It’s a great day for BECK fans, especially for those of us who’ve been following Koyuki and his band for the better part of the last decade! The legendary rock ‘n’ roll manga got rebooted as an comiXology Originals series last year from Kodansha Comics, and today—at last—all volumes of BECK just became available in English for the first time! Will the band’s dream of bring people together through music come true? What happened to Koyuki and his love interest? Read it all to the weepy conclusion only on comiXology and Kindle—and you can also binge read the whole series totally FREE with comiXology Unlimited!
BECK new Volumes 23-34 just launched today on comiXology and Kindle! The complete series is available for free with comiXology Unlimited!
But WAIT! That’s not all! Harold Sakuishi, the creator of BECK has been making history with his latest epic, Seven Shakespeares! With his ever so powerful artwork and storytelling, Sakuishi tackles the myths surrounding the literary legend, William Shakespeare. Two new volumes of Seven Shakespeares (volumes 8-9) also launched on comiXology and Kindle today!
Spaceships … time travel … mobile suits … and aliens! Are you a … true science-fiction head? Or just inspired by Battle Angel Alita? Whatever the case may be, Kodansha Comics has lots of cool science-fiction manga on offer, and to showcase our recent hits like EDENS ZERO—a new space-fantasy series by none other than Fairy Tail‘s Hiro Mashima—and timeless classics like The Ghost in the Shell and Parasyte, this week we’re hosting the Science-Fiction & Beyond Sale where all volumes of 30+ manga series are up to 50% off at our digital retail partners: BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, Kindle, and nook. (Sale ends March 4.)
~ Science-Fiction & Beyond Sale ~ February 26-March 4 Click on the link to read Chapter 1 for FREE!
Gather round, Kodansha Comics fans! As you’ve heard, 2019 marks the 10th Anniversary of Kodansha Comics, and to celebrate, each month of 2019 we’ll be featuring a different series as we celebrate some of the classic and most iconic Kodansha Comics series with exclusive contents, special deals, sweepstakes, and more. (ICYMI—we’ve already spotlighted AKIRA and Battle Angel Alita!).
But special surprises and exclusive new content isn’t all we have in store—we’re also hiring an intern mascot, drawn by the one-and-only Hiro Mashima, creator of Fairy Tail, to help us celebrate and promote our 10th Anniversary all year long! We’ve narrowed our pool down to three candidates, and we want you, our fans, to help us decide the winning mascot.
Check out the three candidates below, and vote here for who you think we should choose as the winning mascot. The winner will be announced in the coming weeks, so stay tuned to KodanshaComics.com and our Twitter @KodanshaUSA, Facebook @KodanshaComics or Instagram @kodansha_comics for more #KC10YRS news, announcements, and more!
The voting period starts on February 21 through March 11, 2019. VOTE NOW!
Celebrate 10 Years of Kodansha Comics with us all year long by following us on KodanshaComics.com!
Be sure to check back again next month, when we’ll be shining the spotlight on yet another Kodansha classic!
Kodansha Comics is proud to announce that not one, not two, but five of our series have made the Young Adult Library Services Association’s (YALSA) 2019 Great Graphic Novels for Teens list! If you’ve been searching for a new manga series to discover—or if you’ve been looking for the perfect new series to gift to a friend or teen family member —look no further than these five, fabulous series below!
Kinichiro Imamura isn’t a bad guy, really, but on the first day of high school his narrow eyes and bleached blonde hair made him look so shifty that his classmates assumed the worst. Three years later, without any friends or fond memories, he isn’t exactly feeling bittersweet about graduation. But after an accidental fall down a flight of stairs, Kinichiro wakes up three years in the past… on the first day of high school! Has he really gone back in time, or is this just a crazy dream? An encounter with an awkwardly eccentric fellow student might give Kinichiro the chance to live a different version of his dull high school life—if can just bring himself to seize the chance…
Again!! Volumes 1 through 6 are available now —Volume 7 coming March 19, 2019!
