Webcomic of interest alert – Christy Lijweski, creator of the recently concluded RePlay (published by Tokyopop) has put up the first few pages of her new webcomic, Samurai Host Club.

“Assassins, Mafia wars, gunfights, massive bleeding, hookers and hosts. Maybe a samurai or two thrown in for good measure. Mature content for violence, language, sex and other hot sh–.”

Not much there so far in its infancy but still well worth a look-see for those who enjoyed her gritty characters, sharp art style and well dressed guys with guns in past works. While I don’t personally read many web comics, I’ll definitely be keeping my eye on this one. You can also see more of Lijewski’s artwork on her DeviantArt page, including promotional images for Samurai Host Club.

Since the earthquake that struck Haiti quickly nabbed media attention around the world, support has been flooding in from every corner of the globe. The internet is certainly no exception and many artists have opened commissions and auctions to sell their services and work for charitable donations in support of Haiti.

Two well known manga-style artists have also done just that. Christy Lijewski (artist of RePlay!, published by Tokyopop) and KOSEN (artist of Saihoshi, published by Yaoi Press) have each put up a piece of their original artwork on eBay with all proceeds going to a Haiti support charity. Great art for a great cause!

Christy Lijewski is selling the original copic-coloured artwork commissioned by Tokyopop for the cover of the third and final volume of RePlay. The auction ends January 23, 2010.

KOSEN is selling an original copic-coloured drawing of the character Yinn from their boys’ love fantasy series, Saihoshi. The auction ends January 19, 2010.

This past holiday season I sent out holiday cards to a number of publishers – my little way of showing my appreciation to those companies who helped make 2009 a real treat for both me and my readers here on Kuriousity.

I created custom Christmas cards for Yen Press, Vertical, Viz Media, Digital Manga and Yaoi Press, and since then a couple have asked me to share the artwork. I put it off a couple weeks to ensure everyone had time to receive their cards and maintain some charm to the surprise ;)

The curious can now check out my five manga-holiday images under the cut. All pre-existing characters belong to their respective copyright holders/companies/people-of-greatness.

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Nearly a year ago today, I posted about an online CLAMP fan-community’s project in celebration of CLAMP’s 20th year anniversary. The project was titled the CLAMP Appreciation Fanbook and over the past twelves months fans from around the world offered their art, stories, time and donations to create the 348 page hardcover-bound book.

Yesterday, the clamp_now community shared a response from CLAMP that one of the team’s four members, Tsubaki Nekoi, posted on the manga-team’s community boards over at their website, CLAMP-Net:

Best of all is the large number of countries that participated! We really are happy to hear that our works are read, and furthermore liked, in so many different places.

I don’t know whether words of thanks will reach you, everyone, but thank you very much indeed. I think new works will be born after this as well. We’ll do our best so that you read them too!

You can read CLAMP’s full translated response on the clamp_now posting. As for the book itself, print-on-demand copies can now be purchased from Blurb.com. A short preview of the book can be seen there as well and images of the completed product have also been posted on the clamp_now community.

A congratulations to everyone involved in this project. The final product looks gorgeous! It’s great to know that CLAMP now holds the product of your hard work in their hands and it’s a wonderful gift.

Has another year gone by already? Wow… When I think about all that’s happened, it feels believable that it’s been a year. But, when I look back at Kuriousity’s archives to a hundred instances of ‘that was how long ago?!’, suddenly the year feels so much shorter.

Did you know Kuriousity had exactly 200 reviews in 2009? Neither did I but I’m amused by it! It was a great year for good books – I’m not a big list maker but I hope all our reviews have done our favourites justice. I love that I’ve had several new faces joining me here on Kuriousity – 2009 saw the addition of Shannon Fay and Andre to our ranks, and just this week we welcome our light novel reviewer, Jaime Samms to the fold as well. Expect lots from all of us in 2010!

Along with reviews there was plenty of big news this year, including lots of fantastic new licensing announcements too long to list. A few of the top entries posted here on Kuriousity in 2009 include Farewell to Viz’s Shojo Beat, Tokyopop Webinar: Part One, YaoiCon 2009 – Digital Manga, There Are Some of My Favourite Things… And Yours? and Omnibus: The New Manga Frontier.

Other notables for me in the past year include lots of Twitter with many other fantastic bloggers who’ve added a whole new level of amazing interaction to my web-surfing days. I’ve also had the opportunity to have a go at one of my dream-jobs when I lettered a few short stories for Yaoi Press’s Happy Yaoi Yum Yum, plus the web comic I flat colour and letter for, Whore of Turfan, reached it’s one year anniversary! I also launched Boys-Luv.com which I hope to expand even more in the coming year.

