I’ve been working through my manga backlog…

Since my books are still over at my old apartment, I’ve had to plan out what I’m reading a bit more. Instead of just randomly grabbing out something, I’ve been selecting long series that I have more then one new volume of that I haven’t read. I tend to buy stuff and then wait until I have two or three new volumes before sitting down to read it. That worked fine when companies were pumping out titles monthly or even a couple months apart. But now it’s getting more common for there to be 4 months or more between a release. By the time I have a couple volumes I’ve forgotten what was going on before. When that happened I tended just to shelve the new volumes until I had a chance to read the series from the beginning and read something new that just came out.

The past month or so, I’ve been taking a series at a time from my old place and bringing it over for a re-read or in some cases a first time read. Possibly the dumbest thing I did was read The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service series right after I moved in the house. A supremely creepy, gory, supernatural horror in an empty house with poor lighting and no furniture… REALLY CLEVER OF ME. I slept even less then I normally do after that. However, I am eagerly awaiting any future volumes because I apparently am a masochist. See also, Ghost Talker's Daydream which I read because I figured I wasn’t sleeping anyway. It’s got a bit too much fan-service to be as creepy and unsettling as Kurosagi, but it still managed to tell a damn scary story. Too bad it seems that Dark Horse has dropped this one. Volume four (of ten) was slated for May 2009, but it’s not even listed in Amazon now.

More recently I caught up on Ouran, and am now caught up with the official English release. I also caught up on Venus in Love a title I never hear anyone talking about, and it's a shame because it's excellent. It's by the author of ZIG*ZAG, and of the two I prefer Venus. The story starts out following the main character Suzuna, as she settles into her first apartment near the school she’ll be attending Koto University. She meets her neighbor Eichi, and his best friend Fukami whom she immediately starts crushing on. Problem is, she has to get in line. Eichi’s been crushing on him since middle school! What starts out as a friendly and sympathetic rivalry (Fukami is completely oblivious to both of their affections) turns into a fun and teasing friendship.

It was nice to read a manga that is not about a fifteen year old for once, though I will admit Suzuna’s personality isn’t too far off from most fifteen-year-old protagonists in your typical shoujo. She unfortunately fits into that “Sweet, slow and clumsy” trope all too well, but she’s not passive enough to really be annoying about it. The only bad thing about catching up is that a new volume just came out. CMX titles (DC Comic’s manga imprint) never have an easy time getting on local bookstore shelves, so I’ll have to order it in… but I promised myself I wouldn’t buy any manga in the month of October (I’m saving to buy a fake Christmas Tree)!

Currently I’m reading Wild Ones, a Yakuza love story. (Kind of.) I really like this series. It’s artwork is slick and pretty. I love the covers and the interior “Five minutes Later” gag covers. The main character Sachie is rapidly working up my list of “Cool Manga Heroines.” She is not the passive shoujo heroine who just wants a prince to take care of her. I love her responses whenever her love interests say the typical tired “I’ll protect you” or “I’d die for you” type of lines. Plus she’s fully capable of kicking ass all on her own, though she does get “saved” more often then I like (especially since it seems unnecessary.)

There is a new volume of Wild Ones out too, further tempting me to break my promise not to buy books.  Plus more Kimi ni Todoke and Skip Beat!! Add to that that Rightstuf is having a 33% sale off on Viz, and Amazon is having a 4-for-3 promotion AND Borders is having a buy 4 get one free promotion. It’s like the universe is converging to get me to break my resolve. It’s not even October 2nd  yet!