Manga like Nonnonba to Ore

GeGeGe no Kitarou

Also known as GeGeGe no Kitaro.

Status: Finished
Genres: Comedy , Horror , Supernatural

Youkai are specters who have lived in the human world since the dawn of time. They often rest peacefully in their dwelling places, until humans rouse them by inconsiderate actions. Kitaro is a young youkai boy who wants to help humans and youkai live in harmony, and he fights to protect humans from the enraged youkai who lash out at them.

Tags: Youkai , Demons , Shounen , Ghost , Urban Fantasy

Souin Gyokusai seyo!

Also known as Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths.

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Psychological

Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths is his first book to be translated into English and is a semiautobiographical account of the desperate final weeks of a Japanese infantry unit at the end of World War II. The soldiers are told that they must go into battle and die for the honor of their country, with certain execution facing them if they return alive. Mizuki was a soldier himself (he was severely injured and lost an arm) and uses his experiences to convey the devastating consequences and moral depravity of the war.



Note: Won Best U.S. Edition of International Material at the Eisner Awards in 2012.

Tags: Historical , Military , War , Autobiographical , Primarily Adult Cast , Primarily Male Cast , Tragedy , Seinen , Guns , Suicide

Boku no Isshou wa Gegege no Rakuen da: Manga Mizuki Shigeru Jijoden

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

Shigeru Mizuki's autobiography on 1500 pages in six volumes.

Tags: Historical , Autobiographical , War , Youkai , Seinen

Mizuki Shigeru no Tono Monogatari

Also known as Tono Monogatari.

Status: Finished
Genres: Horror , Mystery , Supernatural

Shigeru Mizuki--Japan's grand master of yokai comics--adapts one of the most important works of supernatural literature into comic book form. The cultural equivalent of the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, Tono Monogatari is a defining text of Japanese folklore and one of the country's most important works of literature. This graphic novel was created during the later stage of Mizuki's career, after he had retired from the daily grind of commercial comics to create personal, lasting works of art.

Originally written in 1910 by folklorists and field researchers Kunio Yanagita and Kizen Sasaki, Tono Monogatari celebrates and archives legends from the Tono region. These stories were recorded as Japan's rapid modernization led to the disappearance of traditional culture. This adaptation mingles the original text with autobiography: Mizuki attempts to retrace Yanagita and Sasaki's path, but finds his old body is not quite up to the challenge of following in their footsteps. As Mizuki wanders through Tono he retells some of the most famous legends, manifesting a host of monsters, dragons, and foxes. In the finale, Mizuki meets Yanagita himself and they sit down to discuss their works.



Tags: Historical , Youkai , Nudity , Rural , War

Gabai

Status: Finished
Genres: Comedy , Slice of Life

Gabai Granny is based on the bestseller Saga No Gabai Baachan (Gabai Granny from Saga), which is penned by comedian Shimada Yoshichi as he recounts his childhood memories of growing up under the care of his grandmother.

This is the story of a young boy, after being sent from Hiroshima to Saga (10 years after the second World War, in 1958) by his mom because of a lack of money, journeying to a faraway place, and living in conditions alien to him, definitely makes him miss home. Worse, he is not familiar with his grandmother and her ways too. But with his Gabai Granny, he will slowly discover with his growing pains, just how resourceful Granny is...



Tags: Seinen , Rural , Family Life , Iyashikei , Historical , School

Kantou Heiya

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Slice of Life

August 15 1945, a plane from the US Air Forces crashes in a field in the Chiba region. Thus begins, the day of Japan's capitulation, that great bildungsroman about Kinta, a young boy raised by his grandfather after his mother's death.

Tags: Historical , Seinen , Transgender

Boku no Tezuka

Status: Finished
Genres:

Takao Yaguchi, well-known for his work Tsurikichi Sanpei, create this one-volume dedicated to the memory of the "Manga no Kamisama", Osamu Tezuka.

Tags: Historical , Seinen

Mushishi

Also known as Mushishi.

Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Fantasy , Mystery , Slice of Life , Supernatural

Some live in the deep darkness behind your eyelids. Some eat silence. Some thoughtlessly kill. Some simply drive men mad. They are known as mushi—creatures that came into being shortly after life emerged from the primordial ooze. They still exist parallel to our own lives and can only be seen by a select few. As a mushishi, Ginko is one of the few who are aware of their existense, and this young man with a sardonic smile roams from place to place with the knowledge and skill to aid those unwittingly affected by mushi.



Note: Won the Excellence Prize for Manga at the 7th Japan Media Arts Festival in 2003 and the Kodansha Manga Award for General Manga in 2006.

Tags: Travel , Episodic , Environmental , Youkai , Seinen , Mythology , Rural , Iyashikei , Philosophy , Male Protagonist , Tragedy , Urban Fantasy , Historical , Work , Demons

Gekiga Hyouryuu

Also known as A Drifting Life.

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

Over four decades ago, Yoshihiro Tatsumi expanded the horizons of comics storytelling by using the visual language of manga to tell gritty, literary stories about the private lives of everyday people. He has been called "the grandfather of Japanese alternative comics" and has influenced generations of cartoonists around the world. Now the visionary creator of "The Push Man and Other Stories" and "Good-bye" has turned his incisive, unflinching gaze upon himself. Over ten years in the making, "A Drifting Life" is Tatsumis' most ambitious, personal, and heart felt work: an autobiographical bildungsroman in comics form.Using his life long obsession with comics as a frame work, Tatsumi weaves a complex story that encompasses family dynamics, Japanese culture and history, first love, the intricacies of the manga industry, and most importantly, what it means to be an artist. Alternately humorous, enlightening, and haunting, this is the masterful summartion of a fascinating life and a historic career.



Tags: Drawing , Historical , Autobiographical , Non-fiction , Tragedy , Work , School , Seinen