Manga novel genre?

I'm a little confused. Are you talking about writing and drawing a manga, being inspired by anime/manga, or writing Light Novels?

Do you mean you are inspired by Japanese storytelling and culture? Or are you more interested in character-driven (or slice of life) stories, or anime/manga pacing and storytelling, with the inclusion of Japanese settings and cultures?

I think the type of book you are asking for would probably be Light Novels?

If not, then it could be character-driven fiction or literary fiction, only more focused on a Japanese setting?

I myself don't write Japanese settings, but I do enjoy some of various types of storytelling, including the slice-of-life storytelling in some anime and manga.

I think you're trying to mix together things that can't be mixed together to explain something.

Manga (漫画) is the word in Japanese for cartoon-styled or comics.
Is it not a genre, but a medium.

This is like saying "Comic Novel" which doesn't make sense.
Now there's graphic novels in the west, but that's not what we're looking at here.

Anime (アニメ） is the shortened word for animation in Japanese--because they like to shorten all kind of things for some reason.
Anime is what we would call cartoons, because we don't call Disney and Pixar movies animations. Sounds weird doesn't it?

The closest thing to a manga-styled story that you can get is Light Novels. Now, Light Novels are shorter and written differently because the market and readership in Japan is geared more for that. Most Japanese "novels" are rather short compared to western novels for many different reasons.
There are some translated Light Novels making their way over to the west, but I haven't come across a western light novel. And for good reason; western and eastern tastes differ greatly. Light novels are geared almost exclusively towards a certain demographic in Japan that is not shared by even 1% of the west.


Does this all mean you can't have something inspired by Japanese culture? No, not at all. There's quite a large number of western writers who's stories are clearly inspired by the certain style and lore found around Anime/Manga. Off the top of my head, Brent Week's The Night Angel trilogy is based off of ninjas and a slight Japanese-style setting in a fantasy universe.
Does this all mean you can't have stories that emulate Japanese creations? Not at all. In fact, there's a big movement right now with a lot of Japanese-styled works coming out. Pacific Rim, Edge of Tomorrow(more of an adaption, but still geared towards the western market)--just to name a few.
Does this all mean you can't have your stories based in Japan with Japanese people? Not at all, it just raises a few questions--especially the one that ask if you truly know what you're writing about.

Oh, forgot. If you're trying to sort out what genre/sub-genre your book belongs to, look at the market you'll be selling it to. The market decides the genre, and making up your own without some strong pioneering can prove near-fatal in publishing and sales. If your book has fantastical elements, then it's fantasy, and some research in the sub-genres of fantasy can help you located a sub-genre that your book can squeeze into. Don't feel pressured to find the perfect one; if you're planning on trade publishing, the publisher will pigeon-hole it as they see fit. And, no book fits perfectly to a genre/sub-genre.

I would just call that a novel. I'm assuming you're WIP is like the VAMPIRE HUNTER D series: mostly text a couple illustrations. I think .HACK// did the same thing (a novelization of the manga??) if I remember correctly. [These are apparently Light Novels. You learn something new every day.]

I don't know that it would necessarily be considered manga, or would be shelved specifically in a manga section of a bookstore. It may depend on how you go about publishing. VAMPIRE HUNTER D is published in North America by Dark Horse Comics, which places it in the graphic novel section - probably because it's anime related and a Japanese import. Most likely, your piece would fit into fantasy or science fiction, depending on the elements of the story. As far as I'm aware, there isn't really a sub-genre like you're looking for, but I've been wrong before. Having the setting be Japanese doesn't automatically make it manga related and there's not a rule saying you have to adhere to specific pacing/style for it to be a "real book" so~



Not super helpful.

If you mean a conventional novel with a manga style and tone, that is a "thing" and a few imprints relating to it opened up a couple of years ago but I do not know if they are still around. I know Mojocastle was taking it also, specifically yaoi. Now Light novels seem to be the big thing everyone is excited about. (What makes it in the same style basket is the perspective. Yaoi and western-style M/M have different conventions relating to plot and relationship roles etc. The same distinction can be made for other genres that are manga inspired.)

Have you heard of the Broken Sky books by Christ Wooding. He was heavily influenced by Japanese manga and anime. Maybe you can tell?



He wrote these books for MG I believe.

I think any novel can just be marketed as a novel within its top level genre (literary, fantasy etc). You then have the option of using more narrow marketing niches if it will be to your benefit.

I don't think you necessarily need to have the novel be set in Japan to have it be manga\anime in tone.
I'd like to try light novels, they sound interesting to read and write really...

I understand the light novels in Ebglish (I have read a few) as being any length or themes although they are often category length, just manga in tone and with some manga illustrations. Basically like a Japanese-aesthetic illustrated pulp/yellowback novel. The ones actually in Japanese seem more YA than the ones in English.

I've read the first page (or so) of many a "Light Novel" and they are generally awful. I've never been able to figure out if the prose is just bad, or if it's the translation...

BUT anyway, a lot of light novels have manga like plots and even get turned into manga and anime in Japan.

Example- Aria the Scarlet Ammo novel

And Aria The Scarlet manga

Osulagh said:

I think you're trying to mix together things that can't be mixed together to explain something.

Manga (漫画) is the word in Japanese for cartoon-styled or comics.
Is it not a genre, but a medium.

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Totally agree about the medium point. I can't say I want to write an impressionist painting book. Doesn't that really mean I want to write a book set in 1870s France (more or less)?
I also think (at my best guess) you're trying to do something inspired by "Japanese shounen anime aesthetics" (which may be closer to the mark of what you're trying to do). If you're doing that, then that's an MG audience to me. Be very hard to skew the story higher than that age range.

Also, I have to say, western "otaku" (or even asian otaku that aren't Korean) that write fanfiction make me cringe, and this is because they don't really understand Japanese culture. It's like when the Japanese portray Americans in manga and anime - that's equally cringe-worthy. And look, I'm saying this as someone who has lived in Japan for some years and has blood ties to Japan.

For example, foreigners tend to over-emphasize the concept of "honor" when they write about Japanese people. But the truth is they're looking at it from a "reward driven culture" of the west where honor is some personal prize to be won. This is very un-Japanese. The Japanese on the whole, from my experience are the opposite. That is, they are a "shame avoidance culture". Westerners emphasize the "honor" component too much and ignore the "shame" component, which is much more of a driver for action (and inaction) in a Japanese setting.

soho-syndrome said:

I understand light novels as something with a less serious plot and shorter in length. I've always written multi-chaptered stories that focus more on character growth, more similar to the pacing of a TV show than a novel. Do you guys think that's a little too untraditional and not market-friendly?

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So it's more character-driven, then?

I'm sure there are novels (or novellas) out there that have character-driven plots in all genre.

I can't answer your question without knowing much about your story and what kinds of stuff you like to read about.

What kinds of novels do you like to read? Are they children's books, Young Adult/teen books, and/or adult books?

What genre is the story, or, what kind of genre do you like to read? (Ex: Romance, Literary, Scifi, Fantasy, etc?) Reading more in the genre you would like to write in can help quite a bit.

Miss Strawberrii said:

Have you heard of the Broken Sky books by Christ Wooding. He was heavily influenced by Japanese manga and anime. Maybe you can tell?

He wrote these books for MG I believe.

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OMG, I read those books! I really enjoyed them, though I don't remember much of the plot nor its ending. (I have a terrible memory and I read those as a small kid.) I remembered being let down by someone's betrayal, but I liked it overall. The main girl reminded me of Rachel from "Animorphs", which I was into at that time. (I always loved the aggressive female characters.)