And what does 2010 hold? A whole lot that’s for sure! You can check out our release schedule for books coming out over the next 12 months with so many amazing new and continuing titles that it will undoubtedly boggle your mind and your wallet (but worth it!). Expect lots more news and reviews here on Kuriousity as we continue to help you fulfill it in this wonderful world of manga :)

In distinctly-not-short, Happy New Year everyone! May it begin fantastically so as to give the rest of the year a solid step in the right direction – see you in 2010!

Image above from Kiyohiko Azuma’s Yotsuba&! (c) Yen Press

Found via Manga Xanadu, information about Tokyopop’s next webinar has been posted to their website. Scheduled to happen on Monday, November 30, the webinar will be directed live from Japan and will have Tokyopop editor Lillian Diaz-Przybyl interviewing the company’s CEO, Stu Levy, “in a discussion about the past, present and future of TOKYOPOP from a CEO perspective.”

Sounds like this has high potential to be an interesting and informative one, and though the exact time of the webinar has not yet been posted, I’ve got my fingers crossed it’ll prove convenient for a good number of us curious. Get your questions ready!

Today MangaViews.com is officially launched! Tagnongat and I have been working on this project for the past few weeks (I did the design while Anna is the genuis mastermind behind everything else) and we hope manga fans take the time to look around and let us know what they think.

MangaViews.com is a hub for manga reviews and reviewers from around the world. Bringing together writers, their thoughts and a love for manga, Manga Views’ intent is to foster discussion, promotion and connection among readers.

The website has an automatically updated list of new manga blog posts on the front page, forums for some fun discussion and a new but growing review database where we encourage bloggers to submit their reviews as well as series they’d like to see reviewed on the review list.

Because the site is still new, we’re constantly tweaking, shifting things and adding new content. If you come across any issues or dilemmas while using MangaViews, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

Digitalmanga.com | DMPbooks.com | Junemanga.com | 801media.com | Dokidokibooks.com

Digital Manga’s multiple imprint web pages were hit or miss in the past but since their recent upgrades and redesigns, they’ve risen to the cream of the crop status for manga publishers on the web. Their new websites are visually attractive and full of colour, and the usability of the sites has seen a huge improvement. Overlapping databases between the different websites ensure all information is the same and is updated simultaneously. All sites also share one blog with imprint-specific posts appearing on their individual front pages.

All book information, release dates and blog posts are compounded on their company’s index site, DigitalManga.com which also includes job postings, surveys and corporate information. This hub site also includes links to all the imprint pages as well as other Digital Manga properties such as Pop Travel Japan and Akadot Retail.

*Note: At the time of this writing, 801Media.com had not yet received it’s intended overhaul. It’s design and function will not be included in this review.

Read more…

Websites – it goes without saying that if you’re reading this post, that you’ve seen your share. Each manga publisher has their own website and while they all stand to serve generally the same purpose, they all do it a little differently and some with more effect than others.

In this digital age, websites are for many the key indicators of a company’s status – their dependability and professionalism are all immediately measured by the upkeep of a website. When a visitor appears on a site and sees it in disarray, such as littered with errors or simply full of outdated information, it’s an immediate negative impression. Are they still publishing? Is this information accurate? Do they care their website is broken? And if a website looks poorly designed, what reason would a reader have to think otherwise of their books?

But a strong website can have multiple benefits – information about books and their availability, full control advertising over their own products and services, an indicator of the publisher’s design style and simply imbuing faith in a company’s strength and current activity.

Over the next little while, I’ll be posting my reviews of different publisher websites, a follow-up of sorts I’ve been wanting to do since my Manga Publishers and Me posts last year. In these posts I’ll be looking at different points: Visuals, where I share what I think about how they look; Usability, where I took a glance at how they work; and Online Presence, where I’ll focus on the company’s online interaction.

I know publishers’ websites mean a lot to me, and those that I find helpful, I use on a daily basis. But I’m curious – how important are manga publisher websites important to you? And if you use them, what’s the most important part? Has a shabby website ever left you hesitant to buy their books or a snazzy website given you reason to make a purchase?

Let me know what you think and you can expect my first publisher site review up tomorrow afternoon.

This past Thursday, Tokyopop held another of its webinars – an open to the public live video feed where they announce new information and take Q & A from attendees.

