Manga like Kabocha to Mayonnaise

Solanin

Also known as Solanin.

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Music , Slice of Life

College graduates struggle to cope with the real world. Music offers refuge in this modern manga with an American attitude. Meiko Inoue is a recent college grad working as an office lady in a job she hates. Her boyfriend Shigeo is permanently crashing at her apartment because his job as a freelance illustrator doesn't pay enough for rent. And her parents in the country keep sending her boxes of veggies that just rot in her fridge. Straddling the line between her years as a student and the rest of her life, Meiko struggles with the feeling that she's just not cut out to be a part of the real world.



Notes:
The chapter count contains an epilogue published in October 2017 as part of the new Japanese volumes edition release.
It was nominated for the 2009 Eisner Award for Best U.S. Edition of International Material - Japan.
It was nominated for the 2009 Harvey Award for Best American Edition of Foreign Material.

Tags: Coming of Age , Band , Tragedy , Seinen , Heterosexual , Found Family , Primarily Adult Cast , Female Protagonist , Family Life , College , Urban , Rock Music , Office Lady , Nudity

Indigo Blue

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Romance , Slice of Life

Rutsu, a novelist, finds herself caught between her boyfriend and another woman.

Tags: Love Triangle , Primarily Adult Cast , Female Protagonist , Yuri , Josei , Writing , Bisexual , LGBTQ+ Themes , Heterosexual

blue

Also known as Blue.

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama

Kayako Kirishima and Masami Endo are about to discover that their recent friendship is turning into obsessive love. But when today’s hopes and yesterday’s dreams meet tomorrow’s problems, will they be able to continue? With clear outline and confused feelings, Kiriko Nananan demonstrates that it is possible to make a Blue manga from black and white.



Tags: Yuri , Coming of Age , Josei , School , LGBTQ+ Themes , Female Protagonist , Tragedy , Primarily Teen Cast , Coastal , Age Gap , Primarily Female Cast , Bisexual , Heterosexual

pink

Also known as Pink.

Status: Finished
Genres: Comedy , Drama

Pink is a manga about a Japanese girl named Yumi, a beautiful girl in her early 20s. During the day, Yumi works as a regular office lady, but by night, she works as a prostitute. Yumi needs her two jobs to make ends meet. She also needs the extra income to feed her unusual pet, a crocodile, which she keeps in her apartment. Working in an office is quite normal for young Japanese women, but keeping a pet crocodile, and being a prostitute makes Yumi stand out. In truth, few girls are like Yumi, however, many readers can empathize with her. Young women love their "something," symbolized by her pet crocodile, and they can also identify with Yumi's "wild at heart" nature.

Tags: Josei , Prostitution , Nudity , Female Protagonist , Tragedy , Heterosexual , Urban , Primarily Adult Cast , Animals , Office Lady , Work

Sekishoku Elegy

Also known as Red Colored Elegy.

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Slice of Life

Seiichi Hayashi produced Red Colored Elegy between 1970 and 1971, in the aftermath of a politically turbulent and culturally vibrant decade that promised but failed to deliver new possibilities. With a combination of sparse line work and visual codes borrowed from animation and film, the quiet melancholy lives of a young couple struggling to make ends meet are beautifully captured in this poetic masterpiece.

Uninvolved with the political movements of the time, Ichiro and Sachiko hope for something better, but they're no revolutionaries; their spare time is spent drinking, smoking, daydreaming, and sleeping--together and at times with others. While Ichiro attempts to make a living from his comics, Sachiko's parents are eager to arrange a marriage for her, but Ichiro doesn't seem interested. Both in their relationship and at work, Ichiro and Sachiko are unable to say the things they need to say, and like any couple, at times say things to each other that they do not mean, ultimately communicating as much with their body language and what remains unsaid as with words.

Red Colored Elegy is informed as much by underground Japanese comics of the time as it is by the French Nouvelle Vague, and its cultural referents range from James Dean to Ken Takakura. Its influence in Japan was so large that Morio Agata, a prominent Japanese folk musician and singer songwriter, debuted with a love song written and named after it.

"I wanted to live like Sachiko and Ichiro; to have aspirations even while living stoically and humbly." --Morio Agata



Tags: Seinen , Drawing , Heterosexual , Work , Nudity , Suicide , Primarily Adult Cast

Sayonara Midori-chan

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Slice of Life

At age 20, Yuko is leading a life without aspirations, what with work as an assistant in a company and her boyfriend Yutaka. Determined to give a new twist to her lifestyle, she accepts Yutaka's offer to work at his side by night as a bar hostess. But Yuko quickly becomes disenchanted: this choice brings her much more trouble than pleasant surprises, leading her to face difficult situations, even dangerous ones. And above all, she doesn't succeed in getting closer to Yutaka who remains elusive and indifferent to her signs of affection. Despite his infidelity, Yuko persists in clinging to that futile and fruitless relationship. Will she react before being unable to break the deadlock? How far will she let herself go?

Tags: Primarily Adult Cast , Josei , Nudity , Female Protagonist

Undercurrent

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Mystery , Psychological , Slice of Life

The manga begins as Kanae Sekiguchi, proprietor of the Tsuki no Yu bathhouse, struggles to reopen her business after the unexplained disappearance of her husband...

Tags: Seinen , Primarily Adult Cast , Female Protagonist , Work , Detective , Suicide

Dousei Jidai

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Romance , Slice of Life

Kyouko (21) and Jiro (23) live together in Tokyo as an unmarried couple. She was a graphic artist in an advertisement agency, and he was just starting out as an illustrator. In a world on the verge of a sexual revolution, this is the story of their daily life with friends and family, and the struggles of their relationship.

Tags: Philosophy , Seinen , Heterosexual , Female Protagonist , Cohabitation , Nudity , Primarily Adult Cast , Urban , Episodic , Drawing , Office Lady , Tragedy , Incest , Sadism , Suicide

Guzu na Onna Bakari ja Nai Ze

Also known as Not All Girls Are Stupid.

Status: Finished
Genres: Romance

A collection of one-shots by Minami Q-ta.

1-6. Guzu na Onna bakari ja Nai ze (愚図な女ばかりじゃないぜ)

3-4. Tanoshii Houkago (楽しい放課後; Fun After School)
This is a two-part one-shot that tells about the relationship between Iwata Megumi, the idol of Chofu High School, and Midorikawa Mayuko, also known as Miss Chofu High School. When another student takes a picture of the two of them in an intimate moment, what lengths will Megumi go to to get the picture and negative? Note: contains non consensual sexual situations.

Ninpu-chan (にんぷちゃん)
Hikari-chan no Koibito (ひかりちゃんの恋人)
Koibito to Wakareru Hi (恋人と別れる日)

School Days (スクール・デイズ)
This centers around a girl named Misaki who hates the co-ed school she was forced to transfer to and desperately misses her best friend from the girls' school she used to attend. Note: contains heterosexual sex.



Tags: Josei , Yuri , Anthology , Nudity

Renai Anagram

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Romance

Scarred by domestic violence and the sudden departure of her mother and her younger brother, Satsuki doesn't know how to trust people. Renai Anagram is the story of a young woman's struggles to overcome her past and learn how to accept and value herself.



Tags: Primarily Adult Cast , Josei , Female Protagonist , Disability , Tragedy , Heterosexual