Side note: reading tons of manga kinda made be a lot less enthusiastic about reading vertical comics. The are some really good ones out there, and full color default is nice, but you’re basically trading color for loss of paneling, and (more importantly) constantly scrolling is sooooo annoying. That said, I’m surprised there aren’t more JP translations of Korean webtoons. The only ones I can find, I read to death already in English
About color: If they ever released a printed version of やが君, I’d totally buy the whole series again. Thankfully they’ve kept it all digital, so I don’t need to
About price: half the manga I’ve been looking at lately are old Yurihime (like early days of the magazine old), and short stories, and they’re all like 700-900円 digitally, and I’m starting to wonder if I shouldn’t just make a giant list, and then get them all physically at this point, I wonder how many I’d need to get to balance out the shipping costs
Why finish an ongoing book when you can start a new one?
On that front, I compared the published version and webcomic version, and they did make an effort to get a reasonable paneling. Also, the drawing was somewhat upgraded.
I read the first three “volumes” and I just don’t like it. I appreciate the effort they put into translating the webtoon into a traditional manga, but the pages are just so empty. There are a lot of pages for what feels like so little content, and (as is often the case) it feels more natural in the original format. Sadly I don’t have access to the webcomic since I’m not in Japan (they even blocked me on vpn), or else I would have binged it in the original format years ago.
Honestly, the story was a bit shallow anyway, so I don’t think I’m missing much.
Same. I hope they eventually release a printed color version, but it seems unlikely.
Region blocking stuff (including chiebukuro too) is so dumb… I still can’t understand the rationale behind it.
I’m about the same place as you were right now. A bit shallow is the perfect level of depth for me when it comes to that topic, honestly. But, yeah, it makes it hard to justify buying the ebooks.
You all are saving me some money. I have been watching and enjoying the 先輩はおとこのこ anime, but this seems like a case where the anime might be more enjoyable than the manga. (At least, the printed version.)
I was able to get LINE Manga from not the play store, if you have an Android. I know there are people who are hesitant to get apps from other apk stores (which understandable), but it is an option.
I looked into that at the time, but the only “Android” device I have is an old Amazon Fire tablet, and it just wasn’t worth it. Especially since I’d still need to get past the region blocking anyway.
For good measure, I read 男の子になっちゃった女子高生 1巻 | L24?? and it’s exactly the same issue as 先輩はおとこのこ 1 | L17 so I assume it was a vertical comic originally.
I thought that, at least, this one is cheap… but it’s only 55 pages long. So I guess it’s ebook only.
The story is literally just what the title says. There’s a rare in-world disease that swaps genders and the main character was affected. It reads like trans masc fantasy (“wow I can pee standing now” and “oh I’m so much taller than [childhood friend] now”) and I like it for that (also it feels extremely rare in published format) but it’s also at the same quality level as stuff people randomly post on the internet, soooo, I also don’t really want to spend (more) money on that
At least with 知恵袋 I’ve heard it’s due to not wanting to deal with European data privacy laws. They don’t block American IPs so I can access it fine (and semi often end up screenshoting or copying answers from there for European friends).
I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve posted in this thread. Life has been busy and I took a break to do focus on Korean reading for a few weeks. I still did finish some Japanese books, though, so mini updates about each:
地雷グリコ | L31 I got around halfway through this and realized I wasn’t having fun with it, so I dropped it. It relied a little too heavily on tropes for me and the “mysteries” of how to win the games in each chapter were the type that are impossible to guess ahead of time. That’s ok if the journey to the explanation is exciting, but it wasn’t. Oh well.
荒地の家族 | L35 Reflections on surviving natural disasters, trauma, and death by a middle aged man in the 東北 region who survived the 3.11 earthquake. Ngl this book was pretty grim, but it also had beautiful descriptions of the sea and nature that were a treat to read. Three stars for being a perfectly fine book!
東京都同情塔 | L35 Ok I loved this!! Sci-Fi dystopic view of Tokyo a few years in the future with commentary on the meaning of words and language, communication, cancel culture, DEI, generative AI, architecture, gender, and class. There was so much going on in this book that I almost want to immediately reread it because I’m sure I’d find new things. It reminded me of 1984 and the idea of “newspeak”, even though it was completely different - that is to say, though, if you like that type of “dark look into the future” story you’d probably like this. This made a lot of buzz when it won the Akutagawa because the author used AI to write some of it, but after reading it I was like “なるほど”! The AI sections are very easy to find and serve a purpose for the structure of the book in a way that feels very meta. If you want to know what I mean then you’ll just have to read it and see for yourself.
