Anime and manga have exploded as a medium over the past fifteen to twenty years. Thanks to easier access and entry points like the One Piece adaptation, more people are diving in than ever. That begs the question: where should they start? The Essential Manga Guide, by Briana Lawrence and illustrated by Ebipo, seeks to help with this question. By highlighting 50 iconic, quality, and diverse series, The Essential Manga Guide serves as a great starting point. However, this guide also has plenty of value for long time fans.
Stretching the meaning of essential
Trying to establish an “essential” canon of any medium is particularly fraught. However, Briana Lawrence has found a strong through-line. By making The Essential Manga Guide a crash course in manga’s history, the book is less about being definitive as much as it is a grand record. This begins right from the introduction, in which Lawrence recounts not only the historical origins of manga but also its journey to North America. That introduction had me reflecting on halcyon days of library manga volumes and Shonen Jump issues from the grocery store magazine racks through this history lesson.
These introductory paragraphs are quite clinical and straight forward. That makes sense given the topic at hand and Lawrence’s experience as an editor at Crunchyroll. Before long, The Essential Manga Guide gives way to far more personal writing. Instead of the essays accompanying each vaunted entry being clinical summaries of plot or impact, they are about how each series resonates with the author. As a result, The Essential Manga Guide is one of the most complete collections of manga analysis in the West — at least in book form.
The Essential Manga Guide is much more than surface level recommendations
Even the most dedicated weeb will find a takeaway from Lawrence’s essays. Her familiar anecdotes about the word of mouth anime fandom of the ‘90s and early ‘00s gives way to strong critical analysis. Interestingly, that analysis sometimes even takes the form of pointed critique. I was somewhat blindsided by the Dragon Ball entry taking a sharp turn into a bit of a takedown of Goku’s shortsightedness. Lawrence is not the first person to be critical of Goku but she may be the first I’ve seen do so in order to recommend Dragon Ball. I think it’s actually a grand idea though — I doubt Dragon Ball needs any more surface-layer platitudes.
More detailed analysis is probably for the best, as The Essential Manga Guide does focus more on series with decent to large fanbases. The curation is a careful treatment, with many different genres and topics encapsulated in the list. This includes highlighting LGBTQIA+ stories, and not just boys love and girls love. There’s equal weight given and by setting the entire list chronologically immediately highlights how these stories are fundamental to the medium. You can’t argue that manga isn’t “woke” or whatever when The Rose of Versailles (which kicks the whole list off) predates so much of it!
Possibly too many recommendations
The downside of this curation is that even with all the effort, The Essential Manga Guide ends up weighted towards shonen. That’s a result of the genre’s dominance and the fact that many sub-genres fall within and overlap with shonen.While Lawrence stresses the guide’s purpose is to help with discovery rather than argue for everyone to read all these series, there’s a subconscious push into the hands of Weekly Shonen Jump. Sure, this means your friendly InBetweenDrafts anime/manga editor didn’t feel like a poser, but those with no interest in shonen will have less to take away.
Some of Lawrence’s essays left me wanting even more from them too. Each one fits within the same amount of formatting, which is a testament to her ability as a writer. But 50 series is a lot to write about, and it means some essays have to be cut short when they could very easily keep going. If the number of series covered was reduced would the essay word count be increased? Personally, I’d have welcomed it. Some of these essays are easily the introduction to a full book of its own. Those who hang out in the InBetweenDrafts Discord to discuss manga in detail (wink wink nudge nudge) would eat these right up.
A wonderful companion to your manga collection
It is a real joy to see this kind of thoughtful writing about manga published. The medium is full of incredible works. They’re just as deserving of deep analysis in academic criticism as any other medium’s best, and sneaking it in via a recommendation guide is inspired. There’s plenty of that analysis online, of course, but it is really special to be able to put The Essential Manga Guide on the bookshelf right alongside the manga it celebrates.
The Essential Manga Guide is available now from Running Press.
Featured image via Running Press
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‘The Essential Manga Guide’ - 9/10
9/10
Travis Hymas is a freelance writer and self appointed Pokémon historian out of Salt Lake City, Utah. Known to be regularly obessive over pop culture topics, gaming discourse, and trading card games, he is a published critic featured on sites such as Uppercut and The Young Folks.
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