Vertical
Marketing Director
Ed Chavez
is announcing on the ANNcast program on Thursday that the publisher has acquired the North American rights to two
Kodansha
manga titles:
Osamu Tezuka
's
Princess Knight
(
Ribon no Kishi
) and
Tadashi Agi
and
Sh? Okimoto
's
Drops of God
(
Kami no Shizuku
). Additionally, Chavez confirmed outside of the podcast that
Vertical
has acquired the rights to
Usamaru Furuya
's manga
No Longer Human
.
Princess Knight
revolves around a princess raised as a boy so that she can inherit her kingdom's throne. The manga pioneer
Osamu Tezuka
drew the original story in
Kodansha
's
Shoujo Club
magazine from 1953 to 1956.
Princess Knight
and Toshiko Ueda's
Boku-chan
(1951) are among the first
sh?jo
manga in history. Tezuka later created the
Twin Knight
sequel in
Kodansha
's
Nakayoshi
magazine from 1958 to 1959, followed by a 1963-1966
Ribbon Knight
remake in the same magazine.
Vertical
will publish
Princess Knight
in two volumes: the first, about 384 pages long, on October 4, and the second, about 330 pages long, on December 6. Both books will carry a suggested retail price of US$13.95. The books will be the same trim size as
Dororo
and
Black Jack
? two other
Vertical
releases of Tezuka manga.
Kodansha
released
the
Nakayoshi
version of the
Princess Knight
manga as part of its Bilingual Comics line in 2001, but this version has been out of print for some time.
Viz Media
's
Shojo Beat
published
a 25-page excerpt from the original
Shoujo Club
run
in its July 2007 issue, but did not publish any additional materials.
Tezuka's manga was adapted into a
television anime
in 1967 and an anime
film
in 1994.
Moyashimon
scriptwriter
Natsuko Takahashi
launched
a manga remake of Tezuka's series titled
Sapphire:
Princess Knight
in 2008 with artist
Pink Hanamori
. An anime film adaptation of the series was also
announced
in 2009.
The story of
Drops of God
revolves around a young man whose father, a famous Japanese wine critic, passes away. When he visits his father's estate to lay claim to his inheritance, he learns that his father adopted another man and that the two must compete to identify 13 wines in order to earn the inheritance: a vast fortune in the form of a wine collection. Each
Vertical
volume will contain the equivalent of two
Kodansha
volumes, for a total of about 400 pages, and carry a suggested retail price of US$14.95.
The series is currently 27 volumes long and is still ongoing. Throughout its serialization, the manga has famously
boosted
the sales of wines profiled in the story. It has also been recognized by the French wine magazine
La Revue du vin de France
, who
gave
the manga its top award, and by the
New York Times
, which
profiled
the manga in its Dining and Wine section. A Korean drama based on the series also
aired
in 2009.
Kami no Shizuku
's creators
hinted
at an English-language release for the series last April.
In an email to ANN, Chavez also confirmed that
Vertical
will release
Usamaru Furuya
's manga adaptation of
Osamu Dazai
's
novel
No Longer Human
. The story follows a young man's deepening alienation from the rest of the world, despite his attempts to maintain a cheery facade. The first of three parts will be released on September 27 and the second on November 22. Each volume will have a US$10.95 suggested retail price and consist of about 200 pages.
Vertical
originally
announced
the manga last October, then
retracted
the announcement as premature.
Update:
Chavez indicates that
Vertical
will release the original
Shoujo Club
version of the
Princess Knight
manga.