• Reviews of more than 900 manga series • Ratings from 0 to 4 stars • Guidelines for age-appropriateness • Number of series volumes • Background info on series and artists THE ONE-STOP RESOURCE FOR CHOOSING BETWEEN THE BEST AND THE REST! Whether you’re new to the world of manga-style graphic novels or a longtime reader on the lookout for the next hot series, here’s a comprehensive guide to the wide, wonderful world of Japanese comics! • Incisive, full-length reviews of stories and artwork • Titles rated from zero to four stars–skip the clunkers, but don’t miss the hidden gems • Guidelines for age-appropriateness–from strictly mature to kid-friendly • Profiles of the biggest names in manga, including CLAMP, Osamu Tezuka, Rumiko Takahashi, and many others • The facts on the many kinds of manga–know your shôjo from your shônen • An overview of the manga industry and its history • A detailed bibliography and a glossary of manga terms LOOK NO FURTHER, YOU’VE FOUND YOUR IDEAL MANGA COMPANION!

Sailor Moon. Card Captor Sakura. Magical Girl Rayearth. They’re magical girls, and they’re some of the biggest names in manga. Magical girls, ordinary schoolgirls given superpowers, are hugely popular in Japan and the United States. Now Christopher Hart shows fans everywhere how to draw these manga shoujo faves. Faces and body proportions, action poses, costumes, expressions, transformations, special effects—they’re all here, all in Hart’s distinctive step-by-step approach. So are magical fighting boys and everybody’s favorite, the cute, furry manga mascots. Hart demonstrates how to create funny mascots, magical boys, fighting teams, and supporting characters, plus how to design layouts. Magical girls show us that we all have special powers deep inside—now Manga Mania: Magical Girls and Friends let those special drawing powers reveal themselves at last!

Christianity has been in Japan for five centuries, but embraced by less than one percent of the population. It’s a complicated relationship, given the sudden appearance in Japan of Renaissance Catholicism which was utterly unlike the historic faiths of Shinto and Buddhism; Japan had to invent a word for “religion” since Japan did not share the west’s reliance on faith in a personal God. Japan’s views of this “outsider” religion resemble America’s view of the “outsider” Islamic faith. Understanding this through the book Orientalism by Edward Said, Patrick Drazen samples depictions of Christianity in the popular Japanese media of comics and cartoons. The book begins with the work of postwar comics master Tezuka Osamu, with results that range from the comic to the revisionist to the blasphemous and obscene.

"Saint Joan" is a play written by George Bernard Shaw, first staged in 1923. It is based on the life and trial of Joan of Arc, the French heroine who played a significant role in the Hundred Years' War between France and England. Shaw's play explores themes of faith, martyrdom, politics, and the nature of leadership. The play portrays Joan as a complex figure, driven by her unwavering faith and conviction that she is following divine guidance. Shaw presents her as a visionary and a symbol of individual courage against oppressive authority. At the same time, he critiques the political and religious institutions that ultimately lead to her downfall. "Saint Joan" received critical acclaim for its thought-provoking exploration of Joan's character and the social, political, and religious forces of her time. Shaw won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925, partly in recognition of this play and his other contributions to literature and drama.

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue "Remote Sensing of Atmospheric Pollution" that was published in Remote Sensing

The Dungeon's no place for a happy reunion! After the massive battle that took place on the fifty-ninth floor, Loki Familia embarks on a triumphant return to the surface only to be interrupted by the appearance of an Irregular that forces them to make camp on the eighteenth floor. There, Aiz unexpectedly stumbles upon the unconscious form of a familiar white-haired boy, who a certain young elf couldn't be less excited to see. The other members of her familia are curious about him, hoping to find out more about the fastest-growing adventurer in history, but Lefiya has other ideas...