This week they had a special guest – Goda-san – the creator of the popular, Domo. The Tokyopop representatives, Cindy Suzuki and Lillian Diaz-Pryzbyl, were there to speak with him about creating Domo while Tokyopop rep Vy Nguyen collected questions from the virtual audience.

If you ever wanted to learn more about Domo, then this Domo-nar was certainly your chance!

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Halloween is almost here – I hope everyone already has a spooky stack of books to get them in the mood this year! I sat down this week to put together a list of books I would recommend for readers but it occurred to me I already did that last year, and most of those books will forever stay on my lists of must-reads for Halloween.

You can check out my recommendations from last year which still sport some of my favorite titles:

Good Reads for Halloween (Part One) – Black Sun Silver Moon, Death Note, Kieli, Nightmares for Sale, Tokyo Babylon, Pathos, Mail, Fairy Cube, Ghost Hunt, Twilight of the Dark Master

Good Reads for Halloween (Part Two) – God Child, Alive, Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Pet Shop of Horrors, Beyond My Touch, Daemonium, XXXHolic, MW, Parasyte, Cat Eyed Boy

Here at Kuriousity we’ve also enjoyed some great books this month for Halloween reviews such as Cowa!, Rin-Ne (Vol. 01), Cat Eyed Boy (Vol. 02), The Antique Gift Shop (Vol. 09) and Nightschool (Vol. 02).

My top recommendations for Halloween reads still remain Mail, Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service (post image credit) and Ghost Hunt – three series that should not be missed if you like your books leaving you with a reason to keep the lights on! And a newer recommendation for those who love the spirit of Halloween, but don’t need the scares that’re often associated with it, is the recently released Soul Eater from Yen Press (which you can expect a review for just in time for Halloween!).

What about you? Please share your suggestions and favourites – I’d definitely love some more ideas for what to sit down with and enjoy once the candy, costumes and chaos of Halloween dies down this Saturday evening :)

Happy Halloween!

Over on the Tokyopop website, staffers have put up an article about their next Toykopop webinar, coming to an internet near you on Wednesday, September 2nd.

“Did you miss out on the first Insider? Wanted to join but got stuck in traffic? Well not to worry because we’re having another Insider on Wednesday, September 2nd and at a traffic friendly time of 7PM PST! We’ve got more exclusive news coming your way. Want the inside scoop on what TOKYOPOP has in store for the future? Want to confirm those forum rumors? Have a questions that you’re just itching to ask? Then stick around for the Q&A session.”

To combat the complaints over the early time of their previous seminar, which was 1PM PST, this second one will begin at 7PM PST. For those of you like me in the Atlantic time zone, that means 11PM (I’ll definitely be out of work by then at least).

You can read my outline of the first Tokyopop webinar here: Tokyopop Webinar Part One. The previous (and first) webinar was held on August 6th.

Edit: Tokyopop has changed the time of its second webinar to Wednesday, September 2nd.

The CLAMP Fanbook project is soon coming to conclusion with submission time closing and fans from around the world having completed their art, stories and cosplay for the 20th Anniversary fanmade gift to the 4-woman manga team.

However, a little space remains in the book so the editor team is offering the first 100 commenters their chance to have a short note to CLAMP included in the book. From a kind thank you to sharing your favourite character, if you’ve wanted to let CLAMP know how much you love ‘em then this could be your chance!

I recently moved and this meant getting the chance to go through all my piles of accumulated swag from years of fandom, convention attending and learning the wonders of credit card + internet (a dangerous combination at times!). Best part of this necessary clean-out evil is rediscovering some of my favorite things, the selective cream of the crop, so to speak, of my personal collection.

It got me curious, what’re other people’s favorite things? What do you display most proudly or feel the most giddy about when it crosses your mind? What’re your absolute best finds, purchases or discoveries in your collection? Or the goodies that have the most nostalgic value? I invite gloat-age and love on this pleasant summer Saturday!

To inspire, here’re some of my own under the cut. While like any other I could gush about how I love being surrounded by all my favorite stuff, in my manga collection there’re still a couple gems that stick out:

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Deadlines for submissions to appear in the upcoming CLAMP Fan Appreciation Book have been posted over at the clamp_now LiveJournal community. Submissions are due between July 11 to July 25th of this year and must be sent to the person in-charge of overseeing contributers in your specific country/area.

You can check out the full post to read the details including submission guidelines and contact information.

Looks like I’ll have more than SDCC to prepare for that month! Here is me telling myself I will try to get some shiny artwork done for it. Fingers crossed! I’ve no doubts it’s going to be a lovely book when it’s done, full of much love and appreciation for CLAMP and the lovely work they’ve shared with us over the years.