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Yen Press Licenses Skull-Face Bookseller Honda-san Manga, Little Witch Academia Novel, More (Updated)

Yen Press announced on Monday that it has licensed the following titles:

• Honda's Skull-Face Bookseller Honda-san manga
• Momo Tachibana's Little Witch Academia: The Nonsensical Witch and the Country of Fairies novel
• Mahito Aobe's Count Fujiwara's Suffering manga
• Yuriko Hara's Cocoon Entwined manga
• Togame's Secretly, I've Been Suffering About Being Sexless manga
• Inumajin and Kiki Koikuchi's Woof Woof Story - I Told You to Turn Me Into a Pampered Pooch, Not Fenrir! manga
• Usata Nonohara's The Survived Alchemist With a Dream of Quiet Town Life! light novels and their manga adaptation.

All of the licenses are slated to debut in July 2019.

Honda launched Skull-Face Bookseller Honda-san (Gaikotsu Shotenin Honda-san) on the Pixiv Comic website in August 2015. Kadokawa brand company Media Factory published the first compiled book volume in March 2016, and the third volume in September 2017.

The comedy manga's story centers on a skeleton named Honda who works in a bookstore. Hilarity ensues daily in his work at the shop's manga counter.

The manga inspired an anime adaptation that premiered in October. Crunchyroll streamed the series as it aired.

The manga ranked at #12 on the list of top manga series for female readers in Takarajimasha's Kono Manga ga Sugoi! (This Manga Is Amazing!) guidebook in 2016. The manga also ranked at #12 in Japanese online bookstore Honya Club's "Zenkoku Shotenin ga Eranda Osusume Comic 2017" (Nationwide Bookstore Employees' Recommended Comics of 2017) poll in 2017. In addition, the series was nominated in Pixiv Comic and Nippon Shuppan Hanbai, Inc's "Web Manga Sōsenkyo" (Web Manga General Election) poll in 2017.

Kadokawa published Little Witch Academia: The Nonsensical Witch and the Country of Fairies (Little Witch Academia: Detarame Majo to Yōsei no Kuni) in July 2017 under its middle-grade JY imprint. Momo Tachibana wrote the novel with illustrations by Eku Uekura.

In the novel, Akko takes a trip to a hill where fairies gather and meets the hill's guardian Sifra. When Akko finds out that Sifra's dog and cat are missing, she sets out with Lotte and Sucy to find them.

Studio Trigger's Little Witch Academia television anime premiered on January 2017 and concluded with 25 episodes in June 2017. Netflix debuted the first 13 episodes outside Japan in June 2017, and added episodes 14-25 in August 2017. The television series was preceded by a 2013 short from director Yoh Yoshinari and a Kickstarter-funded sequel.

Count Fujiwara's Suffering (Fujiwara Hakushaku no Junan) is told from the point of view of a self-important cat who fancies himself a count. He lives with two strange sisters: the older one who is a shut-in, and the younger one who secretly crushes on her sister.

Aobe launched the manga in Kodansha's Monthly Shonen Sirius in August 2014 and ended it in June 2016. Kodansha published the series in three compiled volumes.

Yen Press describes the story of the yuri manga Cocoon Entwined (Mayu, Matou):

Clad in school uniforms practically breathing with life are the girls of Hoshimiya Girls' Academy. When a certain “incident” rocks the academy, hidden feelings will be entwined in this pure girls' love story.

Hara launched the manga in Kadokawa's Comic Beam magazine in February 2018. Kadokawa published the first volume on September 12.

Yen Press describes Secretly I've Been Suffering About Being Sexless (Jitsu wa Watashi Sexless de Nayandemashita):

Deep struggles and concerns about sex are stripped bare in this shocking confession! Married life isn't all lovey-dovey, or ooh-la-la steamy—not when you and your partner have opposing sex drives. When a married woman with a raging libido can't find the satisfaction she needs from her tame, lackluster husband, she's left with no choice but to get her fix elsewhere…

Togame originally published the short autobiographical essay manga on pixiv in October 2017. Togame later began a new serialized version in Kadokawa's Comic Flapper magazine in March 2018 and ended it in July. The single compiled volume shipped on August 23.

Yen Press describes Woof Woof Story - I Told You to Turn Me Into a Pampered Pooch, Not Fenrir! (Wan Wan Monogatari ~Kanemochi no Inu ni Shite to wa Itta ga, Fenrir ni Shiro to wa Ittene!~):

Oogami Routa, a corporate slave who died from working too much, wishes he could be the dog of a rich household…and has his wish granted by an enthusiastic rookie goddess! But isn't he a little too big for a dog?!

Inumajin launched the novel on the Shōsetsuka ni Narō! website in March 2017, and Kadokawa published the first volume in print with art by Kochimo in November 2017. The fourth and most recent volume shipped on December 1. Yen Press will publish the first volume on February 19.

The manga by Kiki Koikuchi launched on Kadokawa's web comic service ComicWalker in February 2018, and the first volume shipped in October.

Yen Press describes The Survived Alchemist With a Dream of Quiet Town Life! (Ikinokori Renkinjutsu wa Machi de Shizuka ni Kurashitai):

Two hundred years ago, the Kingdom of Endalgia was destroyed by the monsters of the Demon Forest. The sole survivor is an alchemist named Mariela, who managed to escape through suspended animation. When she wakes up two centuries later, she learns that alchemists have gone extinct, and potions are now at a high premium. But what does the last alchemist standing want more than anything else? …A laid-back, quiet town life!

Usata Nonohara launched the novels on the Shōsetsuka ni Narō website in February 2017, and Kadokawa began publishing the series with illustrations by ox in September 2017. The fifth novel volume will ship on January 18.

Guru Mizoguchi launched the manga adaptation in Kadokawa's B's-Log Comic in November 2017, and Kadokawa shipped the first volume on September 1.

Source: Yen Press' Twitter account

Update: Plot summaries, release window updated. Source: Press Release