Manga – Lace and Dagger Books

Do I Still Like This Manga? Miracle Girls by Nami Akimoto

March 30, 2023March 29, 2023by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

Welcome to the next instalment in my Do I Still Like This Manga series! This time we’re throwing it all the way back to the first manga series I bought where I hadn’t already watched some of the anime. Yep, back when I was 8/9, I bought a few volumes of Sailor Moon and Cardcaptor Sakura, and then I started to collect Miracle Girls!

This is a shoujo manga series that not many people will have heard of. Originally published in Japan in the ’90s, Tokyopop bought it to an English-speaking audience in the early 2000s. This was back before Tokyopop started releasing manga published the original way around. So these were shorter volumes, printed the western way around and released with anglicised names for most characters – names I will use in this post.

Ahh, the old days.

Miracle Girls is technically a magical girl series, but not in the way you’d expect. In it, we follow identical twins, Mika and Toni, as they attend school, fall in love and learn more about their psychic powers. The girls go to different schools, and when Mika asks Toni to switch with her to compete in the sports festival, someone seems to catch on to their powers. Putting them at risk as they try to deal with their personal relationships.

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do i still like this manga, Manga

Do I Still Like This Manga? Marmalade Boy by Wataru Yoshizumi

March 16, 2023March 4, 2023by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

If you’re into shoujo manga, 90’s shoujo anime and/or Japanese dramas, you’ve probably heard of Marmalade Boy. It’s an incredibly popular shoujo manga series from the early 90s. It was one of the earlier titles that Tokyopop released in English back in the day. It was a series I picked a few volumes up back when I was 12/13, and it was a series that I always meant to finish. But one that, due to it going out of print and me being a kid who didn’t think to hunt it down online…I never did.

So I’m so glad that Seven Seas have bought the rights and are now rereleasing this series in some stunning collectors’ editions. I obviously preordered volume 1 and read it super quickly after getting it.

But it’s also a very dated series with some content I was leery of even reading it as a kid. So I was curious about how I’d feel about this series now. I wasn’t put off knowing some of the content in this book. However, some newer readers might wind up DNFing due to the issues. Still, the 90s/00s style drama isn’t usually something I enjoy anymore. And this series is packed full of that.

Marmalade Boy follows 16-year-old Miki, whose life was turned upside down when her parents return from a holiday only to tell her they’re getting divorced. On the trip, they met another couple, and now they’ve decided to switch partners! They move in together to keep the family units together, including Miki’s new step-brother, Yuu.

Just a quick warning that this post will contain spoilers for this and later volumes, so read on if you’re okay with that.

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Manga

Manga I’d Love To See Translated Into English

January 21, 2023January 15, 2023by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

The problem with being into manga is you’ll always stumble upon series that look good but need English translations. Fortunately, publishers sometimes hold surveys asking what titles they should pick up, so you can always shout about them. But until then, if you want a copy? You’ll have to grab it in Japanese or another language if it’s been translated elsewhere.

Since I’ve started collecting more series in Japanese, I’ve got a growing list of series that I really want English publishers to pick up. So today, I wanted to share my excitement for some of these series with you all! You may wind up wanting them translated too.

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Manga

Shoujo Manga Recommendations

January 12, 2023January 1, 2023by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger Books2 Comments

For as long as I’ve been reading manga, I’ve been predominantly reading shoujo manga. If you’d asked me earlier this year, I’d have assumed that I was starting to read less of it, but it’s been the exact opposite. I’ve been picking up more and more of it again.

So, I thought it was about time to share some of the shoujo manga that I love – and are readily available – for you to all check out.

Some of these will be the cutesy type of series that you expect hearing the word shoujo, but some less so. So give this list a read, even if you think you don’t like shoujo.

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anticipated releases, books, Manga, Young Adult

My Anticipated Releases – Books I’ve Preordered in January & February

January 7, 2023January 1, 2023by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger Books3 Comments

Ahh, preorders, what a great way to start the year. There are so many anticipated releases coming out this year. And though I can’t afford to preorder all of them, I have preordered a few in January and February.

So, I thought, why not share them with you guys? Add to your TBRs, haha. I won’t be posting regular lists of books I’m anticipating this year, as these posts take way too long. But I do want to take this opportunity to share some of the books and manga I’m excited about.

Starting with…

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Manga, Review

Manga Review: White of a Wedding Ceremony by Takayama Shinobu

November 10, 2022October 15, 2022by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger Books1 Comment

It’s been a while since I’ve reviewed a manga volume and this one is a little different. While I usually read and review English translations, this volume is one that I read in Japanese. Well, I used a translation app on a Japanese volume. But this stunning manga book is a series that I’ve been wanting to start for a while. I don’t think it’ll be getting an official translation any time soon, so here we go.

