I’m going to giveaway Ai Ore Volume 1!
Since this series has a gender bending theme, just leave a comment on this post naming your favorite androgynous or cross-dressing person (real life or fictional).
Giveaway open to US residents only please. This giveaway is open until the end of day next Monday.
Giveaway is now closed.
To kick off the Shojo Beat Manga Moveable Feast on Manga Report, I decided to see exactly how many volumes I have in this Wall of Shojo Beat post. I am still in the process of trying to get all those books back on the shelves!
Starting the feast week on a Sunday means it might be a little light on posts, but I over at Matt Talks About Manga, Matt is trying out the melodrama Sand Chronicles. He ends up concluding that the third shojo manga that he’s read is “a conventional and forgettable romance that didn’t do much for me beyond providing a few laughs.”
Lissa over at Kuriosity has better luck with Otomen Volume 13, a series that she thought was starting to get lackluster, but was reinvigorated by the volume’s sudden focus on Ryo: “When I read the synopsis for volume thirteen however, I felt excited. Ryo and Asuka facing off against each other in judo? Cool! What I got was both what I expected and not at the same time. This volume has the longest focus on Ryo I recall since the series began. It provides a better look at her as a character and springs forward her relationship with Asuka more than I ever honestly thought would be possible.”
Monday morning brings a bunch of posts for the feast! Lori at Manga Xanadu looks at the first five volumes of St. Dragon Girl, concluding “St. Dragon Girl is a fairly light and fun romance. Matsumoto’s artwork is beautiful to look at (especially the dragons), and she uses a lot of great Chinese costuming, making the series another plus in my book. There is next to no drama, and the comedy is well-timed with the more serious moments.”
Ash at Experiments in Manga offers quick takes on Shojo Beat manga and anime, covering Dengeki Daisy, Library Wars, Otomen, and Honey and Clover
I start out the week by looking at my most anticipated Shojo Beat volume, Fushigi Yugi Genbu Kaiden volume 10.
Fushigi Yugi Genbu Kaiden Volume 10 by Yuu Watase
I decided to start my week of blogging for the Shojo Beat manga moveable feast by looking at a title that I had anticipated for so long, when it actually showed up at my door I thought it might be a mirage! Volume 9 of this series was published way back in Sept of 2009, so that is certainly a long gap between volumes. I tend to look at Arata: The Legend with a little bit of side-eye just because of my resentment due to the Genbu Kaiden publication gap. In any case, I was very happy to get this volume and to see that volume 11 is listed as coming out in March, so there is less of a torturous wait as I continue to follow this series.
There’s a brief bit of story summary at the beginning of this volume, which was handy because I hadn’t gone back to reread the series. Watase starts the reader off in the middle of the action as Takiko continues her quest to save Bei-Ja as the Priestess of Genbu, aided by her Celestial Warriors. Takiko’s would-be lover Uruki decides that he’s going to save Takiko by taking her virginity, thus ensuring that she won’t be able to fulfill her duties as a Priestess. Hotcha! Unfortunately Takiko’s innate nobility, concerns for the people of Bei-Ja, sense of duty, and her secret knowledge that she has consumption cause her to turn down Uruki’s impassioned pleas. Resigned to the fact that they can’t be lovers, Uruki decides to support Takiko as best he can nonetheless.
While Takiko has managed to collect most of her Celestial Warriors, the holdouts are the twins Teg and Hagus. Teg’s odd destructive singing power has caused him to be imprisoned for use as a human ultimate weapon. Tagus won’t join Takiko’s band while his brother remains captive. Takiko and her companions set off across a frozen landscape to find Teg, harried by superstitious citizens and Takiko’s growing illness. I enjoy this series because Watase is able to balance so many story elements. There’s plenty of action and geopolitical intrigue as the Celestial Warriors try to round up their remaining members. There’s the always affecting romance between Takiko and Uruki, which is balanced out by all of the bonding moments and companionship with the rest of the Celestial Warriors. This volume also fills in a bit more detail about Uruki’s tortured past, which is always interesting. One of the things I always appreciate about Yuu Watase manga is her clarity of storytelling. Even though it had been years since I read the last volume, I was immediately swept up in the story again. I was able to appreciate the pacing of the action scenes and meeting the large cast of characters again. I’m so glad that there will be much less of a wait before the next volume! I hope that the release of this volume will encourage people to go back and check out the entire series. Watase’s blend of shonen action and shojo action make Fushigi Yugi Genbu Kaiden extremely entertaining.
