Dear Author: Romance Book Reviews, Author Interviews, and Commentary

Basara by Yumi Tamura. Published by Viz. Retail: $9.99. Rated T+ for older teens (frank sex and violence. The sex isn’t graphic but the violence can be.) 25/27 volumes published, complete in Japan.
Dear Readers,
Some long running romance manga series are drawing to a close this month, and all deserve mention here. This column is for the first, Basara, a shoujo manga classic that is Romance in both the old and new senses of the word.
Basara is a sweeping saga of 27 volumes, the tale of the death and birth of a nation, epic in length and scope. It’s also an involved love story that is as heart-rending as anything you’ll read (but *hint* it is a romance manga when all is said and done). The main story ends in volume 25, which is just out this month. The last two volumes are side stories.
The gist of the story is that Japan has had an apocalypse that’s sent society back into more primitive times, and it’s now ruled by a dissolute king and his four wicked …

Ai Yori Aoshi by Kou Fumizuki. Published by TokyoPop. Retail: $9.99. Ratings: T+, older teens, for most volumes (many sexually suggestive situations a.k.a. fan service - the cover gives you a taste for that), Mature for the last volume (tasteful sex between the h/h). 17/17 volumes published.
Dear Readers,
Two long running romance series have drawn to a close this month, and both deserve mention. This one is different from what I normally review because it’s a shounen harem story, written for boys. Oddly perhaps for those of us in the west, while the other series, Basara, was written for girls it concentrates on warfare and politics albeit emotionally; this series however concentrates on love and relationships. It’s called Ai Yori Aoshi.
Ai Yori Aoshi is, through much of the story, a typical harem manga. That means a young man finds himself living with a group of young women, generally stock characters, all of whom fall in love with him. Circumstances always keep him and the one he truly loves from being together until the end. …

Princess Tutu created by Ikuko Ito and Junichi Sato. Released in English by ADV. Entire 26 episode series available at Amazon for $28.49. Manga adaptation available but really, don’t go there.
Dear Readers,
I’m cheating today. This blog is for book reviews, things you read. And so I’m going to review an absolutely terrible manga adaptation so that I can also review the anime of the same name, because it’s just a wonderful series that’s so overlooked, and it would make a great Christmas present for anyone who loves storytelling, ballet, or classical music.
First, the manga. I’m not even linking to it. It’s terrible. It takes an enchanting story and wipes all emotion and excitement and meaning from it. Take, for example, the climax of the first story arc of the series. This is a tremendous episode in the anime, with the “light” and “dark” ballerinas battling through dance for the heart of their prince. In the manga, when the light ballerina comes and dances with the prince and his knight …

Sorcerers and Secretaries by Amy Kim Ganter. Tokyopop. $9.99. Ages 13 and up (kisses). Reads left to right. 2 volumes, complete.
 

Dear Ms. Ganter,
I don’t try much Original English Language (OEL) manga or American graphic novels, because the stories don’t normally appeal to me, and one big reason is that they’re often written for men. Now, I like stories written for men, but after a constant diet of them in comics ever since I stopped reading stuff like Archie in third grade, I prefer stories written for women. So I was quite delighted to find your romance, Sorcerers and Secretaries.
Many readers are sure to identify with your imaginative but lonely and bored heroine Nicole, who carries a notebook and likes to spends all her spare time writing stories of another land and a sorcerer Ellon, who is more real to her than most of the people in her life. Her neighbor Josh is the perfect foil for her, a playboy of sorts who collects girls’ phone numbers that he keeps in a jar under …

Dear Ms Sinclair,
You really love Star Trek, don’t you? Not that I hold that against you. I love it too, including the original series (TOS) with Kirk where men were men and women were, well, sometimes they were clouds of energy that sucked the very life from you, but at some point they could always kiss back.
Your book really reminds me of TOS. No nice Klingons here. The villains are evil bastards without a hint of redeemable material. The monsters? Screw IDIC, kill them all. (IDIC, for the reader, is a Vulcan ideal, Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations, actually mentioned in the book).
And the hero and heroine don’t spend all that much time on introspection. Sure, they’ve both had major problems, especially the heroine, but other than the occasional nightmare she seems to buzz right past them. But then that could be alien psychology, or military psychology, which is at times even more mysterious.
It’s fairly clear from the hint you dropped at the end of the book that the similarities were intentional. …

Manga: The Complete Guide, by Jason Thompson. Del Rey. $19.95. 592 pages. A-.
 
