NYAF07: Del Rey Manga
So Manga Entertainment actually ended a little early so I’m hangin’ out before the Del Rey booth with KuronoK (who actually just scooted off to acquire an autograph or something). The Del Rey guys just arrived to set up. I feel kinda weird sitting next to a keyblade. (It’s really heavy. I would get so tired of carting it around. How do you do it, KuronoK?)
They’re handing out preview books with bits from Fairy Tail, Hell Girl, Aventura, and a couple of others, whee.
Oh hey, I think they’re live-blogging this panel. And so am I. The circle is complete.
Well, they’re liveblogging the con.
Alright, now we’re actually getting started. They’ve started out talking about Katsushi Ota, the Japanese editor of the prose and manga anthology Faust, which Del Rey is putting out in English soon. The anthology includes Kouga Yun (of Loveless), Takeshi Obata (of Death Note), CLAMP (of, uh, CLAMP), etc.
And now…announcements! But first, an ad for The Complete Guide to Manga.
They’re doing something a little funny with Fairy Tale– two volumes at a time. The first two volumes will go on sale on the same day in March.
More on Faust– it’s debuting in the summer. I also note that Fred Gallagher (the Megatokyo guy) is in it. Wait, really? He intended to have a story in Faust…but he had his baby a bit early so no Fredart in the first volume. Fred, late? SHOCKING!
The first real announcement, then, is xxxHOLiC: Another Holic, an xxxHOLiC light novel by NISIOISN (who also wrote VIZ’s Death Note: Another Note light novel). But it contains original art by CLAMP, so yay.
Another NISIOISIN novel: Zaregoto (illustrated by Take).
And now, finally, Del Rey Manga announces a manga! It’s Mao-chan, with concept and character designs by Love Hina’s Ken Akamatsu, though the manga itself is actually by Ran. Yeah, got me!
Kamichama Karin-Chu! The sequel to Kamichama Karin. I’m such a Koge Donbo whore! :D
Next up is Gankutsuoh, the manga adaptation of the amazingly visually rich Gonzo anime, which is an adaptation of Alexandre Dumas’ Count of Monte Cristo. Sweet!
Papillon, by Peach Girl’s Miwa Ueda.
Kasumi, which is an OEL written by Surt Lim and drawn by Hirofumi Sugimoto. It actually reads right-to-left like a traditional manga. It’s about a girl who can be invisible for as long as she can hold her breath and other people with similar odd powers.
Dallas is answering a question about cultural notes and stuff, and he mentions that fans in the U.S. have overwhelmingly demonstrated that they prefer (for example) the original Japanese pop culture references rather than American pop culture substitutes.
He also notes that instead of releasing all of the company’s books on the same day each month (as many manga publishers do), they’re going to stagger them and put out a few books each week instead.
Parasyte is going to start coming out more frequently– every three months instead of every six months, apparently.
By the way, Faust is not a specific genre of fiction. Pretty much everything the Japanese editor thought was good will be in it.
They have more light novels that they’ll be doing, by the way. Look out, Seven Seas!
Apparently Publishers Weekly’s Calvin Reid is “the Oprah of comics.” Pass it on!
[...] Other coverage: Ed Chavez at MangaCast Deb Aoki at About.com Gia at a geek by any other name [...]