Review copy provided by the publisher.
For Day 1 of the Manga Moveable Feast, I decided to determine how many volumes of Shojo Beat manga I have by pulling everything off the shelves and stacking them up!
I figured this would have an added benefit of helping me consolidate series when I put everything back, as I am not terribly organized when it comes to my personal library. One of the things that struck me when I was pulling volumes was how many series I had that predated the imprint, and are thus not included in this photo. Hana Kimi is currently being reprinted under the Shojo Beat line, so I could have pulled that. Other great pre-Shojo Beat series also include Boys Over Flowers and Kare First Love. I’ve sold off some series I thought I wouldn’t read again, and I have some volumes of manga in storage, so the total for the Shojo Beat manga I have readily available in my house is in the 200+ volumes range which is actually much less than I thought!
How many Shojo Beat volumes do you have?
Apartments of Calle Feliz Vol. 1 by EST EM
It probably isn’t fair to EST EM, but I tend to think of her work as “yaoi for people who hate yaoi.” Yaoi just isn’t my thing as a genre, yet there are quite a few creators who have a large catalog of yaoi titles who I enjoy reading. Fumi Yoshinaga and EST EM seem like standouts as they have more of an indie sensibility, with a a focus on characterization and slice of life stories. I’m guessing that Natsume Ono would fit into this category of authors too, but her yaoi work hasn’t been licensed in the United States. I still have my EST EM titles from Deux stockpiled for a rainy day, but in the meantime I’m enjoying her e-book titles. Working Kentauros was gloriously off-the-wall, but Apartments of Calle Feliz provides a quieter, more meditative look at the lives and loves of a group of men who all live in the same apartment building. The core of the story centers around Luca, a writer who has just been kicked out of his apartment by his boyfriend. He finds the apartments of Calle Feliz and talks to the landlord, Javi. Javi says that his last apartment is already rented but says that Luca can be his roommate. Javi’s sudden offer of becoming roommates is mysterious in motivation and he declares “Because I think you’re pretty hot….is unfortunately not actually the reason.” Luca finds the economics of the situation compelling despite Javi’s eccentric behavior and he moves in, discovering that Javi is actually a well-known radio DJ in addition to being an apartment landlord. When Luca’s stuck for writing material, Javi tells him to write the stories of the residents of Calle Feliz.
Luca’s habits of writerly observation allow EST EM to provide quick snapshots of men in different situations. Dino and Salvatore are a committed couple, but their relationship is strained by Salvatore’s quirks – he’s a nudist and an agoraphobe who hasn’t stepped out of his apartment in three years. Noe has a relationship with twins, who want to know who he actually prefers. A puppet maker has a habit of rehabilitating people who’ve lost their voices. Eva lives in a noise-filled apartment and finds a connection with his deaf upstairs neighbor. All of these character vignettes are interspersed with the continuing story of Luca and Javi, as Luca begins to wonder what happened to Javi’s old roommate while they start becoming better companions for each other. EST EM’s art is always a treat, and she has certainly honed her talent for drawing attractive men. Unlike many other manga artists who cycle through a standard set of character designs, only varying hair and outfits, the reader can easily distinguish the differences between the large cast of people in this manga. While Apartments of Calle Feliz didn’t provide the humor and insanity of EST EM’s manga about salarymen centaurs, it offers a variety of enjoyable slice of life stories that should appeal to anyone who also enjoys the work of Fumi Yoshinaga and Natsume Ono.