A mysterious disease has been killing people and bringing some back to life. The tell is the flowers on the body and newspaper reporter Kiso has been sent to investigate. During his research, he meets Shiraume, a tempting young woman who calls herself a “Demon’s Burning Light”. Fascinated by her, the two of them start looking more into these strange cases.

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books, Manga, tbr

Light Novels I Have To Read

October 22, 2022October 20, 2022by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger Books1 Comment

I’ve spoken about light novels a fair bit on here and on my social media. They’re something I really enjoy reading and will continue to do so. So I’ve decided to put together a little post about a few of the books I’ve got to read!

Most of these are isekai series. For those who don’t know, isekai are series where a character is transported or reborn in another world or time. Usually, the characters are transported into some sort of series they like, but apparently, even a series where a character dies and goes back to repeat their time can be considered isekai. I don’t have anything against the idea of isekai series, but the market is a little oversaturated with them. I’d like to pick up more light novels that don’t fall under this genre but alas…it’s most of what we get.

That said, all the series on this list are ones targeted at girls or women. I don’t have much interest in checking out any of the shonen or seinen light novels I’ve seen. But if you have more shoujo or josei recs? Shoot them my way!

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Manga

BL Manga Recommendations – Part 2

August 11, 2022August 7, 2022by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

It’s been over half a year since my last one of these. Since then, I’ve seen Gavin from How to Train Your Gavin on Youtube discover that BL is a thing and start diving into it. Seeing that reminded me of my rec post and made me want to start reading more of it again. It’s been a while since I really bought a lot of manga, so this has been fun, and now I have new recommendations for you!

Once again, these all veer more towards shonen-ai than yaoi. None of these series is mature – though I’m reading some of those too, ahem – and the highest rating is OT which is 16+. These are all manga I’ve read myself and enjoyed, so I’d be happy to talk about them if any of you have read them!

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do i still like this manga, Manga

Do I Still Like This Manga? Legal Drug 1-3 by CLAMP

July 26, 2022July 24, 2022by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

Back when I was a teenager I started the CLAMP series Legal Drug. I read volumes 1 and 2…then never got around to reading volume 3. The series wasn’t officially finished. The magazine the manga was in closed, and it took years for it to get picked up by a different magazine. But I’ll get more into that later as it’s kind of interesting.

I recently saw the continuation of the series available in English. It’s called Drug and Drop, and I was so excited to get to it. With so many years of difference, I was curious to finish this first set off and move on. Unfortunately, I won’t be continuing on to it now as I DNFed volume 3.
It’s safe to say that I’m very disappointed.

Legal Drug follows two 17-year-old boys who work at the Green Pharmacy. They spend their days working as shop assistants, but every now and then, their boss, Kakei offers them a different job that only someone with psychic powers can complete. Kazahaya can touch things and see memories, and Rikuo can destroy things with a thought. You don’t really see much of Rikuo’s power, but it’s still there. Using these abilities, they’re trying to solve some mysteries connected to their own pasts whilst trying to earn extra money.

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Manga, video games

Anime, Manga and the Female Gaze

April 2, 2022March 28, 2022by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger BooksLeave a Comment

I love anime, manga and video games. I talk about them on my blog and all my social media. I’m majorly into a mobile game right now, one that has an anime series, including an upcoming film, and I’m even writing fanfiction for it. Some of the series I love are the popular ones you see a lot of people talking about, and you can easily get merch for in the west. But those series tend to be shonen or seinen series. That’s not to say I don’t love any series where the target audiences are girls and women. My current obsession is definitely aimed at girls, and it definitely has a fairly large fanbase but is it promoted as much in the West? No.

In fact, very few female-targeted series get promoted as hard in the West.

I did a poll on Twitter recently asking people whether they thought female-targeted series are promoted as much in the West, and 5 out of the 6 people who answered agreed that they aren’t. There is something incredibly sad about this, and I want to talk about it.

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Category: Manga

Do I Still Like This Manga? Miracle Girls by Nami Akimoto

Do I Still Like This Manga? Marmalade Boy by Wataru Yoshizumi

Manga I’d Love To See Translated Into English

Shoujo Manga Recommendations

My Anticipated Releases – Books I’ve Preordered in January & February

Manga Review: White of a Wedding Ceremony by Takayama Shinobu

Light Novels I Have To Read

BL Manga Recommendations – Part 2

Do I Still Like This Manga? Legal Drug 1-3 by CLAMP

Anime, Manga and the Female Gaze

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