Candy: Shou Harusono Collection Review
This art collection delivers exactly what it says in the Yen Press blurb: ‘a delightfully delectable and sugary sweet amalgamation of gorgeous illustrations, rough sketches, exclusive bonus manga and even an interview with the series creator of Sasaki and Miyano and Hirano and Kagiura!’ Candy is an apt name as all the cover art is here but in 8.25″x11.75″ large format, which showcases the mangaka’s art to perfection.
I was a little surprised to discover that this art book, the first by Shou Harusono to be made available in the West, has a removable dust jacket and slightly flimsy soft covers – but delighted that the pages within are of good quality paper and the printing really does justice to the mangaka’s eye-catching skills with colour. Shou Harusono first made an impression with her gorgeous shades of blue and russet on the cover art of the first Sasaki and Miyano volume published by Yen Press back in 2021 (2016 in Japan) and has gone on from strength to strength, more recently expanding on the side story of Hirano and Kagiura. All the front and back cover art for both series is here, in volume order, up to #8 for the main series. The rough sketches will be of particular interest to readers who are artists but even if you’re not, it’s fascinating to follow the way Shou Harusono plans her work on the page. My only quibble? Have a magnifying glass to hand, because much of the accompanying text is truly tiny-small and I couldn’t read it without magnification. And you’ll surely want to read the mangaka’s observations as much as I did.
Between the two rough sketches sections come full-page cover arts from Monthly Comic Gene and later on, there are some original fan arts by Shou Harusono for other manga/anime series, including Love of Kill. (This charming custom in which mangaka produce art for the end cards of other mangakas’ TV series seems to be flourishing at the moment.) Then we get to see how Sasaki and Miyano began: 4-koma colour panels that Shou Harusono started posting on Twitter in 2014. This was followed by the Valentine’s bonus story which the mangaka posted to her personal pixiv as ‘A Little Story about Sasaki and Miyano’.
If you recall the adorable cats that feature in the anime TV series and especially in the OVA, you’ll love the images at the end of the main colour sections, which feature the main characters and… cats! Another black-and-white long bonus is the inclusion of ‘A Little Secret Story’ in which the mangaka shares some of the rough pages with her comments in the margins, an enlightening glimpse into work in progress and the work process. ‘Sometimes dialogue changes after I submit it, so sometimes the original lines are there too.’
At the end, we come to three whole pages of Q&A with Shou Harusono, the original editor Izumori, and the current editor Sakura, which contain some intriguing answers to questions (from Twitter) such as: ‘Was there any reason you started off using the 4-panel + story format?’ and ‘How did you get into BL, Sensei?’ as well as inquiries about the characters and the art techniques employed. The book finishes with the mangaka’s afterword, just like every volume of both series featured here.
Good news for fans of the main series is that Volume 10 will be out in January 2025 and we are promised: ‘Now that reading BL is no longer just a hobby for Miyano, but also the story of his life, it’s almost time for the college arc! However, before he gets to that, Miyano’s final cultural festival of his high school career is just around the corner! Meanwhile, his adorably sweet boyfriend, Sasaki, is struggling to figure out what his path forward should be…’ in the Yen Press blurb. A college arc? That sounds as if Shou Harusono is preparing to move into new territory as the main characters grow older and embark on the next stage of their lives.
Our review copy from Yen Press was supplied by Diamond Book Distributors UK.