Now I am reading 穢れた聖地巡礼について | L35 because it is by the same author as 近畿地方のある場所について | L34 (banger that I loved and raved about last time I posted ) and I can’t lie, in my heart I really wanted this book to be the exact same thing as 近畿地方 except a different location. I wanted more of the same! Alas, it’s a completely different type of book so far and not as scary. It is fine and entertaining enough, the bar was just set so high already…
Here’s the original: "男の子になっちゃった女子高生"/"浅月のりと" Series [pixiv] … So doesn’t look like it (pixiv is vertical scroll regardless iirc, but no continuous image). I haven’t checked panel by panel tho
I just learned this is in the same world as ぜんぶきみの性 1 | L22 (pretty good gender swap romcom) - which bumps it higher on my priorities list
Well, it looks like this one is just putting together the content into a single (short) book. That makes it feel even more like a waste of money, since the original is literally identical.
It both makes sense and is making me scared now that I know that they want to ignore those laws
In my experience it’s mainly the requirement that the data has to be housed in the EU. In addition to that, the way that databases work, it’s a huge deal to separate out data based on the country of residence. So a lot of companies decided if they didn’t already have a large EU customer base (and 知恵袋 can’t possibly) they just choose not to deal with the problem and block access.
I’d personally rather see the choice be made at the user level and not the government, but that’s probably the American in me.
I think I technically read things that are worse about this than akebi-chan, but in it it made my skin crawl. I think because the characters are more realistically proportioned and actually act like little girls. It’s basically the only reason I dropped it when I otherwise liked it. If it really isn’t present in later volumes I might pick it back up.
Well, following that trend, I got a recommendation of Line Manga for 男をやめてみた~癌になったので女装して恋をすることにしました~1 | L29
I guess Line Manga thought “soooo I heard you like transgender stuff, here’s some more”.
At first I discounted it since it looks waaaay too horny for me, but after a while (Line Manga is insistant like that) I clicked on it and found out it’s based on a true story, so I got curious. Plus, I got two chapters for free, so why not.
And… well, it is horny, but yeah, I do know trans women who started dressing a bit risqué after transitioning because, suddenly, they could. And the book deals with it in a way that makes sense to me.
Now, the comments though, those I should have avoided. I clicked on them because I only get one free chapter per day (which was chapter two), so I had nothing better to do. Well, chapter two has the main character getting groped on the train by a salaryman and panicking about it.
Guy 1 in the comments: “why didn’t she just turn around and ask him to stop?”
Ah yes, I’m sure that would have ended well.
Guy 2 in the comments: “oh no, I can’t stop myself from seeing things from the perspective of the aggressor” (because she is hot and he would also grab her ass, I guess? Thanks for sharing)
And more like that. It’s not just that, but it is seriously facepalm inducing.
Still, I’m kinda curious about this one, but not really committed yet.
Finished the first volume of 黒鷺死体宅配便. I took a break for a few days at the halfway mark. When I came back to it and kept reading I was like “Wait a minute, didn’t this manga have furigana?”. Yes, yes it did. Only for exactly half of the book. It seems the second volume has no furigana at all either. Is this common? I haven’t encountered it before.
Furigana is based on the original publication. According to wikipedia, some chapters were published in magazines aimed at a shonen audience (=furigana) while some were published in magazines with a seinen audience (= no furigana).
It’s a bit weird, but I guess it works if the chapters are standalone. Also, all magazines belong to the same publisher.
That’s definitely understandable. I’ve found myself much more bothered by other things I’ve read (or decided not to read)
As an aside, I realized オレが私になるまで 1 | L21 is an interesting point of comparison, since it’s similarly a realistic middle school girls’ coming of age story (tho with Akira’s gender/transition being the focus), with a large ensemble cast, but which doesn’t have anything ecchi
I’ll report back when I’m there I guess… As of vol 4, I wouldn’t recommend you pick it back up.
There’s no edit, no exclusive bonus content, no あとがき… Every other manga I have seen was at least trying to add some value, but this one didn’t.
I’m planning to finish the first volume and see how I feel about it. It feels hard to believe the story is 100% real, but I can believe it is based on a true story. That part does catch my attention.
Oh well.
) and I can’t lie, in my heart I really wanted this book to be the exact same thing as 近畿地方 except a different location. I wanted more of the same! Alas, it’s a completely different type of book so far and not as scary. It is fine and entertaining enough, the bar was just set so high already…
