s success would say something wonderful about the audience for comics for everyone.”

I would count myself as one of those hopeful people. I’m even more in that camp after reading about Siegel’s experiences thus far and, in particular, his view of the potentially beneficial role of a good editor in the creative process:

“But there’s so much stuff that’s produced both here and in Europe where you get incredible artistry, brilliant characters, a totally dazzling premise, and then halfway through the story kind of falls apart. That’s the kind of stuff where a novelist would expect a good editor to ask tough questions and have that fine balance of how not to meddle with someone’s vision and be there coaching alongside, and sometimes being unpopular. In the second draft you might be the most hated person in their life, but you’re going, ‘Hang on, this relationship arc disappears halfway through the story. What about this?’ It’s not the same with everybody. Some people take to that, and some people really, really want to be left alone.”

I think the common perception of a comics editor is as continuity cop. Siegel’s take sounds like more of a case where an editor is a creative partner, not really guiding the artist’s work but maybe helping them mold it.

Anyway, the interview is great, and there are lots of little nuggets about future projects, creators who have signed on with :01, and plenty of insights from both Siegel and Spurgeon.

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Another fun interview comes from Lyle (Crocodile Caucus) Masaki, who talks to Mark Andreyko over at Prism Comics. Andreyko, creator of the latest (and most interesting, in my opinion) version of DC’s Manhunter character, talks about where the book is headed, the office politics of killing villains, and just why it took Obsidian so long to come out of the closet. Fun stuff, and it makes me wish DC would pick up speed on releasing Manhunter trades.

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In today’s Flipped, I take a look at the Manga: Sixty Years of Japanese Comics controversy.

I can’t quite figure out Erik Larsen’s latest One Fan’s Opinion column at Comic Book Resources. The teaser text on the front page pitches it as Larsen putting the Asian comics market “in perspective for fans and readers alike,” but I don’t think it quite achieves that.

“(Japan’s) comics are 240-pages long (or more), weekly, black and white, and printed on shitty recycled newsprint. Their best selling books sell in the millions and their cover price is about $2. The stories are clipped into 20 page bits much like our comics are, only their weekly comics have 12 to 20 different features and those are what is collected as the small single volumes that we see here in the United States.”

Well, yeah, but those weekly comics are widely viewed as loss leaders for the end product, the collected volumes of individual stories. American comics seem to have two end products: what Larsen describes as “small, neat, trim, pretty little books with colorful covers on a thicker stock,” and trade paperbacks that collect those individual pamphlets. A better comparison would be the western creators who initially offer their comics online and later collect them in sturdy volumes rather than individual floppies.

As for the “shitty recycled newsprint,” there’s a sound reason for the quality of the weekly and monthly anthologies published in Japan. As Tony Leonard Tamai explained in an interview at Slushfactory.com:

“I do know that the Japanese print industry has also been using Soy ink, so less chemicals end up seeping into the ground, and, more importantly, into your body. You’d be surprised if you knew how toxic some printing inks and varnishes were involved in printing a spiffy 4-color deal…. Japan is roughly (not true scale) about the size of California. It is a crowded, congested ecology with only so much natural reserves, and it would suffer a serious burden if it did not make efforts to control natural resources and ecology. The same follows for energy, air quality & fuels, etc.. If you could imagine in the States, how many individuals would follow a strict program of separating plastics, paper, burnable, and organic trash? Hell if you get it wrong here in Nagoya, the trash men will put a refusal sticker on it and leave it there. So, Manga fits into that same recycle effort.”

Larsen seems to be tripped up by the comparative delivery systems:

“Years ago, I subscribed to a few manga weeklies. Through a (then) local Japanese bookstore in the Seattle area, I had them ship me comics on a monthly basis and they were terrific. I didn’t understand a word, mind you, but the art and the storytelling and the energy was inescapable. Those manga books added up so quickly that they threatened to push me out of my apartment so I had to put an end to my subscriptions.”

It’s an interesting illustration of the opposing collector mentalities evident in different cultures. Floppies here are viewed as collectible objects in their own right, and the notion of throwing out comics is seen with varying degrees of horror.

Larsen also suggests that manga “suffers from being excessively padded. Dozens of pages are devoted to things that would get a page or panel in an American comic — if they made the cut at all.” It’s a matter of taste, but one reader’s padding is another’s nuance. I love the willingness of certain manga-ka to focus on a seemingly small event or emotional moment, describe an event with almost ridiculous specificity, or wander off of the driving narrative to explore thematically supportive subplots and sidelines.

