1. 49

Author: TOUDA Yoshimi
Artist:  TOUDA Yoshimi
Genre(s): Romance, School Life, Shoujo, Supernatural, Tragedy

“In this small town, within the 49 days after a person dies, you can see the dead’s spirit. She once admired this small town where you can still spent time with the ones precious to you within these 49 days, but…” -Kissmanga.com

Thoughts: A nonchalantly deep manga; the story truly opens up when the female protagonist gets confessed to by the ghost of her classmate. This manga is about the reverberations of the confession during and after the her classmate’s ghost’s stay with the living.

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 4/21 - 4/28.

1. Kono Bijutsubu ni wa Mondai ga Aru!

Author: Imigi Muru
Artist:  Imigi Muru
Genre(s): Comedy, Romance, School Life, Seinen

“Uchimaki Subaru, the main character, loves to draw 2- D characters and freakly love them and says that he isn’t interested in 3- Ds girls. Usami Mizuki is quite a normal girl heroine. Lastly, The president doesn’t act like one. 

“There’s a problem with this art club!” Artist Imigi Muru is a winner of the Award for Wxcellence in the 5th Dengeki Comic Grand Prix, went one and had a debut in Comic Gum. Currently has another series running beside this one….” -Mangafox.me

Thoughts: What I like is that this manga starts out generic but has a very subtle twist in the last two pages which prevents me from calling this series generic. In fact, I have no idea how the story will progress.

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 3/31 - 4/14.

1. Dragons Rioting

Author: WATANABE Tsuyoshi
Artist:  WATANABE Tsuyoshi
Genre(s): Action  Comedy  Ecchi  Martial Arts  School Life Shounen  

“As a 6 Year Old, Rintaro is diagnosed with Henisei Tashu Ijou Syndrome (also known as Hentai Syndrome), a disease that could kill him if he gets sexually aroused. To save him and provide a way for him to live as normal a life as possible, his father teaches him the ways to control his body and mind for ten years in the mountains, with the martial art of the Koei Sougetsu. When he’s 16, he chooses to enroll Nangokuren High School, which he assumed to be the biggest all-boys school in the country but is actually the biggest all-girls school that has just gone coed.

On his first day, he stumbles upon a large scale battle and learns that the first rule of the school is that it “Abides the Law of Nature” which has turned the campus into a war zone-like environment. Rintaro now sees transferring out as his mission, but will it be that easy now that he’s caught the eye of the 3 “Dragons”, the bodacious female leaders of the three biggest factions around?” -Mangahelpers

Thoughts: I usually don’t like manga full of overly well-endowed girls but this one actually has a fairly interesting, if easily avoidable, premise.

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 3/17 - 3/31.

1. Adventure of Sinbad ~Prototype~

Author:  Ohtaka Shinobu
Artist:     Yoshifumi Ohtera
Genre(s): Action  Adventure Fantasy Shounen

“A 70 page manga prologue of Magi. Tells the story of Sinbad’s early life, when he captured the first Dungeon, Baal.” -Batoto.net

Thoughts: Has enough questions left unanswered that I am sure that this will be continued one day.

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 3/3 - 3/10.

Kazama Kenji and his two friends are a normal group of delinquents. For them, life is dandy if not a bit boring. Their lives change drastically when Kazama runs into the Game Production Club. In a school full of freaks and weirdos, he entered the den of the freakiest and the weirdest. The club consists of Karasuyama Chitose, the student council president, Shibasaki Roka, the secret boss of the school whom everyone knows about, Mizukami Sakura, a mysterious girl who likes water, and their adviser, Oosawa Minami.

Together with Kazama and his childhood friends, the two delinquents and the masochistic student council vice president, the group goes through various antics and adventures with the rest of the unusual student body and the surrounding area.

I don’t like sports manga. Most of them are unrealistic and they don’t accurately represent the sport. Often times they are simply an action manga with good looking guys/girls battling through the use of a sport with unrealistic powers and abilities or use the sport as an excuse for pantyshots.

But occasionally I run into sports manga that aren’t like that. They accurately represent the sport and not only provide the reader with meaningful dialogue, but also offer insight into the sport itself. Baby Steps is one of these manga.

1. Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai

 AKA: Ano Hana

Author:    Okada Mari
Artist:     Izumi Mitsu
Genre(s): Comedy, Drama, Mystery, Psychological, Romance, Shounen,Supernatural, Tragedy

“Five childhood friends grow apart after the death of Meiko Honma, close playmate of them all. Jintan Yadomi, leader of the group when they were kids, neglects high school and lives as a shut-in when he unexpectedly starts seeing the ghost of Meiko, who can only interact with him and no one else. She has returned to ask Jintan to fulfill the forgotten wish she made as a kid.” -Mangaupdates.com

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 9/9 - 11/4.

