Zack Davisson

Sixteen mythical monsters and spirits from Japanese folklore take children on fantastical adventures in this first-ever children’s storybook about yokai. Young readers will meet baku the dream eater, mischievous kappa sprites, a ghost child who lives in a hotel, and many more. Yokai have a rich history dating back centuries in Japan, and today, they can be found in monstercatching video games and animated films. Yokai Stories is the first book to weave Japan’s monster mythology into English-language stories for children. Each tale is accompanied by a haunting, modern portrait of the yokai by Swiss artist Eleonora D’Onofrio.

Kitaro takes on a giant Cyclops, Blackbeard, a sea captain who s trying to create hell on earth, and more! The longest story of this collection recounts a huge yokai-vs-yokai battle when a gang of Chinese yokai plot to enslave the Japanese populace. In addition to Mizuki s legendary whimsical tales, translator Zack Davisson pens an essay on the history of Kitaro, and includes a selection of yokai files describing the powers of the various yokai our hero Kitaro confronts in Kitaro s Strange Adventures.

Kitaro and the Great Tanuki War features adventures of Shigeru Mizuki s beloved yokai boy. In the epic title story, Kitaro battles the tanuki, a Japanese animal that features prominently in the country s yokai legends. The furry beasts draw on the power of the blood moon to awaken the monstrous catfish that lives in the depths of the Earth. The twisting of the catfish causes earthquakes that threaten to destroy all of Japan. With his yokai allies captured, Kitaro is the only one left who can take on the great tanuki and his army. Will he be up for the challenge? This volume contains two additional stories about traditional folklore monsters as seen through Mizuki s whimsical and genre-defining lens. In Mokumokuren, Kitaro faces off against a paper screen come to life, while The Obebenuma Yokai introduces a grisly swamp creature. Kitaro and the Great Tanuki War showcase the golden age of the Gegege no Kitaro series from the 1960s and have never appeared in English before. D+Q s Kitaro series celebrates Mizuki s expert blend of folklore, comedy, and horror, sharing the all-ages stories that made Kitaro one of Japan s most beloved characters. This kid-friendly edition also features a History of Kitaro essay by award-winning series translator and Mizuki scholar Zack Davisson.

Kitaro Meets Nurarihyon is the second volume in the adventures of Shigeru Mizuki s bizarre yokai boy Kitaro and his gaggle of other- worldly friends. These seven stories date from the golden age of Gegege no Kitaro, when Mizuki had perfected the balance of folklore, comedy, and horror that made Kitaro one of Japan s most beloved characters. In Kitaro Meets Nurarihyon, Kitaro and his father Medama Oyaji face off against one of their most powerful enemies the self-styled Yokai Supreme Commander known as Nurarihyon. Over the course of this volume, Kitaro takes on the swamp-dwelling Sawa Kozo, the mysterious Diamond Yokai, the sea giant called Umizato, and wages a double-feature of battles against the bizarre Odoro Odoro. Finally, Kitaro journeys to hell itself in the infamous and surreal story Hell Ride. In addition to more than 150 pages of Mizuki s all-ages monster fun, Kitaro Meets Nurarihyon includes bonus materials: Yokai Files that introduce Japan's folklore monsters and a 'History of Kitaro' essay by translator Zack Davisson. If you found the world of yoki fascinating in the The Birth of Kitaro, you will find even more to love in Kitaro Meets Nurarihyon!

The Birth Of Kitaro collects seven of Shigeru Mizuki's early, and beloved, Kitaro stories, making them available for the first time in English, in an all-new, format. These stories are from the golden era of the late 1960s, when Gegege no Kitaro truly hit its stride as an all-ages supernatural series. Mizuki's Kitaro stories are both timelessly relevant and undeniably influential, inspiring a decades-long boom in stories about yokai, Japanese ghosts and monsters. Kitaro's Birthday reveals the origin story of the yokai boy Kitaro and his tiny eyeball father, Medama Oyaji. Neko Musume versus Nezumi Otoko is the first of Mizuki's stories to feature the popular recurring character Neko Musume, a little girl who transforms into a cat when she gets angry or hungry. Other stories in The Birth of Kitaro draw heavily from Japanese folklore, with Kitaro taking on legendary Japanese yokai like the Nopperabo and Makura Gaeshi, and fighting the monstrous recurring villain Gyuki. The Birth of Kitaro is the perfect introduction to award-winning author Shigeru Mizuki's most popular series, seminal comics that have won the hearts of Japanese children and adults for more than half a century.