In the same Slushfactory article mentioned above, Frederick Schodt (author of Manga! Manga! and Dreamland Japan) takes a more balanced view of the different publishing models:

“I don’t see any reason for the U.S. industry to import the disposability aspect of Japanese Manga. It would help, however, if U.S. comics were priced lower for children, and if they had more pages, so artists could tell more complex stories. The catch here, of course, is that in order to bring the price down, the publishers require an economy of scale that would be difficult to achieve in the U.S.”

I certainly agree with Larsen’s basic desire for a good story, no matter where it comes from. And I can’t argue with his observation that “the contradictions and inconsistencies [of shared-universe comics] have become insurmountable and overwhelming.”

But overall, if you want an overview of the manga market and its increasing place in the western comics formula, I’d recommend the latest offering from Paul Gravett at his website.

There’s a thread going on at The Engine where Warren Ellis is asking forum members about their favorite manga. I always enjoy discussions like this so I can see what other people are reading and what I might be missing.

And since I haven’t done it in a while, I’ll offer a list of some titles currently in release that I’m really enjoying:

Antique Bakery (Digital Manga Publishing): There’s an abundance of quirkiness, creativity and generosity of spirit that I find lacking in most other yaoi titles. See yesterday’s comments for more.

Cantarella (Go! Comi): You Higuri’s beautiful art helps elevate this supernatural retelling of the twisted lives of the Borgia clan. It’s tense, tawdry, and really easy on the eyes.

Death Note (Viz – Shonen Jump Advanced): Constant twists and turns of plot, caustic humor, and twisted morality make this a real page-turner. You think it can’t get much crazier, but it does.

Fruits Basket (Tokyopop): Murderously manipulative shôjo filled with secrets, hopes and all those good things.

Fullmetal Alchemist (Viz): It’s just a great blend of adventure, suspense, and comedy with indelible characters. There really does seem to be something for everyone in this book, and it deserves its excellent sales.

And here are three that are jockeying for position:

Anne Freaks (ADV): I feel a little bit guilty about being so taken with an ultra-cute, ultra-efficient teen assassin, but I’m eager to see where this goes next.

Eden: It’s an Endless World! (Dark Horse): Anyone who enjoyed Planetes (Tokyopop) should probably give this a try. It’s complex science fiction with a humanistic bent. Plus giant robots!

Nana (Viz – Shojo Beat): I’ll happily read anything by Ai Yazawa. I’ve found it a little slow to start, but I can easily see this book becoming a favorite in short order.

Plus two that don’t come out nearly often enough:

Sgt. Frog (Tokyopop): With only one more volume to come, I’m torn between wanting to put off reading the final chapters of the invasion of Pokopen and wanting the book yesterday.

Yotsuba&! (ADV): Pure bliss. It’s adorable and very funny without being a bit saccharine, a great choice for all ages.

Remember that delightful Batgirl meme that ran for a while earlier this year? It came to mind when I saw this piece of art that’s being auctioned off to support the Doug Wright Awards. (The auction ends April 27, and the bids had passed $400 the last time I looked.)

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Brigid at MangaBlog has picked up one of the regular features at Love Manga, the weekly rundown of what’s new in manga in your local comics shop.

She’s also done a sterling job following the California library controversy in a number of posts.

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I can’t say I’m too crazy about the new format at comiclist.com. I think I’ll peruse Chris Butcher’s version instead.

The highlight for the week (if it actually arrives at the shop) will be The Japanese Drawing Room from Boychild Productions. (I’m crazy for Victorian travelogues.)

I’m looking forward to Jeremy Tinder’s Cry Yourself to Sleep from Top Shelf. Jog offers his thoughts on it here.

I’ve read the second volume of Naoki Urasawa’s Monster (Viz Signature) and found it to be a lot stronger than the first. As Jog puts it, “More suspense! More characters! Less sap than last time!” He goes into greater detail here.

This week’s installment of Flipped is up. This time around, I talked with Alexis Siegel, who has provided translations for books such as The Rabbi’s Cat for Pantheon and Deogratias, Vampire Loves, and Klezmer for :01 Books. Chances are, if you’ve read something by Joann Sfar in English, Siegel had a hand in it.

If you were fearing complete David Taylor withdrawal, not to worry. The genial Mr. Taylor has decided to keep doing his monthly manga sales analyses, and I’m more than happy to host them here (though I lack his mad table formatting skillz). So, here’s David’s look at the numbers for March:

Just a bizarre observation but I assume it is the people at Comic Book Resources that compile the Top 50 chart rather than Diamond’s, because this is the third time in a row that both Spawn Manga and Bleach have been missed from the charts. I can understand Spawn but Bleach is a little odd to miss really, especially considering it is lining up to be the next Naruto in terms of sales.

