The manga, Fullmetal Alchemist, won the 49th Shogakukan Manga Award for shounen and the Seiun Award in 2011 for best science fiction comic.  Additionally, it is a best seller in both Japan and America. It is a given that either you or someone you know wants it. But it is a whopping 27 volumes long; buying each volume will take a hefty chunk out of your wallet.

So what do you do? Buy the box set, of course. But don’t get too excited: the box set is far from perfect.

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Keiko Takemiya-sensei burst onto the manga scene in the early 1970’s and helped pioneer a new genre of shōjo (girl) manga and shōnen-ai, which depicts love between two young men. In fact, in December 1970 she published the short story, In the Sunroom, which is considered to be the first shōnen-ai and contains the earliest known kiss between two male characters in shōjo manga.

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Winner of the first Seiun Award, a prestigious award for science fiction, and the Shogakukan Manga Award for shonen/shojo manga in Japan, To Terra, directly translated as Toward the Terra, is a three-volume series about the future of Earth and humankind. In this future, Terra, or Earth, has fallen into ruin because of human neglect. Becoming uninhabitable, humans leave to colonize other nearby planets or far-off corners of the galaxy, never to be heard from again. But some humans decide to stay, with a desire to renew Terra into a livable and vibrant world. 

The humans that settle on Terra figured that humans caused Terra’s ruin—so, they create machines to rule over and control the humans. The lead machine Grand-Mother, brainwashes humans and breeds them in vitro. Although Grand-Mother controls the genes that create humans, a certain gene continuously pops-up. This gene gives rise to a new species called the Mu. Although weak-bodied, the Mu are blessed with physic abilities and are thereby hunted down by Grand-Mother. This is the story of a quest to return to Terra, told both from the perspectives of the Mu and the humans.

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Fujio Akatsuka-sensei pioneered comedy in manga, hence his title as the Gag Manga King.

He has numerous accomplishments under his belt: As one of the founding artists of manga he revolutionized the manga industry through his use of puns and countless other means of word play.  Ever wonder why puns are in every manga you read? Well, it is because of this man.

At age 20, with his debut manga, Yoshihiro Togashi won the 1986 Tezuka Award, the most prestigious award for new mangakas, for his work on Buttobi Straight. Togashi-sensei is also notable for writing and drawing both Yu Yu Hakusho and Hunter x Hunter, both being hugely popular and the former winning the 1994 Shogakukan Manga Award. Interestingly, he is married to Naoko Takeuchi, the author of Sailor Moon, with whom he has two children.