Book picks similar to
Apollo's Song by Osamu Tezuka


manga
comics
graphic-novels
graphic-novel

Akira, Vol. 1


Katsuhiro Otomo - 1984
    The science fiction tale set in 2019 in Tokyo after the city was destroyed by World War III, follows the lives of two teenage friends, Tetsuo and Kaneda, who have a consuming fear of a monstrous power known as Akira.

All You Need Is Kill


Ryōsuke Takeuchi - 2014
    Keiji dies on the battlefield, only to be reborn each morning to fight and die again and again. On his fifth iteration, he gets a message from a mysterious ally—the female soldier known as the Full Metal Bitch. Is she the key to Keiji's escape or his final death?

Ghost in the Shell


Masamune Shirow - 1989
    In the rapidly converging landscape of the 21st century Major Kusanagi is charged to track down the craftiest and most dangerous terrorists and cybercriminals, including ghost hackers When he track the trail of one hacker, her quest leads her to a world she could never have imagined.

Death Note, Vol. 1: Boredom


Tsugumi Ohba - 2004
    But all that changes when he finds the Death Note, a notebook dropped by a rogue Shinigami, a death god. Any human whose name is written in the notebook dies, and now Light has vowed to use the power of the Death Note to rid the world of evil. But when criminals begin dropping dead, the authorities send the legendary detective L to track down the killer. With L hot on his heels, will Light lose sight of his noble goal... or his life?BoredomLight tests the boundaries of the Death Note's powers as L and the police begin to close in. Luckily, Light's father is the head of the Japanese National Police Agency and leaves vital information about the case lying around the house. With access to his father's files, Light can keep one step ahead of the authorities. But who is the strange man following him, and how can Light guard against enemies whose names he doesn't know?

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Part 1—Phantom Blood, Vol. 1


Hirohiko Araki - 2002
    For some reason, Dio has a smoldering grudge against him and derives pleasure from seeing him suffer. But every man has his limits, as Dio finds out. This is the beginning of a long and hateful relationship!

Beastars, Vol. 1


Paru Itagaki - 2017
    Who among them is a Beastar—an academic and social role model destined to become a leader in a society naturally rife with mistrust?

Lone Wolf and Cub, Vol. 1: The Assassin's Road


Kazuo Koike - 2000
    Creating unforgettable imagery of stark beauty, kinetic fury, and visceral thematic power, the epic samurai adventure has influenced a generation of visual storytellers both in Japan and in the West.

The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Volume 1


Eiji Otsuka - 2002
    among the living, that is! But all that stuff in college they were told would never pay off - you know, channeling, dowsing, ESP - gives them a direct line to the dead... the dead who are still trapped in their corpses and can't move on to the next reincarnation. The five form the Kurosagi ("Black Heron" - their ominous bird logo) Corpse Delivery Service: whether suicide, murder, accident, or illness, they'll carry your body wherever it needs to go to free your soul! The kids from Kurosagi can smell a customer a mile away - it's a good thing one of the girls majored in embalming!

Nijigahara Holograph


Inio Asano - 2006
    To appease its wrath, they decide to offer it a sacrifice--a human one. But this is only the beginning of Nijigahara Holograph, which takes place in two separate timelines and involves the suicidal Amahiko; Kohta, the lovestruck bully; their teacher Miss Sakaki, whose heavily bandaged face remains a mystery; and many more brothers, sisters, parents, co-workers, teachers, aggressors, and victims who are all inextricably linked to one another. Ten years later, all will have to face what they've done or suffered through--and maybe the end of the world. Nijigahara Holograph--complex, challenging, and elliptical--was named one of the most anticipated new manga at Comic-Con International: San Diego. Hailed as a voice of the current generation in Japan, Inio Asano, whose Solanin was nominated for Eisner and Harvey awards (and was made into a feature film), delves into David Lynchian territory with this psychological horror story.

PLUTO: Naoki Urasawa x Ozamu Tezuka, Band 001


Naoki Urasawa - 2004
    Europol's top detective Gesicht is assigned to investigate these mysterious robot serial murders; the only catch is that he himself is one of the seven targets.

Gantz/1


Hiroya Oku - 2000
    What a waste! And yet somehow they're still . . . alive? Or semi-alive? Maybe it's reanimated . . . by some kind of alien orb with a nasty message . . . "Your lives are over. What you do with your new lives is up to me!" And what this orb called "Gantz" intends to do with their lives is make them play games of death, hunting all kinds of odd aliens, along with a bunch of other ordinary citizens who've recently met a tragic semi-end. The missions they embark upon are often dangerous. Many die-and die again.This dark and action-packed manga deals with the moral conflicts of violence, teenage sexual confusion and angst, and our fascination with death.Hang on to your gear and keep playing the game, whatever you do; Gantz is unrelenting.* Gantz has been one of the most popular adult anime in recent years with over 175,000 copies sold!* Dark Horse makes Gantz available in English for the first time with its U.S. debut.* Gantz has been running weekly in the Japanese magazine Young Jump, which has a circulation of over 1 million.Each volume comes shrink-wrapped and carries an 18+ content advisory.

Blame!, Vol. 1


Tsutomu Nihei - 1998
    He wanders an endless labyrinth of cyberdungeons filled with concrete and steel, fighting off cyborgs and other bizarre silicate creatures. Everyone is searching for the Net Terminal Genes, but no one is quite certain what kind of power they contain. The answer may lie hidden among the scattered human settlements of this vast and desolate future world.

Battle Angel Alita, Vol. 1


Yukito Kishiro - 1990
    When he rebuilds her body, Alita's only clue to her past surfaces-her deadly fighting instincts! And now she is determine to find out the truth about who she once was...

Gyo, Vol. 1


Junji Ito - 2002
    Yes, it's Gyo, where terror takes the name of horribly mutated fish and sea creatures that invade, en masse, a seaside town. Sophisticated, atmospheric work by perhaps the finest horror comics working in the world today. Young couple Tadashi and Kaori are vacationing in Okinawa, but instead of enjoying their time, they bicker endlessly about such important topics as Tadashi's bad breath! But that stench may actually be something quite different. When a strange walking fish appears, Tadashi and Kaori know something's amiss. When a Great White Shark attacks -- walking -- they know they're in real trouble!

Opus


Satoshi Kon - 2011
    But before he became a director, he was a manga artist, and Dark Horse is honored to remember Kon with the release of Satoshi Kon’s OPUS,an omnibus collection of a two-volume manga from 1996, created by Kon on the eve of his first film. OPUS contains the mastery of both realism and surrealism that would make Kon famous in Perfect Blue,as a manga artist planning a shocking surprise ending to his story gets literally pulled into his own work—to face for himself what he had planned for his characters!OPUS is Kon's metafictional tale of Chikara Nagai, a creator under pressure to finish his latest graphic novel, Resonance, who finds that the harshest critic of the shock ending he's got planned is the character who'll have to die in it! Nagai's stregths and weaknesses as a creator are tested beyond their limits as his present and his past, and the worlds of the manga and of reality, become the levels of a maze he may never escape... let alone get a chance to resolve the story!