Well yeah, but that’s a different style of storytelling. Gilligan’s Island and Lost are both stories about people stranded on an island, but one’s episodic and the other’s arc-based, and you wouldn’t judge one by the standards of the other.
I grew up reading and re-reading (and enjoying!) my school library’s collection of Asterix and Tintin books, but believe me, if they’d also had Nausicaä sitting alongside, I might have been hooked on manga way earlier than I actually was. I can like both.
Funnily enough it might be the 4komas where a shitload of plot gets stuffed into very few pages, now that I think about it. At least for the 4komas with plots…
plot per page is a bad metric to judge things by anyway lol
Unsurprisingly I have similar issues with many long-running TV shows, although I haven’t watched either Gilligan’s Island or Lost. At the very least many TV shows attempt to have a proper arc every season so you get some form of closure even if you decide not to continue. And I think shows like Gilligan’s Island are not really heavily serialized, so you can just watch random episodes and not commit to the full series (much like Seinfield, Friends, The Office or whatever). Of course in these days of Netflix that’s probably not how most people consume these shows, admittedly.
I think Westworld completely jumped the shark for instance but I would still recommend watching season 1 even if you don’t continue afterwards, it works on its own. It’s a bit harder to do that with manga in my experience because there are not always clear cuts that way, or they are much further apart. I do like Witch Hat Atelier but I would hesitate to recommend it because it wouldn’t make sense to just read 2 or 3 volumes of it but then I have no idea what a reasonable cutoff point would be. Apparently more than 9 volumes’ worth.
I haven’t read Nausicaä but it’s 7 volume long, that’s basically a short story by manga standards! Actually that’s probably going on my backlog for this reason alone.
Anyway I’ll stop spamming this thread with my off-topic hot takes about manga pacing.
Seems like I started a contentious topic! Thanks for the responses.
On balance I decided to buy the set. The preview looks kind of interesting, and with tax removed it’s only $66 AUD for 19 volumes - then I get half of that in coin back.
I won’t start reading yet though. I need to finish a few series first.
Mostly agree - even in season one, it had a bad habit of telegraphing all of its twists ten minutes ahead of the reveal, but yeah, it certainly went downhill after that. Heroes, now. Heroes season one was a masterpiece. It’s such a shame they only made one season of that show.
Mostly used that as an example because it’s the first story-arc-style manga I read. 
BOX!吉良いと短編集 (2021) - 74 - Drama, Slice of Life
Tags: Anthology
Cleopatra D.C. (1986) - 64 - Adventure, Comedy
Tags: Female Protagonist, Seinen
Go with a friend! (1995) - 50 - Comedy, Romance
Tags: Shoujo
Headhunted to Another World: From Salaryman to Big Four! (2019) - 66 - Adventure, Comedy, Fantasy
Tags: Economics, Isekai, Demons, Magic, Work, Politics, Male Protagonist, Archery, Elf
If This is the Thread of Fate, Then I Will Cut it For You (2020) - 59 - Fantasy, Romance
Tags:
Love Order 200X (1999) - 76 -
Tags: Josei
Mane of the Wind (1987) - None - Horror, Mystery, Romance
Tags: Shoujo, Heterosexual, Female Protagonist
Milk on the Farm (2014) - 63 - Comedy, Slice of Life
Tags: School, Rural, Slapstick, 4-koma, Yuri, College, LGBTQ+ Themes, Gyaru, Agriculture, Veterinarian
My Death Flags Show No Sign of Ending (2020) - 74 - Action, Adventure, Drama, Fantasy, Mystery, Romance
Tags: Anti-Hero, Male Protagonist, Isekai, Conspiracy, Magic, Video Games, Swordplay
Riverbed Projector (2012) - None - Drama, Mystery, Supernatural
Tags: Hikikomori, Amnesia
The Raving Warrior: Suima-kun (1994) - None - Comedy, Sci-Fi
Tags: Shoujo, Male Protagonist, Aliens
Too Much Booty (2014) - 63 - Comedy, Romance
Tags: 4-koma, School, Female Harem
World End Solte (2020) - 74 - Adventure, Fantasy
Tags: Magic, Time Loop, Female Protagonist, Amnesia, Demons, Post-Apocalyptic, Anthropomorphism, Henshin, Reincarnation, Survival, Isekai
Young Miss Holmes (2006) - 63 - Mystery
Tags: Historical, Detective, Female Protagonist, Foreign, Seinen
あおのたつき (2019) - 80 - Drama, Supernatural
Tags: Historical, Josei, Oiran
うちの会社の小さい先輩の話 (2019) - 72 - Comedy, Romance, Slice of Life
Tags: Office Lady, Work, Primarily Adult Cast, Heterosexual, Episodic, Office
ぎゃる侍 (2007) - 70 -
Tags: Shoujo, Swordplay, Gyaru
ばっくれ一平！ (1985) - 75 - Sports
Tags: Shounen, Baseball, Male Protagonist
ふくよも (2008) - 70 - Comedy, Slice of Life
Tags: Kids
クリスティ・ロンドンマッシブ (2011) - 80 - Mystery
Tags: Seinen
ソフィアの円環 (2020) - 77 - Action, Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
Tags:
チョコっとちょこちゃん (1992) - 90 -
Tags: Kids, Magic
ファンタジウム (2006) - 91 - Fantasy
Tags: Seinen, Disability
メガロポリス・ノックダウンR (2021) - 85 - Action, Comedy
Tags:
南国トムソーヤ (None) - 71 - Adventure, Slice of Life
Tags: Seinen
同じギルメンの声が好き (2022) - 72 - Romance
Tags: Heterosexual, Video Games, Age Gap, Primarily Adult Cast
大東京トイボックス (2006) - 77 - Comedy, Drama
Tags: Seinen, Politics, Primarily Adult Cast, Coming of Age, Otaku Culture, Work, Software Development
学園天国 (2003) - 100 -
Tags: Shoujo, School
戦国妖狐 (2007) - 82 - Action, Adventure, Romance
Tags: Demons, Shounen, Cultivation, Gods, Samurai, Kemonomimi, Time Manipulation, Dragons, Revenge, Youkai, Ensemble Cast, Amnesia, Historical, Male Protagonist, Shapeshifting, Time Skip, Astronomy, Anti-Hero, Meta
猫と竜 (2017) - 73 - Adventure, Fantasy
Tags: Dragons, Animals, Time Skip, Ensemble Cast
男の子になっちゃった女子高生 (2021) - 70 - Comedy, Romance, Slice of Life
Tags:
純情クレイジーフルーツ (1982) - 75 - Comedy, Romance
Tags: Primarily Female Cast, School, Delinquents, Shoujo, Female Protagonist
(Note: these are affiliate links)
The first three volumes of Dungeon Meshi are on half price sale and time-limited free until April 24th.
