Are these titles hopeless cases? There has been no news of volume two of Boys of Summer since the first volume was released. Peach Girl; Sae’s Story doesn’t end, it just stops. Here are two reviews of series which may never be completed.

Boys of Summer, Vol. 1

By Hiroki Otsuka and Chuck Austen
Tokyopop, 202 pp.
Rating: Mature

I didn’t pick up Boys of Summer when it first came out for the following reasons:

1. It’s about baseball.
2. Bikini chick on cover does not appeal to my hetero girl sensibilities.
3. It’s OEL.

Nevertheless, the MangaCast couldn’t shut up about it. They love sports manga and Ed Chavez loves baseball as much as he loves manga (”a love so big, it could crush this town”). Then at MangaNext I met both the artist and the writer of the book – Hiroki Otsuka and Chuck Austen, respectively.

Hiroki Otsuka was a manga-ka in Japan until the stress nearly killed him. The average artist draws 20-30 pages a month, but Otsuka was drawing 50. He quit his job, moved the U.S. studied English for six months, and currently lives in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn, where he is having a great time doing gallery shows of his fine art. Tokyopop hired him to do Boys of Summer.

The writer, Chuck Austen, is a long-time American comic author guy who has penned scripts for Marvel and DC for decades. I’d never heard of him because I’m not into the superhero stuff. He had a bunch of groupies at MangaNext who hung out with him in the hotel bar. They all knew who he was!

Unlike Tokyopop’s Rising Stars-spawned books, Boys of Summer combines a very experienced manga-ka with a very experienced writer. The result is happily like an American indy comic drawn by a Japanese guy.

Protagonist Bud moves out of his single mom’s house to go to college. His fat and somewhat irritating best friend Manny is going to the same college and trying out for the baseball team. Manny can’t convince Bud to join, even though Bud is an awesome pitcher.

The coach’s daughter, Chrissie happens to live across the hall from Bud and happens to discover his pitching arm. It also happens that she’s the only girl on the baseball team.

There are a few manga-moments in the book, the I-saw-you-naked-accidentaly moments, or the Why-is-that-girl-sitting-on-your-lap-it’s-just-a-big-misunderstanding moments. Fortunately, these elements are well balanced with a very realistic story about a very average college (possibly in the midwest) and some very realistic college guys. There are a lot of true-to-life characters and true-to-life moments, balancing out the ultimate cliche of how Bud can never pitch again because his father died in a horrible baseball accident (probably not the case).

Going back to my original list:

1. Very little baseball is played.
2. She’s almost never in her underwear – almost.
3. It’s not exactly OEL… It’s just a comic being done by an international team.

I suspect this manga may have been looked over by a lot of fans like me based on the cover design alone.

Boys of Summer volume two is due out this fall… maybe. Tokyopop hasn’t announced anything about it since volume one came out. If volume two ever happens, I’m looking forward to it.

Recommended.

Peach Girl Sae’s Story, Vol. 1-3

By Miwa Ueda
Published by Tokyopop
Rating: Older Teen, 16+

Sae was the despicable antagonist in the original Peach Girl series, and she returns in Peach Girl Sae’s Story, this time as the Byronic¹ hero (anti-hero?).

Sae was so evil in the original series that my friend Alison was appalled at the idea of a spin-off series. “Sae is so evil!” were her exact words. “I bet she’d kick a puppy!” We began flipping through volume one, and to our surprise Sae does, in fact, injure a puppy! (She throws her schoolbag at it.) There’s a longer, more sympathetic explanation for Sae’s behavior later in the series, but it’s not sympathetic enough.

Sae’s Story lacks the authentic drama of the original Peach Girl story, but it is easier to find Sae’s Story in bookstores. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to read Sae’s Story without reading the original Peach Girl series first. Sae’s Story is mediocre even if you’re already familiar with the characters from Peach Girl. Additionally, Sae’s Story is filled with spoilers for Peach Girl, since you immediately find out which of the two boys Momo ended up with.

Continuity-wise, Sae’s Story takes place after the end of Peach Girl. Momo and Kairi have been accepted to Sae’s college of choice. Sae is repeating her senior year of high school, as she was unable to graduate due to her poor attendance record. She’s not making any progress towards her diploma in Sae’s Story either, since she skips class constantly in order to hang out on the college campus.

Sae’s childhood friend Saru shows up after living in Thailand for the last 10 years. He’s still in love with the sickly, fragile Sae of his youth, and is unable to see the epic b*tch that Sae has grown up to be. Sae brushes off Saru in favor of a hot model with a girlfriend. She only likes stealing other people’s boyfriends, not guys who actually love her. Sae hasn’t learned a thing since Peach Girl.

This isn’t the story of Sae I want to read. I want to read Peach Girl from Sae’s perspective, where Momo is a horrible b*tch and Sae is the awesome hero inside her own head. In the Peach Girl anime series (currently available in the U.S.) Sae is nearly gang raped on a porn movie set, and her male-Sae-equivalent man-of-destiny saves her life. I want to read about that relationship from Sae’s perspective, but it’s not even mentioned in Sae’s Story.

As the Sae’s Story manga progresses the author reveals in her notes that she’s recently had a baby. By volume three Ueda is apologizing about not being about to work at the same pace.

A short story about Momo and Kairi is included at the end of volume 2. A short story about other characters is included at the end of volume 3. The author says in her notes that she will only be able to do short works from now on – motherhood is more work than she expected. By the end of volume three the future of the Sae’s Story series is entirely up in the air. Sae’s Story has no resolution for now. The narrative simply stops. Ueda may be better off abandoning the title.

Sae’s Story has it’s moments of drama and humor, but it won’t appeal to non-Peach-Girl fans. Some of the dialog in volume 2 is particularly on-the-nose and just plain bad. If anything, Sae’s Story is a good “bad” read, especially if you’re unfamiliar with Peach Girl or if you’ve only seen one episode of the anime (and you don’t care about spoilers).

¹ Not actually Byronic. Or is she? Sae was a tragic and depressed youngster.