Here you go, my thoughts on the March 2006 Figures:

This month bucks the recent trend in a couple of ways. Firstly we get 10 Manga Publishers (this is assuming we can get away with Image and its Spawn Manga adaptation [are we allowed to use that word?!?]) even if most of them only have a few titles present with Tokyopop hogging 23 all to itself. The second noticeable trend is that with Tokyopop leading the way this month it can only mean a relatively bad month for Viz Media with just 12 titles. Capitalising on this though is a fantastic month for Digital Manga Publishing with 6 yaoi titles including 4 in the top100 chart. There is the Only the Ring Finger Knows novel, a couple of debut titles and, more importantly, 2nd and 3rd volumes. Whilst they don’t have a consistent presence in the chart each month, preferring a flood approach every so often, when they do release they consistently make the charts (Decembers figures show DMP again with 6 titles).

All of this though has to take a back step when put next to the fact that this is the best month manga has had in the Top 100 GN chart since July last year and they didn’t even get the number 1 slot, something to do with a movie I guess. 35 titles make the cut and there are certainly some interesting things in the mix.

Dark Horse has a Kazuo Koike month as Samurai Executioner, Lady Snowblood and the new and improved Crying Freeman all place well in the Top 100 GN. CMX’s de rigueur title in Tenjho Tenge keeps increasing with volume 6 still holding its own though nothing has yet beat the controversial first volume. ADV Manga shows that when they do release volumes they’ve got what it takes as 2 out of 3 make the Top 100.

For Viz Media my first thought was how well Death Note was doing with volume 04 well outpacing all its predecessors which hopefully proves that good word of mouth on this title is actually working. Read or Die and Black Cat both get their debut this month though interestingly ROD places much higher in the Diamond chart whereas Black Cat has done considerably better in the booksellers chart. (Black Cat debuted at #8 in the BookScan charts and hovered around for several weeks, whereas ROD never made the top 10.)

Tokyopop though has some excellent news for their original manga as I Luv Halloween, Warcraft and the new Abandoned all make the Top 100 GN chart, albeit right at the end. The latest installment of Fruits Basket gets the highest placing but is held from the top spot in the Top 100 GN chart by V for Vendetta, though the positions have been reversed in the BookScan chart for the last couple of weeks. The other benchmark title for TP at the moment, Kingdom Hearts, also places well.

It is a good month for Manga in the Diamonds chart which also sees the start of another new publisher in Bandai with Eureka Seven.

Just a quick post to say that this week’s Flipped column will be delayed by a day or so. I’m dotting and crossing various letters. Nothing major, but I’d rather do it before the column drops than after, y’know?

The Comics Journal took an interesting approach to its Best of 2005 offerings in issue #275, asking a variety of critics, commentators, and professionals to offer their choices in a variety of formats. I thought it would be fun to put together a list of all the titles that got the nod and note how many times each was cited.

I was very, very wrong.

It’s not that the pieces aren’t interesting reading. It’s a lot of fun seeing all of the different perspectives and taking in the wide range of quality titles that came out last year. (And it’s nice to see so many manga titles recognized.)

It was just kind of a pain to filter through them all, and the copy editing of the various pieces didn’t help. Sometimes they included creator and publisher information, sometimes they didn’t. Sometimes the same book was referred to in a number of different ways, or words in the title were misspelled.

I was a little bug-eyed by the time I reached the last list, so forgive me if I’ve recreated any glitches or added new ones of my own. I flatly refused to include one contributor’s list of “books that probably would have made (his) best of list had (he) actually gotten around to reading them.”

The big winners were Black Hole (Pantheon) with 11 mentions, Epileptic (Pantheon) with 9, Walt & Skeezix 1921-22 (Drawn and Quarterly) with 8, Wimbledon Green with 7, and Tales Designed to Thrizzle (Fantagraphics) with 6.

Sometimes people would cite a title, while others would specify individual issues of that title, so I’ve listed those separately. For example, six different people cited Or Else (Drawn and Quarterly), but three favored the title as a whole, while three specified issue #2.

Here’s the key of contributors: Noah Berlatsky = NB; Johanna Draper Carlson = JDC; Tom Crippen = TC; Dirk Deppey = DD; Evan Dorkin = ED; Shaenon Garrity = SG; Paul Gravett = PG; Sammy Harkham = SH; R.C. Harvey = RCH; Jeet Heer = JH; Rich Kreiner = RK; Chris Mautner = CM; Calvin Reid = CR; Diana Schutz = DS; Adam Stephanides = AS; Craig Thompson = CT; Tom Underhill = TU; Kristy Valenti = KV; Rob Vollmar = RV; Kent Worchester = KW.

I’ll be posting the list in three parts: #-F, G-P, and Q-Y.

(Corrected, because spell check isn’t my friend, and I wasn’t nearly smart enough to catch that it was turning “Jeet” into “Janet.”)