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Kodansha Licenses O Maidens in Your Savage Season, Magus of the Library Manga

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Kodansha Comics announced at its New York Comic Con panel on Friday that it has licensed Mari Okada and Nao Emoto's O Maidens in Your Savage Season (Araburu Kisetsu no Otome-domo yo) and Mitsu Izumi's Magus of the Library (Toshokan no Daimajutsushi) manga. Its subsidiary Vertical has licensed Kaori Ozaki's The Golden Sheep (Kin no Hitsuji) and Nanashi's Don't Mess with Me, Nagatoro (Ijiranaide, Nagatoro-san) manga, as well as Arata Kanoh's Voices of a Distant Star (Hoshi no Koe Ai no Kotoba/Hoshi o Koeru) novel.

The publisher also announced plans to release Naoki Yamakawa and Akinari Nao's I'm Standing on a Million Lives manga in print next May after previously debuting it as a digital-first title. It will also begin publishing Hiro Mashima's Edens Zero in print this month. In addition, the publisher announced that its Akira 35th anniversary box set is back in stock as of this week.

Kodansha Comics will begin releasing O Maidens in Your Savage Season next April. The publisher describes the story:

The girls in a high school literature club do a little icebreaker to get to know each other: answering the question, "What's one thing you want to do before you die?" One of the girls blurts out, "Sex." Little do they know, the whirlwind unleashed by that word pushes each of these girls, with different backgrounds and personalities, onto their own clumsy, funny, painful, and emotional paths toward adulthood.

Okada and Emoto launched O Maidens in Your Savage Season in Kodansha's Bessatsu Shōnen Magazine in December 2016, and Kodansha published the fifth volume on August 9. The title is the manga series debut of screenwriter Okada.

Okada has written and overseen scripts for such anime as Toradora!, A Lull in the Sea, Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, Kiznaiver, and Dragon Pilot: Hisone and Masotan television anime. She recently made her directorial debut with her Maquia - When the Promised Flower Blooms anime film.

Emoto serialized her Forget Me Not romance manga, inspired by Mag Hsu's original Taiwanese novel Mǎzimen, from 2013 to 2016. Kodansha Comics also publishes Forget Me Not in English.

Kodansha Comics plans to begin releasing Magus of the Library in July 2019. The publisher describes the all-ages, Arabian Nights-inspired fantasy story:

The whole village mocks the poor little elf boy, calling him "Knife-Ears." His only solace is in sneaking into the small branch library to read. Then one day, he meets Sedona, a librarian at the magical central library, who will sweep him away into a world of new knowledge and adventures!

Izumi launched the manga in Good! Afternoon magazine in November 2017, and Kodansha published the first volume on April 6.

Viz Media publishes Izumi's 7th Garden manga in English.

Vertical will release The Golden Sheep in September 2019, and it describes the story:

Tsugu-chan is separated from her friends (Sora, Yuushin and Asari) when she moves away. After a few years, she finally returns and is happy to be reunited with them. Tsugu-chan believes that her friends didn't change, but that doesn't turn out to be the case.

Ozaki launched the manga in Kodansha's Afternoon magazine in September 2017, and Kodansha shipped the second volume on September 21.

Vertical released Ozaki's The God's Lie manga in English, and Tokyopop published eight volumes of Ozaki's 11-volume Immortal Rain manga.

Vertical will begin releasing Don't Mess with Me, Nagatoro in November 2019. The publisher describes the story:

Mischievous Nagatoro-san always bugs Senpai to get a reaction out of him.
What is her motivation? Does she just want to create misery for Senpai?
Or maybe she secretly likes him?

Nanashi debuted the manga on Kodansha's Magazine Pocket website in November 2017. The third compiled volume will ship on October 9.

Vertical will release Kanoh's Voices of a Distant Star novel in July 2019. According to the publisher, the novel "fills in a lot of the gaps and answers many questions" from the manga and original video anime (OVA).

Kanoh's novel is one of two novel adaptations of Voices of a Distant Star; Waku Ōba wrote a different novelization that debuted the same year as the film. Enterbrain published Kanoh's novel in 2006.

Makoto Shinkai (your name.) wrote and directed the OVA that debuted in 2002. Mizu Sahara adapted the anime into a manga (pictured right). Tokyopop released the manga in North America in 2006, and Vertical published a new edition this year.

Source: Kodansha Comics' NYCC panel (Kerry Erlanger)