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Two long-running manga series come to a close this month, but not without captivating final volumes. In Dance in the Vampire Bund, a seinen manga by Nozomu Tamaki, vampires have been secretly living among humans until one day a vampires-only island (the “Bund”) is created off the coast of Japan. Humans and vampires fear what they do not understand about each other, but this separation creates a fragile peace. As the series unfolds, the princess and head of the vampires, Mina, has been kidnapped by a faction of extremists and replaced with an imposter. Her friends, werewolf Akira and once-human Yuki, must free Mina and together retake the Bund from the radicals. Shades of romance and impressive supernatural powers fuel this fourteen-volume series to its climactic conclusion.

A very different shojo series, We Were There, by Yuki Obata, is a contemporary romance in which several older teens age into their twenties as the series progresses. After Yano’s girlfriend dies in a tragic accident, he begins to date Nanami. However, Yano cannot stop thinking about his late love and heads off to help his unstable mother. In the interim, Nanami begins to date Yano’s best friend, and various love triangles and connections among close-knit characters perpetuate through the sixteen volumes in this series. In a fitting close, a reunion at the graveside of their long-gone friend ties loose ends and promises the potential of a happy ending.

Delight in the guilty pleasure of peering into the lives of others? The Voyeurs by Gabrielle Bell offers an intimate series of autobiographical shorts that divulge the frustrations of Bell as an artist, and as a single observer in a hectic world. From being overshadowed by her filmmaker boyfriend in France, to her brief paranoia of becoming John Cheever, to building a tent around her apartment’s radiator for a cheap alternative to Bikram yoga, you never know where Bell’s eccentricities are going next.

Heads or Tails by Lilli Carré is a visually whimsical array of stories and concepts executed with colorful design and incredible lines. Carré creates eerie realms where a man falls in love with a tree, a woman’s doppelganger suddenly appears at her favorite bar, and a chance encounter leaves a man alone and being stared down by a plush animal. Moments of indecision and social awkwardness are poignantly interrupted by mysterious silences of nature, animals, and the grace in absurdity.

Glyn Dillon’s filmic masterpiece, The Nao of Brown, is equal parts psychological thriller and part surrealist meditation. Beautiful Nao Brown is a young, part-time employee at an eccentric toyshop who struggles with loneliness, love, and… compulsive violent thoughts about harming those around her. Her road to enlightenment begins when a burly yet contemplative washing machine repairman, who uncannily resembles her cherished Japanese character “Ichi,” shows up. This absorbing tale of self-discovery is humorous, artistically imaginative, and will stay with you long after you’ve put it down. 

Our neighbor to the southwest is examined chronologically in District Comics: An Unconventional History of Washington, DC. Edited by Matt Dembicki, founder of a comic creators’ collaborative called D.C. Conspiracy, this graphic anthology looks both at the familiar, and especially, the less well-known events that has shaped the culture and history of the city. Each vignette, some no more than ten pages, is written and/or illustrated by a different person, which makes for a great variety of tone and artistic style.

More commonly known aspects of DC history are covered, such as L’Enfant’s design of the city; Dolley Madison’s rescue of priceless items from the White House as the British burned the building during the War of 1812; and the foiled assassination attempt on Harry Truman by Puerto Rican nationalists. Two particularly moving pieces deal with Washington’s role as a focal point of the grief of the nation. One focuses on the work that Walt Whitman did volunteering to help wounded Union troops at Washington hospitals during the Civil War. The other is the story of the man who played Taps at Arlington Cemetery following the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Another important historical event that gets its due is what was known as the Bonus Expeditionary Force, or B.E.F., which “occupied” DC after World War I. This group of veterans did not feel they received appropriate benefits after the war, converged on the city, and were later forcibly removed from their protest area in a fashion that seems eerily similar to the Occupy movement of today. Personal stories are featured as well, including that of janitor James Hampton, who built an incredible altar to his spiritual beliefs in a rented garage – so amazing it later made its way to the Smithsonian. Lawmakers, spies, journalists and athletes, too, take their places among the many stories in this handsome collection.

The graphic novel A Zoo in Winter by Jiro Taniguchi follows a young man named Hamaguchi, who is working for a fabric printing factory in 1966. He is unsettled there; he wants to design his own fabric but is thwarted by the boss, and needs to find more creative employment. Hamaguchi heads to Tokyo and becomes an assistant at a magazine that publishes manga, then a new art form. So begins his journey as an artist.

The story offers quiet realism. Black and white illustrations are beautifully drawn and the characters take on a life of their own. Quiet and thoughtful, Hamaguchi struggles to find his place in the world. Suddenly he’s thrust into an urban setting with quirky “artist types” who work odd hours and drink too much. Taniguchi captures them visually, each drawn expression conveying abundant emotion.  The story is gentle but at the same time compelling. You want to know more about Hamaguchi’s life and his art.  You want to see him succeed.

The work also offers a look into the history of manga and a bit of Japanese culture. These are nicely woven into the story and become a backdrop for the tale without becoming overwhelming. Regular graphic novel readers will be interested to see more from this artist, but even those who only casually approach the genre will enjoy an engrossing biographical story about an extremely likeable character. A Zoo in Winter is a terrific graphic novel, destined to become a classic.  

The new graphic novel, Unterzakhn (Yiddish for “underthings”) by Leela Corman tells the story of twin sisters, Esther and Fanya. The sisters grow up on the Lower East Side of New York at the beginning of the twentieth century. Through Corman’s attention to detail in both her art and text, readers are immediately transported to New York City, 1909. In addition to the lively New York story, Corman also interweaves the family’s tragic past in nineteenth century Russia.

Daughters of Jewish Russian immigrants, sisters Esther and Fanya must learn how to survive when few choices were available to young women. The sisters take decidedly different paths. Esther works for a woman who runs a burlesque theater and Fanya goes to work for a “woman doctor.” These choices go on to shape them as the young woman they become. Although their lives are different in nearly every way--lifestyle, politics and values--their childhood bond enables the sisters to transcend these differences in adulthood.

As in any excellent graphic novel, the text and illustrations work together seamlessly in telling the story. Corman’s keen attention to detail allows the reader to enter Fanya and Esther’s world. Corman gives a real sense of New York and Russia, spanning from the late 1890s to the 1920s. She sprinkles the story with Yiddish phrases throughout and lovingly depicts Russian village life in the late nineteenth century. Corman is also particularly adept at conveying her female characters’ expressions as they go through a lifetime of emotions. Unterzakhn is very much a classic immigrant story but at the story’s core is a tale of two sisters figuring out to survive as young women in this time and place.