2008 in review: manga

[meganbmoore]

A complete list of the manga I read in 2008 is here in poll form.

Here are the stats:

404 total volumes
105 series/one-shots
71 new series, complete, abandoned partway through, still reading, etc.
9 single volume series/short story collections

This does not include scanslations I read of books that I’ll get when the licensed volumes come out.

Of

Comments

[meganbmoore]

Yeah...that's basically what I was trying to say. It gets grouped in because it has gay characters, not because of the story itself.

[smillaraaq]

Well, it has gay and bi characters, plus the mangaka's OTHER work is something like 75% BL; that seems to be a big factor in the marketing and labeling decisions on the US side. (Remember my head-scratching over Wild Butterfly, the anthology that only had one overt BL story in it but was packaged and marketed like it was something straight out of Chara or BeXBoy

[meganbmoore]

or the average Pushy Alpha Bastard Romantic Lead.

I think the only ones who vaguely fit into that that I can stand are Kyo in SDK and Shuri in Basara. And in both of those, it's canon that the girls start punching when that starts up, and there's never the feeling that either guy actually means it. Kyo is basically an adolescent in certain regards, and it reads like pigtail pulling on the playground. Shuri's never actually been turned down before, and is used to being pursued, but underatands "no" perfectly well once he understands that it's being said.

[animeshon]

I am so impressed. You make me ashamed of my little forays into reading last year. I shall have to endeavour to do better this year!

[meganbmoore]

I can tolerate Higuri You's ukes in Seimaden and Cantarella, even though the BL there is a secondary focus. And her guys in general (aside from the evil ones) tend to be concerningly kinky or dorks, so...

[kakkobean]

...so organized...I could in no way remember which manga I read last year *dies*

[meganbmoore]

I keep a file throughout the year.

[kakkobean]

Aha--maybe I should do something like that...*considers*

[moriapolonius]

Hi, I hope you don't mind me jumping in.

May I ask just how did you manage to read over 400 volumes in one year? Is it part of your work or are you just that voracious a reader? It's just... unbelieveable. Financially speaking too. I wish I were able to afford to buy that many volumes.

[meganbmoore]

A) Voracious reader.
B) The bulk of my job is listening to 5 scripts for 8 hours a day. The recordings are 5-10 minutes long. All but the personal information is the same in each call. I read at work.
C) I stalk sales like a stalking thing.