Makoto Kowata, a novice witch, packs up her belongings (including a black cat familiar) and moves in with her distant cousins in rural Aomori to complete her training and become a full-fledged witch.
Flying WitchVolumes 1 through 6 are available now—Volume 7 coming June 11, 2019!
Frau Faust(Ages 16+) By Kore Yamazaki, creator of The Ancient Magus’ Bride
More than a century after an eccentric scholar made an infamous deal with a devil, the story of Faust has passed into legend. However, the true Faust is not the stuffy, professorial man known in fairy tales, but a charismatic, bespectacled woman named Johanna Faust, who happens to still be alive. Searching for pieces of her long-lost demon, Johanna passes through a provincial town, where she saves a young boy named Marion from a criminal’s fate. In exchange, she asks a simple favor of Marion, but Marion soon finds himself intrigued by the peculiar Doctor Faust and joins her on her journey.
A lonely boy wandering the desolate tundra meets a wolf, and the two become fast friends, depending on each other to survive the harsh environment. But the boy has a history, and the wolf is more than meets the eye as well … To Your Eternity is a totally unique and moving manga about death, life, reincarnation, and the nature of love.
To Your Eternity Volumes 1 through 8 are available now—Volume 9 coming April 16, 2019!
Mitsuki is a shy girl who’s about to enter high school, and vows to open herself up to new friendships. Of course, the four stars of the boys’ basketball team weren’t exactly the friends she had in mind! Yet, when they drop by the café where she works, the five quickly hit it off. Soon she’s been accidentally thrust into the spotlight, targeted by jealous girls. And will she expand her mission to include… love?
Waiting for SpringVolumes 1 through 10 are available now —Volume 11 coming July 23, 2019!
The year 2019 marks the 10th anniversary of the first Kodansha Comics manga published in English. Please join us in celebration as we select one classic Kodansha Comics series each monthfor exclusive content, promotions, and other surprises!
December Spotlight: Attack on Titan
Our December Spotlight needs no introduction, and we’re sure many of you have already guessed which major series was yet to be featured. Without further ado, we’re thrilled to feature Hajime Isayama’s worldwide sensation Attack on Titan! It’s also just in time for the series latest entry, Volume 29! So what are the final “special surprises” that we have in humanity’s darkest hour? Check these out! … Read More
November Spotlight: CLAMP
Our November Spotlight is on the critically acclaimed manga team CLAMP and their expansive interconnected world including series like Cardcaptor Sakura, Tsubasa, xxxHOLiC, and the newly minted Magic Knight Rayearth Box Set! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have to whisk you away this month? Check these out! … Read More
October Spotlight: The Ghost in Shell
Our October spotlight title is the cyberpunk cop classic The Ghost in the Shell. Not the usual kind of ghosts October is known for, but as the year winds down to a close, we’re focusing on some timeless manga classics! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you this month? Check these out! … Read More
September Spotlight: Akiko Higashimura
Our September Spotlight is on celebrated all-around manga genius Akiko Higashimura and her iconic shojo series Princess Jellyfishand Tokyo Tarareba Girls, just in time to celebrate Tokyo Tarareba Girls winning the prestigious Eisner Award at this year’s San Diego Comic Con! …Read More
August Spotlight: Vinland Saga
Our August Spotlight title is Makoto Yukimura’s Viking epic Vinland Saga, which recently received an anime debut! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have for you to pillage this month? Check these out …Read More
July Spotlight: Fire Force
Our July Spotlight title is Atsushi Ohkubo’s red-hot series Fire Force, set to debut as anime series this month! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you? Check these out …Read More
June Spotlight: Hiro Mashima
Our June Spotlight is the one-and-only Hiro Mashima, the superstar manga creator of classic shonen sagas Fairy Tail and newcomerEdens Zero! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you this month? Check these out …Read More
Our May Spotlight title is Nakaba Suzuki’s beloved, action-packed shonen series The Seven Deadly Sins! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you this month? Check these out…Read More
Our April Spotlight title is Yoshitoki Oima’s moving coming-of-age manga A Silent Voice, and with the release of the A Silent Voice movie now out on Bluray and DVD, it couldn’t be better timing to celebrate this Eisner-nominated series! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you this month? Check these out …Read More
For the month of January, we have our spotlight on Akira by Katsuhiro Otomo—one most influential comics ever drawn and one of the first Kodansha Comics releases way back in 2009. …Read More
Post-Valentine’s Day! Love Is a Battlefield Sale! Congratulations, you’ve survived Valentine’s Day, again. But let’s be real: romance doesn’t begin or end on February 14, in real life—or in manga! In fact the so-called most romantic day of the year might just be the prelude to one wild emotional rollercoaster ride. And as well-read fans of Kodansha Comics’s extensive romance-manga lineup know, love can be as tough as or tougher than any battle in shonen manga.
