So Close, Yet So Far!

And now for chapter 4 of Full Dozer, which coincidentally also took a week from the last chapter to release. Also, Himegoto has been delayed until early next week.

Full Dozer ch. 4: Mediafire, Dropbox

Like a Bear to Honey!

Another week, another Mizutama Honey Boy with chapter 2, bringing us more than halfway through the volume.

Mizutama Honey Boy ch. 2: Mediafire, Dropbox

A Journey of a Thousand Miles!

Today we have chapter 3 of Full Dozer, bringing us about halfway through the volume.

Full Dozer ch. 3: Mediafire, Dropbox

Racing for My Honey!

It took us a little while, but chapter 1 of Mizutama Honey Boy is done. Not really much else to say this time around, so enjoy.

Mizutama Honey Boy ch. 1: Mediafire, Dropbox

A Star is Born!

Finally, after a five month wait, Full Dozer returns with an updated version of chapter 1 and the brand-new chapter 2. The updates in chapter 1 include the volume covers, the extra pages that precede chapter 1 in the first volume, and Ayumi Komura's usual bonus page at the end of every chapter with her comments (readers of Usolily will know these as the Whatever Lily pages).

Also, regarding the Taiyou/Ten BL one-shot Komura said she was going to release, we have periodically checked the Margaret Bookstore iOS app for it, but as of now, it has not appeared on the app. Komura said it wouldn't be free, so we've been searching for it through her author listing on the app, and although most of her manga are there, there is no BL one-shot. So we'll keep looking out for it when/if it appears, assuming Komura wasn't forced to nix the idea for whatever reason after she made that announcement. It would help if Komura had a blog or a Twitter account where she might make some further announcement, but alas, this is not the case.

Full Dozer ch. 1 (v2): Mediafire, Dropbox
Full Dozer ch. 2: Mediafire, Dropbox

All's Well That Ends Well!

This is it. After nearly five months of work (excluding almost the entire month of March when we didn't work on it, so it's really more like four months), Stop!! Hibari-kun! comes to an end with the 27 pages of extras included with volume 3. Included is a short afterword with the author's final comments regarding the ending, and a bunch of pages of the manga that seem to have been published when it was serialized in Weekly Shounen Jump, but were never republished in the volumes that came later, or else were left out when certain chapters were redrawn or recompiled. The above group image was one such page that, unfortunately, wasn't kept in the main story, but was thankfully at least republished at the end of this volume.

We would like to offer a big thank you to Hisashi Eguchi for creating this manga. I somehow doubt Eguchi would have thought that 30 years after he "finished" it that people would still be reading it and calling for him to continue the story, or that people would get a chance to read it in English someday. Eguchi may be relatively unknown in the west (as far as we can tell, Hibari is one of the only one of his manga ever scanlated into English), but despite the generation gap, at least Hibari has managed to stand the test of time. And despite it taking over 30 years for it to get an English translation, it's better late than never, we always say. Farewell Hibari!

Stop!! Hibari-kun! vol. 3 extras: Mediafire, Dropbox
Series batch available on the Stop!! Hibari-kun! page.

The Key to a Girl's Heart is Honey!

Since several of the series we've been working on have ended recently, we've been looking to pick up a new project, and now we're pleased to present to you the start of Mizutama Honey Boy (Polka Dot Honey Boy) by Junko Ike with chapter 0. The series follows Mei Sengoku, an independent girl and captain of her high school kendo club who enjoys helping others in need. This has earned her a lot of admirers among the girls at her school, as well as a guy named Shirou Fuji well-known at school for his girly way of speaking and gestures. When Shirou asks Mei to go out with him, she simply rejects him, but he comes back the next day and tells her he's not going to give up on her so easily.

The first chapter is actually chapter 0 because it was originally a one-shot that later got turned into a series with chapter 1. This is similar to how Usotsuki Lily started, except that Usolily's one-shot was more or less separate from Usolily's series, but Mizutama's one-shot is essentially the first chapter story-wise. In terms of being a gender bender, Mizutama is probably right on the border, so it's hard to say whether it should be classified as one or not, but the series is far from your typical shoujo manga.

Next up, the final release of Stop!! Hibari-kun! before getting back to more of Mizutama and also Full Dozer.

Mizutama Honey Boy ch. 0: Mediafire, Dropbox

The End is Only the Beginning!

Finally, the time has come to say goodbye to Stop!! Hibari-kun! with the release of chapters 52 and 53 to end the main story, leaving another 27 pages of bonus content to round out the series. Despite certain aspects of this series being annoying to deal with, it was largely an enjoyable series to work on, and a series that we are going to dearly miss, especially since the story itself was left unfinished by the author. The reason for this is touched on in chapter 52, but he goes into further detail in the afterword to be included with the other bonus content.

Working on a series that was so old, and yet so loved to get many reprints through the years, was an interesting experience. The 80s was really a time for new and great manga, and Hibari predated many of the series from the 80s that would later become so much more famous, including epics like Dragon Ball, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, and Fist of the North Star, and considering Hibari's staying power, it might just have influenced many other gender bender-related series that came later, like Ranma ½, Cheeky Angel, Pretty Face, or even more recently, Prunus Girl, and our very own Boy Skirt (which we hope to restart soon as soon as volume 1 comes out).

Hibari is one of those classics that anyone interested in gender bender manga should read, and hopefully people will be reading it for years to come, since (thankfully) the gender bender genre is still alive and well over 30 years after Hibari ended in 1983. So thanks for sticking with this series over the past four and a half months, and please look forward to the upcoming bonus content to complete the series.

May the Fourth be with you.

Stop!! Hibari-kun! ch. 52: Mediafire, Dropbox
Stop!! Hibari-kun! ch. 53: Mediafire, Dropbox

To the Victor Go the Spoils!

Rapidly approaching the conclusion (for what it's worth) of Stop!! Hibari-kun!, we now come to the release of chapters 50 and 51, leaving just two chapters left before tackling about 25 pages of bonus content. This series went by too fast, and it was just starting to pick up right at the end, but we're also glad we could get through most of it relatively quickly. So thanks for sticking with it all the way to the end. Enjoy!

Stop!! Hibari-kun! ch. 50: Mediafire, Dropbox
Stop!! Hibari-kun! ch. 51: Mediafire, Dropbox