Category: Manga of the Month

Manga of the Month: Solanin

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Solanin (ソラニン) by Inio Asano

Solanin is the type of story that sticks with you long after you’ve read it. It has a personal feeling to it and grounds itself quickly as true to life.

I would call Solanin a coming-of-age, the kind that comes when you are in your 20’s and transition from college student to working adult. “Real life” hasn’t quite kicked in yet for our characters; they aren’t sure where exactly to go next creating a sort of holding pattern. The journey that occurs, that journey that you can no longer avoid, doesn’t happen at the same time for everyone. Solanin is about that road that you follow without knowing where it will lead.

The story follows Meiko in her early 20’s who up and quits her boring job, then instead of finding a new one spends the next couple of months deciding just what she wants out of life. A part of this journey is her long-term musician boyfriend Taneda and her collection of college friends all at various stages in the same road. It touches quite poignantly on Japanese youth culture and a difficult economy, which also makes it quite relevant to today’s American 20-somethings, too. Music and friendship dovetail wonderfully to create a hopeful story spurred on by tragedy.

I recognized these people, the relationships, and their questions; it will certainly resonate for anyone out of college. The emotions, reactions, and thoughts seen through the characters of Solanin are utterly genuine and honest. Plus, the ending felt right without grasping for a concrete conclusion to lives that have only just begun.

Manga of the Month: 7-nin no Shakespeare

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7-nin no Shakespeare (七人的莎士比亚) by Harold Sakuishi

One of the reasons people are usually drawn to manga is the sheer diversity of topics it can touch upon. It often seems no matter how wacky the topic there is at least one manga about it. There is salaryman centaur manga. A manga with a half man half horse creature who works in an office. Erin from the Ninja Consultants does a panel just about unusual manga genres and some of the strangest titles within. So when compared to competitive wine tasting or dissociative identity disorder death metal a comic about Shakespeare would appear to be down right mundane. But as usual there is some unexpected twists to this formula.

It is almost impossible to truly know of Bard of Avon. He is one of the most famous western authors of all time. Although there are countless books about him there is still much of his life we know little of. 7-nin no Shakespeare starts at the Globe Theater with politics swirling around William Shakespeare with everyone including Queen Elizabeth. But it seems that much of these shadowy conspiracies also involve an unusual Chinese woman named Li. Li has the seemingly cursed ability to foresee the future that has haunted her more than it has ever helped her. How does the life of this fantastic woman tie into the fortunes of England’s national poet?

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Manga of the Month: The Story of Saiunkoku

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The Story of Saiunkoku (彩雲国物語) by Kairi Yura

Saiunkoku is about a kingdom and a romance, sounds simple enough, but it is anything but. The story while focusing on Shuurei is really about telling us the tale of an entire country’s nobles, peasants, conspiracies, politics, triumphs, woes, romances and even some supernatural forces.

Shuurei is a smart, hard-working, but poor noble princess who is brought to court in the hopes of helping the new emperor. She not only forms a close relationship with Ryuki the emperor, but also many others in his circle. Shuurei at first glance seems to be a too-perfect-nice-girl type but that quickly dissolves as you get into the meat of the story. She is extremely intelligent, on par with her male peers, and shows little intimidation in the many political situations.

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