100 books like Showa 1926-1939

This book is a classic 1960s/1970s style gekiga book, which means more sophisticated literary manga. These are wonderful moving and funny stories from the street, about everyday people dealing with the pain and disappointment that we all must face throughout life. If you have never read any comic books beyond superhero ones this book will open your eyes to how subtle and intelligent comic books can be. I was lucky enough to meet and work with Tatsumi before he died.

Tsuge is another of the early gekiga greats, who only recently allowed English translation of his classic work from the 1960s and 70s. Tsuge pushed the boundaries of what manga stories were about, into more abstract and surreal areas and visual presentation. This book is, like Tatsumi’s books, a glimpse of a little-known Japan beneath the common stereotypes. Its stories are told in an understated and sophisticated fashion. Literary manga indeed. Wonderful stuff, personally I love it.

This is another of the early gekiga greats coming out in a big English edition for the first time. Matsumoto worked alongside Tsuge and Tatsumi in the late 50s, to push manga into more mature territory of what I’m calling literary manga. This book is from early 70s strips which show how people relate to each other in a big city in a simple, understated style. Again, it’s a balance to the image of manga being all about exaggeration. He considers alienation, longing, aimlessness, but with humour and a lightness of touch. It also shows various onomatopoeia which Matsumoto was careful to create, and he made many originals ones.   

(If it wasn't obvious by the cover, this book has adult content in it - so it's not for young readers!)

I relate so heavily to this book! Since it’s an autobiography, it’s such a raw and honest look at what it can be like to explore your sexuality as an adult, all while struggling with mental health and self-image.

I feel that the author’s tone of voice and inner monologue throughout the story is so relatable and humorous. Just like Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me, I would recommend this book for the art alone! It has an incredibly charming and simplistic art style that suits it so well.

This series turns the “tortured outcast” trope on its head: these nerd characters are proud to be outcasts, and the one thing they don't want to be associated with is beautiful, popular people! I love this story because I, too, once fell into the “us vs. them” mentality against people I thought were too cool for me as a youth— people who could have potentially become my best friends! This manga series beautifully celebrates how we are all different, but still might have more in common than we think.

This is an art book that showcases the masterful craft of an artist who knows how to weave souls into their characters and worlds. Her titles made me laugh, cry, jump up from my seat, and the characters and concepts in the pages of this book make me re-live these moments again and again. She uses a very unusual gouache technique, unlike any other manga artist I know of. The precision and determination in every stroke are stunning, and a book I believe any aspiring artist should have in their library.

I absolutely adore Miyazaki’s art in Nausicaa. Although dealing in themes of plague and pollution, the artwork really feels like it comes from a place of love. His creature and vehicle designs exude his adoration of nature and science. And everything is rendered in a soft, effortless chiaroscuro that makes reading an endless pleasure. 

But maybe the single most endearing attribute is the character, Nausicaa, herself. It seems to me, that more often than not, a hero story asks its protagonist to go through some sort of reluctant change to become a hero. But not Nausicaa. She comes to us fully formed, full of virtue and ambition. And so the story is centered on her choices. The story doesn’t happen to her, she drives it herself.

In Japan, Osamu Tezuka is often referred to as the “God of Manga.” And Phoenix may be his greatest manga series of all. He created twelve volumes between 1954 and his death in 1989. Around 1971, a friend in Tokyo lent me the first five and I became hooked on manga and their potential as a medium of expression. The story converges on the present from the past and the future and deals with reincarnation and the quest for eternal life. My favorite volume is Karma, which has a strong Buddhist theme, and spectacular page layouts. With a group called Dadakai, I translated the first five volumes around 1977/78. After collecting dust for nearly twenty-five years, Jared Cook and I translated the remaining volumes, and the whole series was then finally published by Viz Communications between 2002 and 2008. This work changed my life.

I love Mitsuru Adachi for his masterful storytelling and playful touch. Comics are all about choosing the right moments to string into sequences, and Adachi has a knack for choosing surprising moments without losing the clarity of the story. He's had a huge influence on my work. A story about two friends: an ace pitcher and an ace batter, and their rivalry for love and victory on the baseball field. Behind this epic baseball drama is a wonderful story about the couple that could never be.

I was absolutely delighted by this young adult graphic novel which details three Asian girls’ lives as they live and study in Japan. One is from America, one from Korea, and one from Singapore, and each has such a profound story to tell about their path to self-acceptance and personal freedom.