Kodansha is running a massive sale right now across Bookwalker, Comixology, Google Play, Kindle, Nook, and izneo, where you can pick up the first volume in over 270 series for 99p or 99c each! If the idea of choosing from that many series is overwhelming, don’t worry: we’re here to help narrow it down for you.
If you’d like to check out the first chapters of any of these series to see if they’re for you, there are free previews on the Kodansha website.
Yui Sakuma’s Complex Age is about a diehard cosplayer trying to balance her hobby and fandom life with her adult responsibilities. It’s great at capturing the joy and friendship of fandom, while also being realistic about the ways that sometimes fandom doesn’t love you back. I love its depictions of adult fans, and the way it models different paths the characters could take to stay in fandom, although its depiction of toxic parts of fandom were a little too real for comfort. Caution warnings: Agism, harassment; the series as a whole carries warnings for online abuse, sexual harassment, non-consensual photography, ageism, fatphobia. For something that also deals with fandom, but takes a completely different tone: Fujita’s Wotakoi: Love Is Hard For Otaku is a very fannish office romance! Hirotaka and Narumi are childhood friends who work for the same company; he’s a hardcore gamer, she’s a hardcore shipper and doujinshi artist who doesn’t want anyone at work to know. Together, they fall into a relationship of convenience that very slowly might progress to love, and discover colleagues who are as into fandom as they are! It’s funny and geeky and I highly recommend it. Flying Witch by Chihiro Ishizuka is a very peaceful series following a teenage witch who moves to the countryside to live with her cousins and complete her magical training. It’s very quiet and almost domestic; a lot of it is kids having fun in nature or learning about magic, which might make it a good break for your brain right now! The closest readalike I can think of is “If Yotsuba&! was also about witchcraft,” because it’s about the same level of absurd humour and learning about the world!
Gigo Amagakure’s Sweetness and Lightning ( A | BN | K ) follows a widower as he learns how to cook for his young daughter alongside one of his high school students. It’s very cute; Tsumugi is an adorable child with a lot of personality in how she’s drawn, and while Inuzuka is a horribly inept cook, it’s heartwarming to see him trying to do his best for his daughter!
If you prefer something a little more complicated in terms of both recipes and drama, then What Did You Eat Yesterday by Fumi Yoshinaga might suit your tastes better. It’s a slice of life manga about a lawyer who loves cooking for his boyfriend, with lots of in-depth recipes and advice on how to make the dishes. It’s very different in tone; while there is some goofy humour, the protagonists disagree on how out they should be, there are homophobic microaggressions, and one of the stories in the first volume specifically deals with a domestic violence case. The recipes are aimed at a confident audience as well, which means they’re above my skill level! But if you want delicious depictions of food with your drama, it’s a good choice! Witch Hat Atelier by Kamome Shirahama is a beautifully-illustrated series about a girl who discovers that anyone in her world can learn magic, not just people who were born with it, and follows her as she is taken into an atelier to study. I love it for the practicalities of how magic is created and used, and the way that despite the dangers in the world, most of the story centres on small, practical uses of power, and non-violent solutions to problems. Honestly, I’d say it’s worth checking out just for the art, but if you want to read about kindness and helping people, I can’t recommend Witch Hat Atelier enough!
(NB: I agree. I reviewed it and thought it was utterly adorable! – Sarah)
What about you? Any manga in this sale that you recommend?
Hikaru Nakamura’s SAINT YOUNG MEN is *fantastic*, I shrieked when I saw it on sale! Here’s the premise: Good buddies Jesus and Buddha decide they deserve a break, so they decide to take a sabbatical in modern Tokyo. They look like hipster guys in their 20s, and try their best to fit in. It’s apparently a longtime hit in Japan, but only got a US translation last year because publishers were skittish. I can’t imagine why: it manages to be respectful (Nakamura clearly knows her theology well, but it’s much more a comparative studies or philosophical approach than anything dogmatic) and such sweet, goofy pun-filled fun. Any fan of THE ODD COUPLE or the Flight of the Conchords’ TV series will love the perfect sitcom situations, and their roommate dynamic is gently instructive for our shelter-in-place times. If it intrigues you at ALL, do not miss it at this price!
Princess Jellyfish is one of my favorites (esp the animated series) – though it’s vague about whether its main love interest is a cis male drag queen or a trans woman, and y’know, that’s important. On the other hand, it’s not clear whether the *character* knows, so that may be intentional. I love the series either way, and TBH have never felt so seen in this medium, as it’s about socially awkward ladynerds.
10 DANCE is also a fun one, sort of like a yaoi STRICTLY BALLROOM. It’s slow-burn (I’m through four of six volumes and still can’t tell if the guys will give in), and some side characters lean too hard on the “he’s a reserved Japanese/passionate Latin” stereotypes when dealing with the guys (to be fair, the general feeling is that everyone knows that’s bunk), but the first volume is great. Shira Anthony is a big fan of NODAME CANTABILE as I recall (really delves into the music, though it’s very lengthy and not really a romance). Has anyone read LOVE MESSAGE: MELTING BEAUTY TREATMENT? It looks like hot catnip, but some Goodreads folk say the dynamic gets creepy near the end…
Love *Massage*, not Message…sheesh!
Lovesick Ellie by Fujimomo is a cute one. Eriko is a high schooler who tweets out her perverted fantasies of the popular guy in her grade.
What Did You Eat Yesterday (Kinou Nani Tabeta) was one of the first slice of life manga I read, and I adored it. It does deal with more serious issues than other domestic manga, but it feels more real to me for that. And the food is also so good. Don’t read this one without snacks!
@Trix thank you so much for the heads up on Saint Young Men. I’ve been watching for this manga for ages and to find the first volume on sale and the other volumes discounted is wonderful news right now.