Jesus and Buddha descend to the mortal world for vacation after working hard for the turn of the century. They decide to rent a room together in Japan. Yes, you heard me right. This manga is about Jesus and Buddha’s daily life in modern Japan.

Saint Oniisan reflects the importance of Christianity and Buddhism for the Japanese. Through slapstick jokes and the references to both stories from Buddhism and Christianity, the reader gains insight into both religions — their similarities and differences — while reading the humorous interactions between Jesus and Buddha.  Ultimately, who doesn’t want to read a manga about Jesus and Buddha being roommates?

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Fujiko Fujio is the pen name of the mangaka duo of Hiroshi Fujimoto-sensei and Motoo Abiko-sensei. The two have worked apart more than they collaborated, as individuals they adopted various of their pen name as pseudonyms. Abiko-sensei adopted the name Fujiko Fujio (A) and Fujimoto-senei became Fujiko F. Fujio. They achieved their fame from their decorated series, Doraemon.

Together they won: the 1963 Shogakukan Manga Award for their work on Old Song and Tebukuro Tecchan, the 1981 Kawasaki City’s Cultural Prize, the 1982 Shogakukan Manga Award  for children’s manga, the 1989 the Film Special Meritorious Prize, the 1989 Golden Gloss Prize, and the first Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize Grand Prize in 1997.

1. Bouken Erekitetou

Author:       TSURUTA Kenji 
Artist:         TSURUTA Kenji    
Genre(s):    Seinen

“After her grandfather’s death, Mikura chose to continue their island express courier service. With her seaplane and her adventurous cat, Endeavor, she lives life as she chooses. Soon, Mikura becomes very interested in a mysterious island that seems to move around, according to local legend. After some extensive effort to determine the island’s whereabouts, she manages to get a brief glimpse of it from the sky. Now that she knows it’s real, she’s determined to find the island again, no matter what it takes!” -Mangahelpers

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 3/25 - 4/1.

The highly decorated Hitoshi Iwaaki-sensei is the author and artist of notable works such as Kodansha Manga Award winner Parasyte and 2005 Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize finalist and 2010 Japan Media Arts Festival grand prize winner Historie.

1. Radio Heads

Author:        Mukoura Hirokazu 
Artist:          Mukoura Hirokazu    
Genre(s):    School Life, Sci-fi, Seinen

“At the Ozu Technical High School, students ranging from first years in their teens to fifth years already in their 20’s are bred to become engineers. Togawa Sumiji is the president of the Robotics Division and is just as gifted and passionate as all the other nerds in his school. But something about Sumiji makes him stand out from everyone else. And with the robot competition drawing close, it’s time for him to shine as the president and lead his members into building the greatest robot in history.” -Mangafox.com

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 3/11 - 3/18.

Odette Yoshizawa can be best described by her classmate’s reaction: “She looks like a doll.” In one sense, Odette is very beautiful.  However, in another sense, she literally looks like a doll. This is because she is an android.

1. Hana Michi Otome

Author:     HAMASIN   
Artist:       HAMASIN 
Genre(s):   Romance Shounen Slice of Life

“When Mikoto was little, she first heard the voices of plants. She also gained flower markings on her face and body, as a sign of her connection to them. Unfortunately for her, she was brutally teased and bullied, both for the markings and her claims that she could hear flowers talking. By the time she was in high school, Mikoto took to wearing clothes specifically designed to cover everything, but she still couldn’t escape her classmates’ bullying. One day, a strange and exuberant transfer student, Aozakura Yuji, appears and takes an interest in Mikoto. He’s determined to start a flower arrangement club, but with a twist: he wants to photograph beautiful girls arranged with flowers. He first pursues Mikoto, both for her beauty and because he bears the same flower markings as she does. After he photographs her for a promotional poster, everyone at school can see the beauty of Mikoto and her flower markings. Will Aozakura’s flower arrangement club succeed? Is this the start of a new high school life for Mikoto?” -Mangareader.net

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 2/12 - 2/19.

1. Eureka Seven: Astral Ocean

Author:     BONES 
Artist:       KATOU Yuuichi 
Genre(s):   Action Adventure Drama Mecha Romance Shounen

“Manga sequel to the Eureka Seven anime series. The story centers around a boy named Ao who ‘sets ‘destiny’ in motion again when he holds the ‘power”. -ANN

Click below to view the rest of the notable manga from 1/22 - 1/29.