Tis the Season

With the holidays rolling around, so comes the holiday shopping; a Kafkaesque nightmare of cash register lines, busy sales assistants, and poorly managed public transportation. [Ok, that last one maybe only for me. I refuse to drive. My insurance is expensive enough as it is, and my faith in snow tires and my driving abilities is, needless to say, lacking.] Instead of cruising backblurbs aimlessly, why not take a few recommendations? The below are only guidelines, but you'd be surprised what you can miss mixed in among the shelves.

For the shounen fan

Good god, did we get a lot of shounen manga this year. In the wake of this season’s Naruto mania, it’s less than guesswork to predict what’ll pop up under many trees, but parents/siblings/friends have also got a plethora of other titles to choose from, some of them more unappreciated than others. Viz’s Kekkaishi in particular falls into the latter category, as does Tokyopop’s surprisingly good Genju no Seiza. The deliciously delightful Yakitate! Japan also promises intense bread on bread action, and proves a welcome relief from other “sports formula” titles on the market.

For the shoujo fan

2007 brought with it plenty of quarky titles to choose from, and whether you go for haircuts of hockey, there’s a heroine that’s sure to appeal. Viz once again ups the ante with Kiyoko Arai’s Beauty Pop & a few new volumes of Nana, and just about everybody can enjoy Aya Nakahara’s sarcastically endearing Lovely Complex. Del Rey rounds out the field with My Heavenly Hockey Club, while readers looking for something slightly heavier would do well to try Lee Eun Young’s Saver. Dark Horse’s Bride of the Water God is a lushly rendered treat as well.

For the seinen fan

Alright, I’m going to shamelessly push a series I’ve been enjoying here; go out there and buy a copy of Dark Horse’s Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service. For fans who already dig morbidly good times, Hosui Yamazaki strikes again with Dark Horse in Mail while Tokyopop’s The Embalmer stalks similar grounds. If you’re questing for psychological thrills and chills, Monster and Uzumaki might fit the bill, as would Mochizuki Minetaro’s Dragon Head.

For the older fan

For the readers who’ve already blown through Western literature and perhaps ambled through Lit 101 before coming back around to comics, Vertical offers goodies galore. Apollo’s Song, Buddha, MW and Ode to Kirihito remind most of us why Tezuka remains a manga kingpin, while Drawn and Quaterly’s gekiga anthologies [The Push Man and Other Stories & Abandon the Old in Tokyo] remind us that manga can be heavy as anything. jaPress and Patrick Macias get ten points from just about everybody for putting out Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms in collab with Last Gasp.

For the manga reader

Have no clue what they go for? Know they read manga, and little else? Never fear; manga offers up plenty of titles with demographic spanning appeal. I’m reasonably sure you’d have to have a cold, steely interior in order not to like Azuma Kiyohiko’s Yotsuba&, and Kozue Amano’s Aria & Aqua are pretty innocuous too. Of course, if you can’t give them anything, give them everything; Jason Thompson’s Manga: the Complete Guide should be more than enough to keep your wish lists full for holidays to come.