Short Program, Volume 1

Mitsuru Adachi is one of the most popular manga artists in Japan. However, his typical stories (Touch, H2) are high school baseball epics a decade in the telling. Not exactly fare that will find an easy welcome on this side of the Pacific.Short Program is a collection of seven done-in-one stories and one two-parter. As such, the stories take from 24 to 44 pages to tell. True to form, they tend to focus on high school or college age people -- often interested in sports -- and relationships.Adachi's stories all have a wonderful charm, and a distinct lack of interest in ordinary relationships and characters. His art style and character design are as interesting as his stories. If you're seeking a wider look at the range of Japanese manga, this volume gives a glimpse of a wonderful creator who is otherwise unknown here.

I've been a big fan of Mitsuru Adachi.. since I saw "Touch" which is truly a masterpiece. There are some other brilliant works of his.. such as "Rough", "H2". But I think "Touch" is the most wonderful. So I really hope they will release "Touch" soon.. also in America.

How can stories so small pack such a punch?Here in nine short comic stories, Mitsuru Adachi shows with deceptively simple skill, the fond and traumatic moments of youth. From high-school love to life after high school, Mr. Adachi takes you on a roller coaster down memory lane, and lets you relive tears, laughs, and the thoughtful pauses that make life special. Don't be put-off by the characters' wide-eyed cuteness or slapstick hilarity. These are not "kiddies stories". These are real people living real lives, and maybe you know one of them. Or maybe, they are one of you.

I looked through this latest little manga book and I was quite struckby such adorable wide-eyed young characters, such sweetly briefdialogue, and such professionally drawn backgrounds as well as theusual few juvenile excuses to look up a young schoolgirl's pleatedskirt in a few places (some of them aren't really even connected tothe story itself in the first place!) Divided into several shorttales, this book seems to follow the romantic adventures of apixie-cute young boy with such an innocent big-eyed face and theheight of a young child (despite this, he could still deliver a realwhallop with his little fist!) who had developed a love interest in afair-haired young tomboy (who had eventually grown into a veryfeminine young woman over the years.) Quite funny and whimsical - andfull of such heart-achingly handsome young men with very thickeyebrows and lustrous hair if you're no nerdy "otaku" with aLolita-complex.

This is a manga that ranks among the best that I have ever read. If you enjoy whimsical, warm, and fuzzy feeling type stories, you'll enjoy Short Program. Romance, coming of age, humor, are all wonderfully blended in this. Also blended in, the author often will integrate sports into these stories, and it is similar to One Pound Gospel from Rumiko Takahashi in that respect, so fans of that work may also like this.