Tokyopop Takedown

June 2, 2011

After a month of shuffling my feet, I finally decided to go through my manga shelves. I would post a before pic but it’s too embarrassing. I had manga spread out on every surface in my bedroom, including the floor. Series were scattered, and some are taking up shelf space when I know now that I can put them away – all love to Tokyopop.

I do have a system of organization, if it is somewhat right-brained. The completed series I store and pull out if I want to reread them. The ongoing series I keep on shelves so that I can add to them as they are published. I also have a shelf of what I call “loners” – books that are only one or two volumes of a series. Maybe I started to collect them and never finished, or have just picked up the first volume or two. Anyways, the shelves were full to overflowing.

As I began to pull books off shelves to reorganize, I began to realize just how much of my collection has been dropped by folding publishers in the last year or so. Man, it was depressing! I cleared one shelf just of Tokyopop series. Another one for CMX and Del Ray. I don’t have any more room for storage!

It’s hard to see incomplete series go unfinished. I can commiserate with shojo fans who will not get to see the end of Shinobi Life, V.B. Rose, and DN Angel. DN Angel was one of Tokyopop’s earlier commissions along with Fruits Basket, and they never got through the series the whole time they were running it, from 2004 to 2011. Thirteen volumes in seven years. I think that was part of their problem.

As for now, I guess I’ll just have to search for other ways to determine the end of said stories. If that means learning to read Japanese, well then that may become my next hobby. In the meantime, I’ll continue to pick up whatever enjoyable volumes are available by current publishers, in hopes that those purchases will help out somehow. And I’ll continue to share those with you here, so that you can find enjoyable shojo manga as well.

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Laura

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Super mom and teacher until the kids go to bed, then romance manga addict and writer until the caffeine wears out! Specializes in the shoujo and josei genre of manga and anime.

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2 Comments

I never had the Cardcaptor Sakura manga published by Tokyopop but I guess I got the better since Dark Horse manga is currently publishing Omnibus of the series. I currently have Cardcaptor Sakura book 1 and I’m still waiting for the delivery of my book 2. Anyways, I think the Omnibus is better since it’s cheaper and the cover is really cute compared with Tokyopop’s publication. But If I’ll have the opportunity to have Cardcaptor published by Tokyopop, I’ll never say no since it’s fun to have all the editions in your collection ^_^

AlyssaMihara Oct 08, 2011

It’s a shame so many great series were lost with Tokyopop’s closing. There is hope that other companies will pick up these beloved series and even turn them into Omnibus.

Rebecca Jun 03, 2011