So, to get you through to next year’s Valentine’s Day, at least as far as manga is concerned, this week we’ve selected a massive 60+ romance manga series with a twist, and put them at 50% off at all of our digital retail partners: BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, and nook. (Sale ends February 25.)
~ Love Is A Battlefield Sale ~ February 19-25 Click on the link to read Chapter 1 for FREE!
Update 2/15: The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale extended! All volumes of Battle Angel Alita—including the original series (Volumes 1-9), sequels, and side stories—are still 50% off on comiXology and Kindle through February 21!
The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale, Part 2
Watched Alita: Battle Angel yet? Either way you gotta know there’s more to the world of Battle Angel Alita than meets the eye! Like, did you know Yukito Kishiro, the creator of the original manga series, also expanded Alita’s story into the past and the future? So, if you’re obsessed with Kishiro’s fearless heroine, like we all are, you may want to take a deep dive …
That’s why, starting this week, we’re having the second installment of The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale, where all volumes of prequel and sequel manga series by Yukito Kishiro are up to50% off at all of our digital retail partners: BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, and nook. (Sale ends February 18.)
The Past—Battle Angel Alita: Mars Chronicle
The latest story arc of the Battle Angel saga goes back into what Alita was looking for all along—her childhood memories on Mars.
Synopsis For centuries, war has raged on the dusty, red surface of Mars. This apocalyptic crucible will produce the solar system’s most fearsome warrior, Alita. But for now that warrior is just a little girl named Yoko. The future and past of the battle angel fan out across the reaches of space in the final chapter of one of the greatest science-fiction epics of all time!
Here’s Chapter 1 of the Battle Angel Alita: Mars Chronicle manga for FREE!
The Future—Battle Angel Alita: Last Order
You thought you said “goodbye” to Alita by the end of the original series. Think again. This sequel series tells you how Alita and other characters survived even further into the future!
Synopsis Alita wakes up alone in the sky city of Tiphares, her brain and body reconstructed by the mad scientist Desty Nova. There’s no time to wonder why Alita’s greatest enemy would resurrect her, though—the royal city has been thrown into chaos by Nova’s revelation that the Tiphareans have had their brains replaced by bio-chips! Everyone needs answers—and Alita will fight to get them!
They took a brief holiday, but our “digital-first” debuts are back! And 2019 kicks off with a trio of highly anticipated digital manga debuts by some of the most talented women creators working in the medium. The lineup includes two recent hit shojo romantic comedies in Rumi Ichinohe’s My Sweet Girl and Rila Kirishima’s World’s End and Apricot Jam, to be followed by the English-language debut of one of the most beautiful examples of the medium in Waki Yamato’s renowned adaptation of the literary classic, The Tale of Genji.
