Dark Horse's Harlequin gambit

Well, it's not really fresh news anymore - the press release (accessible in various places, e.g. Anime News Network) is dated June 1. Still, it's interesting enough to throw in a couple of comments of my own.

A 6 book deal starting the new line, 3 for younger readers (Harlequin Ginger Blossom: pink), 3 for older (Harlequin Ginger Blossom: violet). The first 2 books to be published in December. Those first titles have already been announced: A Girl in a Million written by Betty Neels with art by Kako Itoh (or Itou, as alternative transscription), Response written by Penny Jordan with art by Takako Hashimoto.

Harlequin has had a publishing deal with Ohzora Publishing Company for publishing manga adaptations of Harlequin novels in Japan (under the label Emerald Comics) for quite a while. The press release cites over 250 Harlequin manga published to date. As reported from various sources, samples of some of those manga may be seen at CuppaCafe.

What the press release didn't state was if those announced titles would be taken from their library of exisiting manga adaptations or if they would just use their resources (artists, etc.) and create something new for the US market. I did some digging, and I found two published manga from the japanese Harlequin manga line adapting the indicated novels and illustrated by the indicated manga-ka, so I suppose they'll just re-import those.

A Girl in a Million was published in March 2002 as Itsuka hanayume ni (something like Someday to be a bride... I think... my Japanese isn't that good). The ISBN is 4-87287-630-X and the book is listed at amazon and yahoo books.

Response came out in April 1999, titled Kakuu no rakuen (probably Fanciful Paradise or Fanciful Pleasure Garden). The ISBN is 4-87287-290-8 and the book is listed at amazon and yahoo books.

If you look closely at the covers at yahoo books, you can even see the original english titles of the novels. Both of them seem to be out-of-print now, by the way... at least amazon.co.jp doesn't sell them directly anymore.

Opposite Forces - "volume 2" vs. "version 2"

Opposite Forces is a fun little series written and drawn by Tom Bancroft. So far there exists a 4-issue mini, self-published through Funny Pages Press (you can still find sample pages there). For an overview of characters and premise I refer the interested reader to one of the many available reviews on the net (e.g. the one at Still on the Shelf). I learned of the series sometime in 2003 when I found a lonely #1 somewhere at a convention. Since #3 was already out by that time, I never got my hands on #2 and #3 of the FPP edition (though I took some steps towards procuring some copies, recently).

A couple of months ago, Alias Comics made their debut as a comics publisher... with a bit of an involuntary delay (which has been discussed in far more depth and breadth by the comics scene than the actual problem merited, IMHO). Opposite Forces is one of the properties they snagged for their second wave of titles. Diamond Previews May 2005 featured a solicitation for "Opposite Forces, volume 2 #1" (with a $0.75 price point), slated for a mid-July release. I didn't look any closer and just preordered the book, since "volume 2" definitely suggested new material to me.

As it turns out, though, it's more like a "version 2". A company rep recently posted on the Alias boards that the new books will be inked and colored versions of the FPP issues (which were for the most part b&w or even just pencils) instead of new material. The positive in this is that we'll finally get to see a polished version of the original series, the negative is that the solicitation in Previews was, even in hindsight, kind of misleading as a product description.

Personally it doesn't worry me that much. I'll take a second, better version of Opposite Forces over most of the current mainstream books any time, especially since I'm still missing the middle part of that arc. Also Mr. Miller of Alias was very nice and prompt in answering my question about this, and pointed out that it probably was some misunderstanding between Alias and Diamond and would be looked into.

Still, it won't be common knowledge yet, and I don't know in what way (and how soon) they'll manage to correct this in future solicitations (and a similar problem with Pakkins Land as well, though there the true facts were at least mentioned in the solicitation text), so even with the publication of #1 still more than a month away: the more sources for this exist on the web, the better informed potential buyers will be.

On a related note: I'm really curious to see how Alias will fare with the $0.75 introductory price point for most of the #1's in their second wave of titles (and also some of the first). Especially in comparison to Kandora Publishing, who are using a stratagem of $3.50 price point, but with a slightly higher page count, for their books. Interestingly enough, some Kandora titles (e.g. Jade Fire) were as late as the first ones of Alias (if not more), without the company getting as much flak for this (if any) as Alias did.

Who is this guy? And what's this Blog about, anyways?

A couple of words about myself: 26 years old, German, studying electrical engineering (automatic control), currently working on my diploma (kind of like a master thesis).

I've been reading comics in one form or another for most of my life. Got started on Micky Mouse magazine (which is still bigger over here than it's been in the US for decades) and Disney's Lustige Taschenbuecher. Then converted to German translated franco-belgian BDs and a narrow selection of German translated floppy-format super-hero fare. About 8 years ago the first German translated mangas started cropping up, like Appleseed, Dominion - Tank Police and other Shirow works. But it took another 2 years till the first right-to-left pocket books started the real boom. About that time I also found my first import shop for English language comics and discovered that there were US comics besides the super-hero genre.

At the moment most of the comics I buy are either manga (in German, English, French or Japanese language edition) or US small press books (indie, yes, but almost no art or underground comics). Germany's indigenous comics industry doesn't have much to offer me (with a few notable exceptions like Der Hartmut or Zuckerfisch), and French BDs (translated or in the original language) are just too expensive to follow more than a hand full of series.

The thought of starting a Blog didn't appeal to me very much, at first, but in the recent months I've been reading more and more Blogs by interesting personalities, while I myself just scattered my opinions over an ever-increasing number of webboards with disparate audiences. I think I'll try this for a change, as a way to concentrate my thoughts on subjects I care about in a single place. Nothing big, but my own. We'll see what comes of it.