CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

Issue: I need to start buying original Japanese language manga to help with my Japanese studies. The problem is that I'm having issues finding a good site that sells it. The best one I found so far charges an arm, a leg, and a torso for shipping, AnimeNation has slim pickings in the import section, and eBay isn't always reliable for finding everything I want. So...

I know I'm grasping at straws here, but if anyone knows a really good site to order from, I'd greatly appreciate it.

If you have a Borders in the area, they sell some imports. The tankouban are somewhere in the $12 market.

Also, I'd advise looking for a Japanese market/bookstore if you have one in the area the manga is fairly cheap there.

Akadotretail.com sells import manga with a pretty good selection if neither of the above options are doable. I haven't bought manga specifically from them, but they're located in the US, so shipping shouldn't be an arm and a leg.

Kokoro Daisuke wrote:If you have a Borders in the area, they sell some imports. The tankouban are somewhere in the $12 market.

Also, I'd advise looking for a Japanese market/bookstore if you have one in the area the manga is fairly cheap there.

Akadotretail.com sells import manga with a pretty good selection if neither of the above options are doable. I haven't bought manga specifically from them, but they're located in the US, so shipping shouldn't be an arm and a leg.

Yeah, I went to a Borders, and found a nice section on untranslated manga. It was pretty sweet.

Kinokuniya is very cheap. It is a Japanese book store. You will need some knowledge of Japanese or else communicate via e-mail to get what you want though since they assume anyone wanting Japanese language material is fluent. They are willing to ship to a mailing address.

Manga tend to run 5-9$ (looks like about a 10-20% markup over the Japanese price) per volume and being in the US it is domestic charges for shipping

http://www.kinokuniya.com/
This is the basic website (I don't know if you are east or west coast)
sf@kinokuniya.com is the e-mail of the San Francisco store, but there are other locations as well to try

I have done business with the San Francisco store and found them very polite, and willing to special order from Japan (no extra fees).
This is where I have gotten my Japanese versions of Azumanga Daioh and Love Hina for example

Hope this helps

Waldenbooks/Borders have great selections of untranslated manga, and you can find lots of Ribon telephone books on ebay pretty easily for fairly cheap.

Wow. More responses than expected. Thanks, guys.

There is unfortunately no Borders in my immediate area (40 minute drive) The nearest Waldenbooks, which is in a mall, has a very small selection of import books (being an extra tiny store to fit in the small mall).

I might be able to make good with Kinokuniya and Akadot. Though I wish the former had pictures for most of their items. (Don't trust my reading skills 100% yet =P)

Update

Well, after hours of searching, it seems I came upon just what I was looking for.

http://www.sasugabooks.com

Their prices could be a little cheaper... but at least they aren't charging $35 shipping and handling.

Ah, I've ordered from Sasugabooks.com before. I was going to throw that in, but the one time I ordered books from there they got backordered for a couple months. >_> Not sure if that's a normal thing. lol

I'm slightly worried about that too... since they state on their webpage: Due to limited storage space at our store, we are not able to keep every item listed on our web site in stock at all times. If you have ordered an item(s) that we do not have in stock, you will be notified by email after we receive your order, and we will order the item(s) for you from the publisher at no additional cost.

But... considering it seems to be the only place to get the particular stuff I have in mind (I'm into particularily long series'), may as well give em a shot.

I was going to mention Sasuga. I bought the first two tanko of One Piece for around $16 (including S&H) and had them in about a weeks time. Seems pretty good (I need to order again from there sometime, but I'm still trying to get my computer).