Media/Reviewers:
For an advance review copy of The Tale of Genji: Dreams at Dawn, visit our site at NetGalley or contact pr@kodanshacomics.com
Since 2017, readers of our “digital-firsts” have gotten the jump on everything from the updated translation of Battle Angel Alita to new volumes of never-finished classics like BECK to the first appearance of current hits like Tokyo Tarareba Girlsand Grand Blue Dreaming. The success of our digital-firsts program has allowed us to continue building a rapidly expanding English-language manga library based on diversity of content, regular and quick releases, and commitment to completing series—and with our 2019 debuts, each series will see one new volume published per month, until the series is completed or we catch up to the latest Japanese release.
Starting with Rumi Ichinohe’s My Sweet Girl on February 12, 2019’s opening round of digital debuts will be available on all of Kodansha Comics’s partner digital platforms, including Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, Kobo, MyAnimeList, and nook. Detailed descriptions and release schedule below—and click on the cover links to read Chapter 1!
My Sweet Girl(release date February 12) Rumi Ichinohe’s sweet, pure love story is about a girl who never imagined falling in love, until one day she she meets a boy from the next class. This one’s dedicated to all the girls who find things a little bit awkward when it comes to romance. Published in Japan in 8 volumes (still ongoing) under the Japanese title Kimi wa kawaii onnanoko. English volumes will be released monthly until caught up to Japan.
World’s End and Apricot Jam(release date February 19) Music and romance collide in Rila Kirishima off-kilter comedy about a building manager who has a run-in with a bumbling tenant—who turns out to be the lead singer of a supercool band. Published in Japan in 6 volumes (complete) under the Japanese title: Sekai no hajikko to anzu jam. English volumes will be released monthly.
The Tale of Genji: Dreams at Dawn(release date February 26) First published in the 1980s and 90s, Waki Yamato’s rendition of Murasaki Shikibu’s 11th-century literary masterpiece is still gorgeous to behold and is considered one of the greatest novel-to-manga adaptations of all time. Published in Japan in 10 oversized volumes (complete) under the Japanese title Asaki yumemishi, Volumes 1-3 of this new digital English edition will be released on February 26, with subsequent volumes released monthly.
The year 2019 marks the 10th anniversary of the first Kodansha Comics manga published in English. Please join us in celebration as we select one classic Kodansha Comics series each monthfor exclusive content, promotions, and other surprises!
Our February spotlight title is Battle Angel Alita by Yukito Kishiro—the kickass, cyberpunk classic that Kodansha Comics brought back in 2018 in beautiful, hardcover deluxe editions after over a decade out of print. And with the upcoming theatrical release of 20th Century Fox’s Alita: Battle Angel(in theaters on February 14), it couldn’t be a better month to celebrate this classic series and all things Alita! So what kind of “special surprises” do we have waiting for you this month? Check these out …
Surprise 1: Exclusive Battle Angel Alita pin! As a part of the 10 Years of Kodansha Comics project, we’ve teamed up with our friends at Rightstuf to bring you these awesome exclusive Battle Angel Alita pins! Visit Rightstuf and order any hardcover volume of Battle Angel Alita Deluxe Edition, the Battle Angel Alita Deluxe Complete Series boxset, Battle Angel Alita Mars Chronicle, or Battle Angel Alita Last Order and you’ll receive a exclusive Battle Angel Alita pin for FREE! Available this month (February 2019) only or while supplies last.
Surprise 2: The World of Battle Angel Alita Digital Sale!
Whether you’re a gnarly old school fan of Alita through the manga (or better yet, the OVA from the 90s) or shiny new school fan who just found out about Alita through the movie, it’s a good time to revisit the original manga! That’s why, starting this week, we’re having The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale, where all volumes of the masterpiece by Yukito Kishiro are up to 50% off at all of our digital retail partners: BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, and nook. (Sale ends February 11.) … More Details
Update 2/15: The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale extended!
All volumes of Battle Angel Alita—including the original series (Volumes 1-9), sequels, and side stories—are still 50% off on comiXology and Kindle through February 21! …More Details
Surprise 3: Battle Angel Alita Survey Sweepstakes! Have you ever wished you could own a collection of all things Alita? Well here’s your lucky chance: for the month of February only, ONE lucky winner will win a grab-bag of Alita stuff, including the Battle Angel Alita Deluxe Complete Series boxset, Battle Angel Alita Mars Chronicle volumes 1-5, and all volumes of Battle Angel Alita Last Order! All you have to do is take this survey by February 28.
