Mal's Running Rec post

[maldoror_gw]

Wherein Mal lists and rates some of the stuff she's been reading, for those who may be interested. I'll just add to this list, from the top, when I finish something new and then put up a new post linking back to it.

Comments

[reflecttheother]

Have you read the manga "Gokusen"? It's shoujo, but I was pleasantly surprised to find it to not be pathetically sweet and relationship driven (if you discount the very end of it). The series drags on a bit too long, imo, but it's not so bad that I wanted to stop reading.

[reflecttheother]

*seconded* Strong, adult lead woman who does not get rescued by one of her potential boyfriends despite being a fighting expert herself. Pretty realistic view of low class Japanese life (both school and Yakuza). And the manga pulls off a hair raising balancing act on a road filled with pitfalls. It staggers from brink to brink, gets its feet seriously sloshed with cliche, but never quite slips all the waz. Except for the very end (as already mentioned). But if you've stuck around for 140 chapters, you probably will forgive that turn because it is a josei manga after all.

[maldoror_gw]

I just spent the last two days reading this manga, so yeah, you can say I liked it ^___^ Thanks for the rec!!

[reflecttheother]

I'm glad you're enjoying it!

[anonymous]

I wanted really hard to get into Noblesse, but the top-down style is just too unusual for me to really like. Maybe with your rec I'll try it again with a more open mind.

-- Guile

[anonymous]

Noblesse is brilliant! Loved it, and there's so much fun without words!

But you should really try reading Tokyo Crazy Paradise - it's Love in the Mask, first version, and it's fantastic. Lots of fun, humour, tropes who develop depth and eye candy (where would we be without eye candy? probably devoid of the entire shoujo genre and most of shonen ^_^)

keep reccing, mal!

misaki_h

[anonymous]

Oh, yes, I also rec Tokyo Crazy Paradise. It is not really "the first version of LitM", because the guy is awesome, too (well, he needs to be, since he is the head of the biggest and strongest yakuza gang of the region, when he is just 15 or so), but the girl is his equal and sometimes better :D

As for books, I like Tanya Huff's works, too. "The Fire Stone" is a classic tale with a nice twist. A princess, the heir apparent; a prince, third son, charming and alcoholic; and a thief, talented, with a death wish and a sad past; all of them on a quest. You would think, cliche, romance, love triangle, blah blah, nothing new. But you may be surprised :)

And John Moore's stories: "Heroics for beginners" and "The unhandsome prince". They are stand-alone books, both poking and twisting the well-known fairy tales like Rapunzel, the Frog Prince... and the typical heroes very nicely. with such a laughing tone :D

[aeropi]

For manga, nothing quite makes me laugh as much as Gintama. It's one of the Jump mangas with a main hero who DOESN'T want to save the world, be the best, or strive for anything. He just wants to make enough money to eat sweets and play pachinko. The manga doesn't take itself seriously and hilariously weird pop culture shows up, but it has as much heart as One Piece or any of the other big hitters. It's the only manga that's had me winded and literally rolling around on the floor from laughing. A lot of my stupid friends discounted it for its old-looking art, but it is sooooo worth it.

[ember_alda]

Oh I agree so much, I am in love with Gintama, it makes no pretenses about what it is. You already know what you are getting into when you read the first few chapters. Sket Dance is really good, and it follows the same type of pace Gintama does. If you enjoy Gintama I would check out Sket Dance too.

[maldoror_gw]

Never even heard of that one, I'll have to check it out, thanks! I started Gintama awhile back and gave up on it, I can't remember why...It didn't quite manage to capture my attention, but I didn't read the requisite 10-20 chapters (the ones that get past the initial stages and which would have tripped me up on a lot of other manga I ended up liking) so I should probably give it another go.