Bakuman: Manga for Manga-ka, by Manga-ka.

Elicia has been pressuring me for the last little bit to read Bakuman. It's by Obata! It's about making manga! It'll totally inspire you! Etc. etc. And while anything combining those three things can never be wrong, I was busy with press deadlines and getting ready to head to Anime Banzai and such, so put it on the back burner. But Elicia reminded me of it last night, and since I wasn't tired after Melissa kicked me out of her apartment, I went back up to work to read Bakuman online.

And read the whole amazing thing in one sitting.

Seriously. My eyes were screaming to go to bed, but I couldn't stop until I had read all the scanlations I could find, which amounts to 11 chapters at this point.

There are so many reasons why Bakuman really gripped me, that have nothing at all to do with the artwork or story, which are great on their own. Personally, I really do feel like Leeshee and I are coming to a crossroads with our stuff; either we commit and do what it takes to get published, or we drop it as a pipe dream and go on with our lives, whatever that may be. Telling stories was always the thing I most wanted to do, even subconsciously when I was little, so it's hard to imagine NOT doing that, but if we don't start getting on with it, when those opportunities finally come we won't be ready; the parade will pass us by, as they say. But I've been doing a lot of soul searching lately, trying to figure out why exactly I haven't been doing the pressing forward I need to do. And funnily enough, it's been a lot of church-related classes and talks I've heard that have been really helping me out (will probably post some of that later.)

But Bakuman crystallizes for me some of the problems I've been having; worrying about normalcy, whatever that is, and forgoing that for a potential career that encompasses both dizzying heights and soul-crushing failure. Finding something to inspire you and catapult you to shooting for greatness. Believing in yourself and what you can do, in spite of the harrowing odds and fears you may have. Bakuman helped me realize, again, that making manga or some hybridized form of graphic novels—in short, telling stories, my stories, through illustrations—is what I really, really want to do and the only thing I can visualize myself doing, deep deep down in my being. And since that is so, I'd better get cracking.

But besides that, Bakuman is a practical tutorial of a rough path of what it takes to actually be a manga-ka; the practical side of the journey. Materials, stages of work, planning, marketing, meetings and critiques and deadlines—basically the toil and hardships that come from doing that. I'm up for all of those challenges—some of those I already face in my current day job—but it's a good reminder of the more toiling sections of doing what you love, which everyone has to face from time to time.

But one of the best sections of the manga is the rules for making manga that the two manga-ka sprinkle in, that hopefully will become a mantra for me. Here they are:

:: Kajiwara Ikki's Rules, from "How to be a Man"

1. Never create a superficial work. Pour your blood into the ink!
2. Never chase after popularity, which is as transient as a flower. Dig deep down in the earth and put up roots.
3. No matter how much status you attain, you must never have regrets. If the choice is between peace and the storm, choose the storm.
4. If you should fail, never cry. Study your failure and let it give birth to success.
5. Even if you obey the previous rules, never think you alone are right. Learn from everything and everyone around you.

:: Mashiro's Uncle's Rules (ie if you are not a genius)

1. Be conceited/have self confidence. Believe you can do better than anyone else.
2. Work hard.
3. Be lucky (ie a gambler.)

:: Editor's Rules (types of successful manga-ka)
1. Those who draw just what they want to and it happens to be a hit. Naive/geniuses.
2. Those who calculate how best to have a hit. (Info, trends, entertainment, questionnaires, composition, design, research)
The ones who hit it big are overwhelmingly not the calculating types. First types are stronger, less likely to fizzle out after one hit.
A Manga just has to be interesting to be serialized.

So yeah, really needed to read this at the moment. Cannot wait to read chapter 12!