Surprise 4: Comment and Brand New Artwork Reveal From Yukito Kishiro! –UPDAE February 8!
With the worldwide release of Alita: Battle Angel coming to theaters on February 14, it couldn’t be a better time to be an Alita fan. And no one is more excited for the premiere than the creator of Battle Angel Alita series himself, Yukito Kishiro! To celebrate Alita’s Hollywood, big screen debut, Kodansha Comics was able to get a word from Kishiro-sensei before the worldwide premiere — and he shared with us an exclusive new drawing and sketches he made just to celebrate the movie!
About Yukito Kishiro
Regarded as one of the finest action illustrators in global comics, Yukito Kishiro is best-known for creating the cyberpunk manga Battle Angel Alita. When he was only 17, Kishiro was nominated for Japanese publisher Shogakukan’s Best New Comic award. Creator of other popular manga titles, Kishiro is known for his strong characters, original settings, and intricate, lifelike artwork.
Kodansha Comics (KC): Congratulations on the release of Alita: Battle Angel! How did you feel when you found out Alita was not only going to be adapted into a Hollywood movie, but also get a worldwide premiere?
Yukito Kishiro (YK): Thank you very much. It turned into a project far bigger than I had imagined, so I’m very excited.
KC: What did you think of the Hollywood adaption of Alita – and especially Alita herself?
YK: I was surprised at first by Alita’s large eyes. But her charms quickly drew me in.
But that’s not all — to celebrate the release of Alita: Battle Angel, creator Yukito Kishiro also drew exclusive, brand new art of Alita based off of one of the movie’s promotional posters! Check out the artwork below — and take a glimpse into Kishiro-sensei’s drawing process through a few exclusive rough sketches he’s shared with us!
Surprise 5: Flash Giveaway! Get your tickets to explore the world of Alita: Battle Angel!
Follow our Twitter @KodanshaUSA or Instagram @kodansha_comics this Monday, February 11 for your chance to earn your Passport to Iron City! Experience the chaotic world of Alita: Battle Angel, if you live in Los Angeles, New York City, or Austin (or have a friend there you really like). Get augmented, uncover the secrets of Zalem, and win big betting on Motorball as you step into the Scrapyard. Don’t lose your head… or any of your other organs!
Battle Angel Alita, Noragami, That Time I Got Reincarnated as as Slime & MORE! Get up to $1000+ worth of digital manga on Humble Bundle x Kodansha Comics: Fantasy! (ends 2/13)
Celebrate 10 Years of Kodansha Comics with us all year long by following us on KodanshaComics.com! Be sure to check back again next month, when we’ll be throwing the spotlight onto yet another Kodansha classic!
Um, ready for Alita: Battle Angelto hit theaters February 14? We here at Kodansha Comics HQ frankly can’t wait to see Alita’s world realized in a big Hollywood pic, but we’re also gearin’ up for the big debates and gushy emotions that get stirred up whenever there’s a movie adaptation of a manga!
So, whether you’re a gnarly old school fan of Alita through the manga (or better yet, the OVA from the 90s) or a shiny new school fan who just found out about Alita through the movie, you have to know the original material to be ready for such battles!
That’s why, starting this week, we’re having The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale, where all volumes of the original manga series by Yukito Kishiro are up to50% off at all of our digital retail partners: BookWalker, comiXology, Google Play, iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, and nook. (Sale ends February 11.)
Here’s Chapter 1 of the Battle Angel Alita manga for FREE!
Battle Angel Alitavolumes 1-9 by Yukito Kishiro are available from Kodansha Comics!
Next week, we’ll have Part 2 of The World of Battle Angel Alita Sale! Stay tuned at KodanshaComics.com for more info!
