"You're holding me in a brand new light / you're holding me through the night / and I'm fine"

[larryhammer]

Because of ADV's taking so long to finally drop this series, I've been waiting for the English edition of Yotsuba&! volume 6 for going on two years now -- thank you, Yen Press, thank you for picking up the license. As in eagerly waiting -- and not just because Yotsuba's wide-eyed gasp of astonishment never gets old. The narrative spine for this volume is Yotsuba's growing independence, insofaras a five-year-old can be independent -- a character development made concrete in her new bicycle.* With it she learns that, to coin a phrase, with great power ("I can go anywhere!") comes great responsibility. Azuma does a good job laying out why Yotsuba feels perfectly justified cycling across town to Fuuka's high school without telling, let alone getting permission from, her father -- and, of course, why he's justified in disciplining the little idjit.

Besides, this is the volume with Yotsuba & Bandaids.

As for how well Yen is handling this series compared to ADV, well. Even better. Translation is solid, honorifics left in place, printing-and-binding respectable. One significant change: Yotsuba's speech bubbles get a variety of fonts, depending on how she's speaking -- which more closely mimics the Japanese typesetting. And the replacements for her verbal manglements are good analogs, such as "dirted" when she's been grounded.

A good series that deserves even more buzz than it gets.**


* As they head out to shop for it, she starts singing "The Bicycle Song": "Bicycle, bicycle! Whoosh! whoosh! whoo-o-o-osh! Led by the great man, Off! I! Went!"

** I am amused, btw, to see Yotsuba&! appear in Questionable Content, of all places, as a poster in the bedroom of the yaoi fangirl neighbor. There are also references to Azumanga Daioh betimes.

---L.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

"betimes" is an awesome word.

I've fallen behind on Yotsuba--I'm glad to know someone picked up the license and that they're doing an even better job with the translation.

[larryhammer]

I have to remember, sometimes, that "betimes" is not a general use word with a neutral tenor.

---L.