I'm sorry for taking so much time, I said I'd write the second selection mid-July but I was very busy. As promised, here are web mangas aimed at a bit more mature audience.
Title : アイカギ屋
Artist : トモリ
Website : brown note
Chapters : 4 (ongoing)
Kogake is an unusual locksmith: on top of the normal keys, she also makes keys that can open the door to someone's heart. While promoting her shop, she travels through many parallel worlds. But Kogake's twin sister, Koyomi is afraid Kogake might never be able to come back to her own world one day.
Aikagiya is a supernatural story with a bit of romance and a lot of slice of life. This art style isn't very engaging but the story is interesting enough to override that weakness. The level is moderate beginner: the grammar is pretty simple with short sentences but as always the problem is the kanjis. There aren't a lot of them but since some of them are unusual or advanced level (i.e. tobira 扉 or kagi 鍵). So you may want to have a dictionary ready at hand.
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Title : Planets
Artist : みさきあん
Website : 朝焼けはじける
Chapters : 2 (ongoing)
Planets is a collection of short stories portraying personification of the planets of the solar system. For example, the first chapter is about Earth and Moon.
The slightly messy art style and the global ambiance made me think of a mangaka I like a lot, Midorikawa Yuki (famous for Natsume Yûjinchô). The text is, of course, typewritten and the size of the pages makes the reading pleasant. There's almost no narration so the language is mainly spoken. The chapters are rather short, around 20 pages, and as the stories are independant from each other, they can be read seperately without being lost. As for the kanjis, there aren't a lot of them but some of them are pretty complicated so once again a dictionary could be useful.
I must say that Planets was a very good surprise and became a new favorite of mine. To begin with, I enjoyed the solar system thema (I was part of an astronomy club for 5 years). The personification of the planets of the solar system isn't anything new, Sailor Moon being the most famous example, but there was a good reflexion on the relationships between the planets and the Sun. That Midorikawa-ish ambiance was quite pleasant with a calm but fluid story flow that stays nonetheless dynamic but without putting action scenes everywhere.
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Title : 猫金魚
Artist : 小川
Website : 134
Chapters : 1 (complete)
Nekokingyo is a short, comical story about a scientist and his assistant finding a strange creature, the cat-goldfish. It's very intelligent and can even speak the human language but it's far from being obedient...
I think Nekokingyo is a good manga when making a transition from beginner to intermediate levels: the grammar is simple and the sentences are short. There are a few difficult kanjis but trying to get pass them can become a good training, for looking up a kanji in a dictionary for example. Since the story is short (16 pages) spending five minutes looking two or three words up won't make you feel like you aren't making any progress in the story.
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