The Angoulême comics festival is just wrapping up in France, and manga seems to have played a prominent part. Riyoko Ikeda, creator of The Rose of Versailles, was a guest of honor, and she sang at the palace of Versailles. An entire section of the festival was dedicated to underground manga by female creators, and there is an entire website, Mangouleme (in French) devoted to the manga happenings at Angoulême.
Melinda Beasi is joining the Digital Manga Guild and plans to write about her experiences there.
Alex Hoffman (possibly NSFW) looks at Manga Taisho Award winners he’d like to see in English.
David Welsh kicks off his josei alphabet at The Manga Curmudgeon with the letter A.
Lissa Pattillo is asking her readers to suggest chibis (-tans) to represent the different manga publishers.
News from Japan: The publisher Kodansha has asked the Chinese portal Baidu to remove manga from their site that have been posted without permission, and Shueisha has told Apple it wants puzzles based on One Piece illustrations and music, also unauthorized, to be removed from the iTunes store. And the manga creator Kazoku Takahashi (Minami no Kazoku) has died.
Reviews: Carlo Santos takes a look at another batch of new releases in his latest Right Turn Only!! column at ANN.
Connie C. on vol. 2 of Ai no Kusabi (Comics Village)
Mark Thomas on vol. 1 of Chobits (omnibus edition) (Mania.com)
Anna on vol. 3 of Demon Sacred (Manga Report)
Todd Douglass on vol. 11 of Higurashi When They Cry (Anime Maki)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 50 of Naruto (The Comic Book Bin)
Oyceter on vols. 3 and 4 of Nightschool (Sakura of DOOM)
James Fleenor on vol. 2 of Ratman (Anime Sentinel)
Emily on Sensei ni Ageru (Emily’s Random Shoujo Manga Page)