Fanbase Press’ coverage of the 2018 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards continues with the “Countdown to the Eisners” series. From Monday, June 4, through Friday, July 13, 2018, Fanbase Press will highlight each of the Eisner Awards’ 31 nomination categories, providing comic book industry members and readers alike the opportunity to learn more about the nominees and their work. Stay tuned for Fanbase Press’ continued coverage of the Eisner Awards, including live coverage of the ceremony at San Diego Comic-Con on Friday, July 20.
Added to the Eisner Awards categories in 2010, here are the 2018 Eisner Award nominees for the Best U.S. Edition of International Material – Asia category:
Furari by Jiro Taniguchi, translated by Kumar Sivasubramanian (Fanfare/Ponent Mon)
“Slowly but surely, he takes a promenade through Edo. Furari could be translated as ‘aimlessly’, ‘at random’, ‘bend with the wind,’ or ‘go with the flow.’ But our stroller this time leaves nothing to chance. Jiro Taniguchi returns with this delightful and insightful tale of life in a Japan long forgotten. Inspired by an historical figure, Tadataka Ino (1745 – 1818), Taniguchi invites us to join this unnamed but appealing and picturesque figure as he strolls through the various districts of Edo, the ancient Tokyo, with its thousand little pleasures. Now retired from business he surveys, measures, draws and takes notes whilst giving free rein to his taste for simple poetry and his inexhaustible capacity for wonder.
Taniguchi slips easily into the heart and mind of this early cartographer and reveals his world to us in full graphic detail so we may fully perceive and understand.” – Fanfare/Ponent Mon
Click here to purchase.
Golden Kamuy by Satoru Noda, translated by Eiji Yasuda (VIZ Media)
Written and illustrated by Satoru Noda, Golden Kamuy is an ongoing manga series that began its run in August 2014. According to Anime News Network, the series plot is as follows: “In the early twentieth century, Russo-Japanese War veteran Saichi ‘Immortal’ Sugimoto scratches out a meager existence during the postwar gold rush on the wild frontier of Hokkaido. When he stumbles across a map to a fortune in hidden Ainu gold, he sets off on a treacherous quest to find it. But Sugimoto is not the only interested party, and everyone who knows about the gold will kill to possess it. Faced with the harsh conditions of the northern wilderness, ruthless criminals and rogue Japanese soldiers, Sugimoto will need all his skills and luck—and the help of an Ainu girl named Asirpa—to survive.”
This historical adventure series has received a number of awards and this past April was adapted to an anime television series.
Click here to purchase.
My Brother’s Husband Vol. 1 by Gengoroh Tagame, translated by Anne Ishii (Pantheon)
“Yaichi is a work-at-home suburban dad in contemporary Tokyo; formerly married to Natsuki, father to their young daughter, Kana. Their lives suddenly change with the arrival at their doorstep of a hulking, affable Canadian named Mike Flanagan, who declares himself the widower of Yaichi’s estranged gay twin, Ryoji. Mike is on a quest to explore Ryoji’s past, and the family reluctantly, but dutifully, takes him in. What follows is an unprecedented and heartbreaking look at the state of a largely still-closeted Japanese gay culture: how it’s been affected by the West, and how the next generation can change the preconceptions about it and prejudices against it.” – Penguin Random House
Click here to purchase.
Otherworld Barbara Vol. 2 by Moto Hagio, translated by Matt Thorn (Fantagraphics)
“Nanami had sworn to never see her granddaughter, Aoba, again. A despairing Kiriya had rejected his father, Tokio. Yet now both are traveling with Tokio to Engaru, where Aoba has slept and dreamt of the island of Barbara for seven years. The poltergeist phenomena become more intense. Aoba seems desperate. Is her world coming to an end? And does that end mean the end of the world, one hundred years in the future? What is the connection between Ezra, Johannes Sera, Paris, Pine, and a senile old man called ‘Doctor Azzurro?’ What truth hides in the ravings of an increasingly unhinged Akemi? In the end, it comes down to a father’s frantic efforts to save the life of his son. But…which son? Who is the dreamer and who is the dreamed? Can the dreamer become the dreamed, and the dreamed the dreamer?” – Fantagraphics Books
Click here to purchase.
Shiver: Junji Ito Selected Stories by Junji Ito, translated by Jocelyne Allen (VIZ Media)
“An arm peppered with tiny holes dangles from a sick girl’s window…After an idol hangs herself, balloons bearing the faces of their destined victims appear in the sky…An amateur film crew hires an extremely individualistic fashion model and faces a real bloody ending…An offering of nine fresh nightmares for the delectation of horror fans.” – VIZ Media
Click here to purchase.
Stay tuned to the Fanbase Press website tomorrow as we continue our “Countdown to the Eisners” coverage! Plus, follow Fanbase Press’ Facebook, Twitter (@Fanbase_Press), and Instagram (@fanbasepress) with the hastag #FPSDCC to stay up to date on our SDCC and Eisner Awards updates, including a live-tweet of the 2018 Eisner Award Ceremony from the Hilton Bayfront Hotel at San Diego Comic-Con on the evening of Friday, July 20th.
