Excellent Lesser Known Manga (Part 1)

Recently I have found several excellent manga which are fairly recent releases and are only three volumes in length but unknown outside of Asia.

The first is Chikyu Misaki written and illustrated by Iwahara Yuji. This one was critically acclaimed in Asia and yet massively overlooked by most major chain bookstores. In fact I only saw the first volume and maybe one copy ofthe second volume in one Books-A-Million.

The summary for Chikyu Misaki cannot truly do this wonderful manga justice. This story doesn't feel like a manga, more like a well crafted novel. A novel that you can revisit countless times and feel like you are simply revisiting old friends. The three volumes also blend together so perfectly that it becomes one continuous story unbroken even by the seperate volumes.

Makishima Misaki's life is fairly normal as she heads to the town in which her mother grew up. Misaki believes she is merely moving to the house she inherited once belonging to her maternal grandfather. One nestled in a small town, one almost forgotten by time, one she hasn't been too in years.

This sleeply snowy town however can boast about its own local legend, the Hohopo. A Hohopo is said to be Lock Ness Monster type of creature said to live in the local lake. Something believed to still live in the lake after Misaki's grandfather discovered a dinasour skeleton near the lake.

Upon arriving at the town Misaki believes her only concern is keeping the family lawyer who she sees as getting to close to her father away from her widower father. Soon though Misaki makes friends,including one girl who becomes her best friend Sanae. On her way back from school on the first day, Misaki encounters a friend she had not expected.

After being hit with numerous stuffed Hohopo toys, Misaki charges into the woods and finds the Hohopo itself. Though even she could not begin to expect the Hohopo was really a shape-shifting creature. When kissed he goes from a small Loch Ness Monster to a little boy. This Hohopo, who she calls "Neo" seems to know Misaki, which is when she takes him home and tries to hide.

Though she and Sanae thought it would be easy to hide the shape-shifting "Neo" thought it would be easy to conceal their shape-shifting friend Neo. However, events make it hard. Due to a plane crash, Fuikawa Reiko hunting for missing gold, and Asai Tokuko of a very rich family hunting for her kidnappers people keep arriving in the small town. There is even a mysterious gunman who is out to make sure no one finds out about the missing gold. Lastly someone seems to know about Neo and desires to hunt him down for their own reasons.

This makes it nearly impossible to keep Neo safe. As Asai Tokuko and Misaki grow closer, and Tokuko promises to help protect Neo, the mysterious shadow comes closer to finding the truth about Neo and taking him for their own greedy purposes.

Chikyu Misaki has about everything a story can, mystery, betrayal, characters who hold deep secrets, a bit of fantasy, and an excellent storyteller through the author. It is truly an enchanting, modern day fairy tale which richly has earned all the critical acclaimed it has been given.

The second but by no means less worthy of notice is Hinadori Girl by Mari Matsuzawa. Though I admit the idea of a robot girl (Steel Angel Kurumi, To Heart, Negima ) is not entirely original to manga or anime, within it is fresh and new. It is one I can re-read over and over and it never feels old, and it is very comedic and light hearted. That is something I really like about it, the very easy nature of the stories.

Hinadori Girl follows Yoshiki and his sister Akira. Yoshiki is a technogeek and self-proclaimed inventor, whose father, Hidetshi Ishikawa created a robot called Sally 001. Yoshiki, takes it upon himself to activate Sally 001. Upon doing so it is clear "Sally" is merely like a child. She knows nothing of her world and is not the maid or support robot she was suppose to be. While Yoshiki believes this to be very cute, and comes to see Sally as his youngest sister, Akira who holds a major crush on Yoshiki, hates Sally. Akira starts to see Sally as her rival. Sally to her is only someone that is getting in her way of spending time with her brother. She is even less thrilled with the idea that Sally is "her child". This comes about because Sally is a birthday gift for both of Yoshiki and Akira from their father.

Along with her troubles of trying to keep her brother to herself, Akira must protect Sally. There are two people, Tukiko Hoshizaki, Akira's junior high school teacher, and Sasuke, Tsukiko's assistant who are trying hard to steal Sally 001 and break the Hinadori code program. That program is said to make Sally special and far more human like then any of the other support robots in existance.

To me it is this mix of comedic humor within a very small harem type of situation, and the mystery about the program codenamed "Hinadori" (which means fledging) and what the program is and what it has to do with their late mother that helps to make this story unique and a must read.

For some reason Hinadori Girl didn't get into a lot of the major book store. If it had I think it could easily have been a major hit for Dr.Master and a highly praised series. Neither did Chikyu Misaki released through DC Comics.

In truth both of these manga deserve more attention then they have gotten, and I hope those of you who read this give them the fair chance they deserve as wonderful enchanting and engaging stories.