Dear Mr. Thompson,
I can’t even imagine the effort it took to put this book together. I heard that you read one to two manga series a day, and upwards of 900 of them total to write the reviews within. The result is frankly an indispensable book for anyone interested in Japanese manga that has been published in English, not only for manga fans, but also for parents wanting to know what their little manga fans are reading. Every bookseller and library should keep one of these at their information desks. It’s just that useful.
I love the header information you give for each series: the mangaka, the original publisher and year, the English publisher and year, the age rating, and the length. It’s what I typically want to know at a glance. The reviews I scanned through in the main section were to the point, even if I didn’t always agree with the number of stars the series were granted. The …

Dear Readers,
Here are some suggestions for slightly spooky romantic manga for Halloween.
Vampire Knight by Matsuri Hino: I enjoy this one even though in many ways it’s a very typical shoujo (girls) romance series. The very polished artwork raises it a notch above many series, and there’s something about the main characters’ love triangle that won’t let me stop reading: The pureblood vampire prince manipulating everyone within reach to bring a peace between vampires and humans for the sake of the young woman he loves; the vampire hunter, bitten and in the process of turning into a mad vampire, who can only control it by drinking the blood of his rival or his love; the young girl with the missing past, family killed by one vampire even while she was saved by another, loving both the one who saved her, and the one she has to save. There are many typical things about it, but because of the characters I cannot stop reading it. B, 15+
Beyond My …

Dear Ms. Ibbotson,
I’ve long been a fan of your adult novels. They have a way of showing even the most mundane things in a magical light, and that always makes me realize there’s a bit of fairy tale in everyone’s life. Your books set in Vienna are some of my favorites, because the city through your eyes becomes a place on par with Faery, with enchantments of color and taste and music to be found around every corner. So when I read that you had written a young adult novel set in pre-WWI Vienna, I promptly ordered it, and upon receiving it, promptly devoured it.
This was, of course, not quite like your adult novels. This was written for children, and clearly from the point of view of a young girl. And to a young innocent living in Vienna, the city is a most magical place with little darkness. People around her did have their foibles, but she rarely focused on them (indeed, sometimes she never saw them for what they were), but you …

Cipher by Narita Minako. Published by CMX. Retail $9.99. Rating: Teen (some heavy issues, but little to no sex or violence; I’d say high school age personally). 7/12 volumes released in English, complete in Japan.
Dear CMX,

I think you are my favorite shoujo manga publisher. I’ve only tried a few of your series, and I love Emma and Seimaden, but even your average ones are better than everyone else’s. Cipher is a case in point.
The series initially interested me for a couple of reasons. One is that it was written in 1985, which I’m told is often considered the Golden Age of Manga. I’ve not read much from the period and wanted to try more. I thought the artwork looked pretty. It reminded me of paintings of children from the early 20th century, despite the new clothing, and I thought I might enjoy the change of pace. Also, it was set in New York City, and I always find manga set in NYC to be amusing for all they …

Fushigi Yuugi by Yuu Watase. Published by Viz. Retail: $9.99 18/18 Volumes released in Englis. Rated T+ for older teens (sexual situations, attempted rapes, pretend rapes, lots of death). D-.

 
Dear Readers,
Imagine if you will being stuck in the middle of the Gobi desert, thirsting for anything to drink, when you come upon a spring of clear water. You fall to your knees gratefully and begin to drink, only to choke when you find it tastes like camel piss (you know this because you drank your camel’s piss in desperation before it died the previous day). It is, however, the only water you’ve got. You drink it, ignoring everything that makes you shudder, and live to walk out of the desert. And when people ask about your journey, you praise the spring to high heaven.
That spring is Fushigi Yuugi.
You see, there didn’t used to be any shoujo manga, manga for girls, released over here. “Everyone” knew, “everyone” being male comic book sellers, that girls didn’t read comics. Then Sailor Moon came along and kicked …