INTRODUCTION TO ANIME AND MANGA

This text-heavy introduction dives into the history, culture, and spreading fandom of anime and manga, highlighting prominent titles and providing an overview of genres and trends.

The popularity of anime and manga, which are made for audiences of all ages, reaches around the world. Chapters 1 and 2 focus on the development of the industries associated with anime and manga, starting with the rise of book printing on a mass scale in the early 1700s and the publication of collections of drawings by the famous artist Hokusai, such as Hokusai’s Manga (1814). Bolte details how trade, war, and natural disasters all influenced the spread, production, and content of early magazines and animation. The next three chapters discuss publishing demographics, genres, successful series, and how fans around the world engage with each other and the industry. For a title focused on visual media, this introduction offers a surprisingly wordy layout and sparse imagery. The photos that are included have a generic quality that’s exacerbated by captions that provide limited context or logical connection. Compared to more robust sections of the book, the breakdown of genres is merely a list of unannotated titles. While the book may hold the attention of readers who are already interested in the topic, its initial focus on history and global popularization is less likely to draw in new viewers and readers.

Dense and lackluster.