Both as someone who used to work selling second hand books, and as a Japanese studying- compulsive buyer of books online, I found this really useful. Thank you
My order from Mandarake just came today and oh my god, the shipping was faster than those I buy from local online shops! I paid the books yesterday and it came today!
I refuse to believe these are secondhand books. It looks very untouched to me. Including shipping, the price averages $4 per book which is very very cheap compared to $13 when I buy the English translated ones here in my country at local bookstores. This will serve as my practice to reading Japanese too.
Thank you for letting us know this wonderful site!
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Books are exempt from VAT in the UK though. Order away!
I’m going to link to this in my reading thread @Sharpevil - hope that’s okay?
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Glad to hear it! If you’re comfortable with it, post pictures! I’d love to see your haul.
I’ve been using HelloTalk a lot lately, and people in Japan are appalled at the price of (and lack of second-hand) manga here when I mention it. Things are pretty good over there for a comic lover.
No problem. I’m sure it’ll help some folks that prefer to hold the real book in their hands.
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Wow, I had no idea that shipping costs were so high! I luckily (or, lazily?) have always had a small pile of to-read books - was planning on using Amazon to get some books when that ran out, but I think after seeing this I’ll just go to my local Kinokuniya.
On that note, if you’re in the Seattle area, go to Kinokuniya! The Japanese manga isn’t as cheap as Book-Off on account of not being used, but it’s still a bargain.
Also, at many of these second-hand stores you can also get used games, though I’ve never seen a good game there that was actually priced to sell.
EDIT: Actually there are a lot more Kinokuniya locations than I thought: Kinokuniya Store Locations — Kinokuniya USA
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I’m quite hesitant to post because it’s all BL manga 
so other people might not be comfortable with it, but sure, I might post it later!
It’s not that high if you plan to buy a lot of books. I just bought 27 mangas, and my shipping fee was 3250 yen (DHL, and it was the cheapest among all the choices of shipping services). And the shipping was pretty fast because it came the day after I paid it.
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I see. Maybe I just think it’s high because I don’t buy a lot of books all at once.
That shipping speed is crazy.
Yeah, that’ll do it. It’s prohibitively expensive for a handful of books, but once you get to around 20ish, it’s only ~$1.30 in shipping per book. Much cheaper than kinokuniya at that point, when you consider that all the books are about $1-$4 each.
As a twist of fate, I actually visited the Seattle Kinokuniya just last December in my first trip to the west coast. I was pretty dismayed at the lack of manga in Japanese, but I still managed to find a couple that interested me. I picked up the first volume of Reincarnated into A Slime and the Danganronpa Ultra Despair Girls manga. Still haven’t read the latter, but I like having lots of options to fit my mood.
Ahh, fair enough. Maybe line them up on a bookshelf and take a photo that way. I can’t imagine there’s anything too racy on the spines.
Ah, I also tend to mostly read books that are not manga. Currently I’m reading 日本の神様図鑑, which is a lot of fun!
Edit: I would also like to plug this library in Seattle: Nikkei Bunko Japanese Language Library — Japanese Cultural & Community Center of Washington Seattle
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With many of us trapped indoors right now, it seems like a perfect time to revive this topic. I can’t speak to the shipping speed during the pandemic, but it’s a great time to spend some quality time reading.
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I bought 6 mangas and 1 magazine from CDJapan about a month ago and I was so excited because the price wasn’t that high. I chose DHL without checking for extra fees (I live in Europe) and when I saw the message from them asking me to pay 30 euros, I lost it. Never making that mistake again… 
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Oof. Sorry to hear that. Yeah, DHL has been impeccable for me, but I’ve heard terrible things from recipients outside of the united states.
I actually just ordered some new items recently, and even in the pandemic, everything arrived in under a week from time of order. And that’s including a weekend and federal holiday!
This time it wasn’t just manga, I picked up a box set of 魔女の宅急便 for the book club right here on the forums.
Of course, I did also pick up some manga.
I’ve already read through the entire シャクレルプラネット manga, which quickly became a new favorite, and I’m eying my budget for an opportunity to get volume 2. The rest is a mix of stuff I like, stuff I know is easy to read, and stuff I remember from my childhood.
Out of interest, what were the extra fees for? I’ve never used DHL; always just go for the super cheap economy option 
Ah I see からかい上手のタカギさん！I thought the anime was too cute!
I’ve never been to Book Off (it seems they don’t have shops in Tokyo, which is the only Japanese city I’ve ever visited), but Mandarake is pretty cheap even when you buy new books (I think – more details in a bit) in person in Japan. I went to the Mandarake Complex in Tokyo and ended up buying a whole stack of Konosuba books. (I’d only read the unofficial translations and watched the anime, so I wanted to get the originals in order to experience them and support the author.) The normal recommended retail price per light novel volume is ¥600 + tax (it’s printed on the book cover), but Mandarake sold them at around ¥480 each. I don’t know if I got a tax discount as a tourist, but I strongly doubt it, because I don’t think they asked for my passport. Most of the volumes had been published a few years ago, so maybe they had been sitting on those shelves since forever, but I also bought the latest volume available at the time and there was almost no difference in price. Everything was still nicely wrapped, and there were even little banners for the 2016 anime announcement still attached to the earliest volumes. Anyway, I’m just sharing my experience in case anyone decides to go shopping in Tokyo (especially once this coronavirus situation cools off a bit and all the borders reopen). It seems like Mandarake offers good deals both online and offline. 
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Ahem, there’s tons of Book Offs in Tokyo 
Counted 18 on their site.
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Lol. Ok then, I probably should have looked more thoroughly, coz I didn’t Tokyo in the list of cities at the top of the home page. In any case, I happened to discover Mandarake on that trip because my brother had heard of it. I was completely clueless, personally. Hahaha.
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Hah, yeah, there are Book Offs all over the place in Japan. Once you recognize their logo, you’ll find you can’t go anywhere without running into one. I mentioned them specifically because of their ubiquity and their large ￥100 manga section in virtually every store.
Mandarakes are cooler, but generally not as cheap, and far more uncommon to find.
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Another difference is that BookOff handles electronic equipment, video games and so on, while Mandarake has garbage ahem curiosities (at least the one in Shibuya, which is the only one I visited).
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