Quick question - for the current book leading the IBC’s vote, I happened to discover there are 2 seemingly identical copies on Bookwalker, it’s just that one costs double. The preview looks… the same. The only difference I can find is the cheaper one was “published” 3 years later. Any insight as to what that is all about? Is the second one the digital equivalent of a paperback 
And to make this at all relevant to the Freebies part of the Freebies thread - I tried out a way to find higher quality free prose on Bookwalker, which might be nice for someone looking to try out reading a book digitally and you’re not sure about the platform.
I sorted free novels by publisher and then looked at Kadokawa or Kodansha and found these two:
At least this way I thought people can try each type of prose experience on Bookwalker with whatever tools you use so that by the time you want to buy something, you’ll know depending on the type of display offered for the book, if it’s for you.
Yes, as far as i understand. When the book is still new, the price is usually high, then after a couple of years or so it goes down. Annoyingly, this is considered a different edition (hardcover vs paperback i guess) so it’s happened more than once that I have a book in my check list and am never notified about the price drop, since it’s supposed to be a whole new book 
I do believe that after a while the expensive edition is removed though.
It is pretty much literally the equivalent of hardcover vs. paperback, yeah.
If you notice, the label and series in the newer edition has 文庫 in the name - 文庫本 are the small pocket sized paperbacks in Japanese publishing, and books will often get a bunko edition a bit of time after the original release. Book stores will have a new (mainly hardback but all larger than bunko) book section, and a new bunkoban section.
That the digital editions end up coexisting when the main format difference doesn’t really matter at all when read on a screen is indeed a strange quirk of ebook publishing, but I suppose alternatively it would also be strange if the bunko just didn’t have a digital equivalent (in which case the lowered price or any added afterword or things like that wouldn’t make it into an ebook) or if it replaced the original edition in-place somehow.
Just one of those interesting publishing interactions to be aware of!
ooh, yes, very good to be aware of. Thank you both!
I don’t think I’ve seen a 60% coin back before.
Almost everything Kadokawa gets 60% coins back until April 24, no minimum amount spent that I can see. Some are also on sale. I’ll start browsing and will report back here with any good finds, but since this is much of Kadokawa’s library, I’m sure there’s something for everyone.
Edit: It’s not on sale, but the book currently read by the ABC is one of the books giving back 60% coins:
Would someone explain to me the difference between These two Versions?
Sure!
According to the description, the 完全版 (“complete edition”) is a new(er) release as part of a line commemorating 15 years since the author’s debut, and it has some revisions/corrections (加筆修正), and includes the side story 『鳥籠巫女と聖剣の騎士』 (which is presumably why the page count is higher).
The other edition is the original one from 15 years prior.
Other current bookclub picks include 気になってる人が男じゃなかった, a BBC offshoot that’ll start on vol 3 shortly and Silent Witch, the current IBC pick.
Some things that were already on sale and are now even cheaper thanks to the 60% are Re: Zero and the aforementioned Dungeon Meshi:
I have seen the face of God and He wants me to keep spending money at the kadokawa digital file store, clearly
I’m going to go feral
/edit not too much in the way of applicable manga sets, but a few here. (Affiliates)
That’s Journey - anime currently airing - 5720 for 11 vols with 2,874 coinback
Gundam 0079 - 12 vols for 5787y with 3,156 return
…and surprisingly that might be it for sets. This might be a ‘buy vol 1s of things that are vaguely interesting sale’ for me.
…better set a budget…
Sorry if I’ve missed it being mentioned, but 二つのスピカ is also on sale/60% coin back for those reading the offshoot. I’ll cross-post there.
I am buying Silent Witch 1 now. Postponing because of the price and using free to read in 10 minutes before.
Is it possible to Filter for those books with the Green Border? I read somewhere that they have Furigana.
Maybe you’re thinking of the 角川つばさ文庫 line? In which case, here you go.
The similar blue-bordered 青い鳥文庫 line from Kodansha may also be of interest.
Linked is the label (レーベル) area found from clicking this area from an individual record (one of the most useful ways to find similar material to something you’re interested in).
