[Manga] Yotsuba&! Volume 1

[SonicTempest]

YOTSUBA&! Volume 1
Author: Kiyohiko Azuma
Publisher: ADV Manga
Price: USD9.99

Most of you should be familiar with Kiyohiko Azuma, the person who created Azumanga Daioh, one of the most charming and hilarious manga/anime that can be found on the market today. Yotsuba&! (Yotsuba to! in Japanese) is his current project. I was reading it via scanlation over the Internet, and decided to pick up volume 1 once it was released in the States.

The printing appears to be well done, with a nice easy-to-read typeface and good quality paper. It also appears to be larger than your average manga, which might be a holdover from the Japanese release - I'm not sure. In any case it's certainly not lacking in production quality. Where the true enjoyment lies is within the pages of the book itself.

Yotsuba&! is the story about the misadventures of a 6-year old girl called Yotsuba who moves into a new town with her father. The story is told in a series of vignettes rather than as a seamless narrative, much like Azumanga Daioh. However, Yotsuba& eschews the four panel style used in Azumanga for a more flexible panel flow and layout. The plot is fairly basic and has a very down-to-earth feel to it, which is perfect for the kind of characters that it contains.

And the characters are really the highlight of this book. From the seemingly ever-energetic Yotsuba, to the three very different Ayase sisters, this book has a whole load of charming and lovable characters. Some of them fall into similar archetypes as characters from Azumanga Daioh, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing, especially considering how memorable some of those characters were. Yotsuba&!'s cast ends up being the source for many of the laughs you will derive from this book, especially the antics of the Ayase sisters as they try to keep up with the hyperactive bundle of cluelessness that is Yotsuba.

The art style serves to reinforce the humour. It's largely the same style of artwork as seen in Azumanga Daioh, although the shift to a more flexible format has allowed for the inclusion of better backgrounds and more detail overall. A large part of Azumanga's humour came from the visual gags, and Yotsuba&! isn't too different in that regard. Just seeing the expression on Mrs Ayase's face as Yotsuba releases a swarm of cicadas into her house will be enough to have you in stitches.

Visuals aren't good enough to hold up a comic on their own - the dialogue has to be good as well. And the translation here is pretty well done. The essence of the dialogue has been brought over mostly intact, with a few changes made due to irreconcilable culture-specific references. There's a list of translation notes at the back of the book, in the order in which they appear, but there doesn't appear to be any reference to them in the actual dialogue itself, which is a bit annoying.

Overall, Yotsuba&! is a great lighthearted romp through the world of a gregarious 6-year old and her odd friends and neighbours. Judging by the first volume, ADV appears to be on the right track with its translation of this fun series. Volumes 1 and 2 are out right now in the US, and I'd highly recommend getting them if you can.

[Blake B]

Thanks, SS.
I've heard so much about this, and i was considering getting the manga.
Based by your review, i'm goin' to get it as soon as i can (like in the next hour)!!!

[Cascade]

I read a few of the Yotsuba comics. My favorite one is the one where Yotsuba watches a gangster show and starts to go about shooting people with a water gun. "I don't kill women and children." "But you just did!"

It was charming because I recognized my younger cousins would do silly stuff like that when they were little.