Digital Manga To Publish Osamu Tezuka’s “Barbara” As Paperback

By Ishaan . January 15, 2012 . 10:30am

Encouraged by the results of their last Kickstarter fund-raiser for an Osamu Tezuka book, Digital Manga are doing another one. This time, it’s for a manga titled Barbara. Here’s a brief summary of the book:

Wandering the packed tunnels of Shinjuku Station, famous author Yosuke Mikura makes a strange discovery: a seemingly homeless drunk woman who can quote French poetry. Her name is Barbara. He takes her home for a bath and a drink, and before long Barbara has made herself into Mikura’s shadow, saving him from egotistical delusions and jealous enemies. But just as Mikura is no saint, Barbara is no benevolent guardian angel, and Mikura grows obsessed with discovering her secrets, tangling with thugs, sadists, magical curses and mythical beings — all the while wondering whether he himself is still sane.

Barbara is over 430 pages long. They say that if the Kickstarter campaign reaches its goal (and it looks like it already has), it will be published as a large-size paperback (5 7/8″ x 8 1/4″), the same as Swallowing the Earth, the previous Tezuka Kickstarter project. Just like last time, you also get prizes for donating.

Digital Manga add that they’ve partnered with Tezuka Productions in Japan to publish more of his work in the U.S. through Kickstarter campaigns, and that they plan to publish other niche manga in the U.S. the same way.