Yumiko Kawahara's disturbing short stories explore the strange and codependent world of dolls and the people who own them. These cautionary tales must come from some desire to teach people a lesson, for in each one there is a horrible outcome when the doll enters their homes. Volume 1 Milk at Mealtimes: A man spoils his Plant Doll, and it matures into a "woman". Potpourri Doll: A mentally unbalanced man buys his daughter a Plant Doll, and starts to obsess over the "nauseating scent" coming from it. Snow White, Part I: A jeweller tries to obtain Tears of Heaven from a Plant Doll named Snow White. Snow White, Part II: A poor man takes in a Plant Doll and dies from the exhaustion of taking care of it. In the end the doll cries. Rainy Moon: An artist with a supernatural reputation does a portrait of a Plant Doll named Rainy Moon. Lucky Doll: A man's Plant Doll, named Otohime, grants him good luck, yet his girlfriend is somewhat skeptical. The Distant Sound of Water: A man wanders the city trying to regain his memory. A Spell to Unbind Spring: A man returns to a secluded manor with a legend of a girl who drowned in a nearby lake. Volume 2 Blue Doll: A man working for a collection agency takes in a Plant Doll left behind by former clients. The Garden in the Sky: A maid gets entangled in a plot involving a fortune depending on the words spoken by a Plant Doll. The Missing Doll: A woman tries to find the Plant Doll once owned by her dead grandmother. Princess Jewel: When a boy's sister dies, his father buys a Plant Doll to help his mother deal with it. The Role of an Angel: After getting divorced, a young model buys a Plant Doll. Forbidden Fruit: Olympia is a special kind of Plant Doll, one who sings. But there is a sinister secret about this certain Plant Doll. A Voice in the Night: A woman wanders the city only to stumble upon her corpse. Volume 3 The Garden of Arcadia: A young man who is mysteriously transforming into a tree is taken to a research institute where he is comforted by many plant dolls. Circle: A group pools their money together to buy a plant doll, which they will all take care of. However, when most of the members begin to see the joy in breaking the rules of plant doll care, one member must take charge of her. Honeymoon: A young girl finds that her previously adoring father has bought a doll that is identical to her in her childhood. Dreams of Flying High in the Sky: A lonely novelist buys a plant doll to impress his editor. When she leaves to marry her sweetheart, he must raise the doll by himself. The problem is, the doll doesn't respond to him and he has never taken care of her! Emerald: A rich woman's young lover wishes to possess a plant doll. As he yearns after the doll his mistress begins to lose interest in him. The Storm: A young woman who is kept in a gilded cage attempts to escape to live life to its fullest. Volume 4 Quicksand: When a sick young boy dreams of a beautiful plant doll with aqua blue eyes, his parents are quick to purchase her when he sees it in the shop. As the boy spends more time with the doll his health begins to improve. A Gift: In the midst of refuse an angel waits to awaken. When she is woken before her time, will she ever bloom into a proper angel plant doll? Coral: A father brings home a mysterious ball of coral with a tiny plant doll inside. As the doll spends more time in the sun, the bigger she grows. The Tiara of Melancholy: A brother and sister team is hired to grow the fabled Tiara of Melancholy for a rich man. What they soon find out is that as the tiara grows it draws its energy from the doll itself.

Two boys find out that there are demons in the world who will relatively soon try to kill all of humanity, and so they seek to combat them even if that means giving up their own humanity and/or sanity in the process. And even if that means destroying their friendship.

Also known as Princess Mononoke, the Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghilbi film. In order to satisfy their own needs for land and resources, Man is encroaching on their sacred territory, cutting down the trees and destroying everything else that stand in their path. As a result, the animal gods became angry and attacked the encampment. Into this conflict wanders a young boy, Ashitaka, a refugee of the Emishi people. His people still live in hiding, but when his village was attacked, he shot and killed one of the animal gods. For this he has been given the curse of death. He has begun a search through Japan to find the secret of his curse when he arrives at the encampment. Outside of the encampment he is attacked by the "Monster Princess", a girl raised in the woods by Moro no Kimi (a 300 year old female wolf god) and who is driven by a fierce hatred for the humans who are destroying the forest. She has repeatedly attacked the encampment, but after she meets Ashitaka, she becomes torn between her loyalty to the animal-gods and the world of the humans. Surrounded by the warring characters of the humans on one side and the animal-gods on the other, each side believing in the righteouness of its cause, it is Ashitaka and San who must face each other personally and, by the end of the film, come to an understanding of each other's world and make the attempt to coexist without hatred and violence. Not far from the heart of the sacred forest where the great Deer God dwells, a new town called Irontown is founded. Conflict seems inevitable. A young girl, raised by wolves, and a warrior bearing a curse inflicted by the hatred of a dying Boar God are trying to make things right. Will they succeed?

From DrMaster: Meet Pam Akumachi, an energetic 13-year-old junior high student who has just turned into ...a little devil! One day, when Pam and her friends try to summon the "benign devil," the magic circle goes out of control and Pam is transported to a strange pararell world where angels and devils reside in an uneasy coexistence.

From Esthétique: Kosumo has a serious medical condition that has kept her in the hospital ever since she was a child. Since Kosumo's blood type is rare, it impossible to find a donor. While Kosumo is on the verge of death, out in the city, the 99th Generation Miko, Himiko-sama, gets into a terrible accident while trying to save a child. She is rushed to the hospital, and there her fate crosses with Kosumo's. When the hospital discovers that Himiko has the same rare blood type as Kosumo, they decide to make her a donor, since Himiko is sure to die as a result of the accident. Kosumo recovers and moves back to Tokyo, but later finds out that Himiko's blood isn't the only thing flowing inside her…

From Kotonoha: Seventh grader Hayashi Renei is troubled by a strange dream: Her dead brother-- killed in an automobile accident--comes back to life as Coo. The dream comes again the following night and then every night thereafter. Coo's world is a cruel one--crueler than the real world, even--with its own share of pain, suffering, and sadness. Renei is searching for her house with her brother and others whom she meets in Coo's world so that she can return to reality and the land of the living...

From Bliss : In this universe, there are four worlds: Meikai, the center of the universe, Ninkai, the human world, Youkai, where monsters with shape-shifting forms live, and Shintenkai, the world of the Celestials. Shiba Yukinari is one of the few who are born of both Youkai and Celestial blood - during the day, he works as a detective, but also has the job of exterminating youkai. As he works collecting 'cores', or a youkai's source of power, he meets Riifei who that demands that Yukinari hand over his own 'core'... Vol.1 Crimson Vol.2 Crimson Crown Vol.3 Crimson Chaos

From Tokyopop: K is a wizard who can grant wishes--all he asks in return is that which is most precious to the wisher... Mourning from a horrific loss, Jin Ryu wants K to bring back her parents and brother from the dead. But when K tells her that a wish such as this can only lead to greater tragedy, he agrees to take her on as an apprentice. Now Jin observes K with his various and sundry clients: A father who wants to put a stop to his son's relationship... A young woman who longs for her lover to remember... A boy who will do anything to be accepted...

Long ago, a group of friends banded together—and now the whole gang has been reincarnated in the present day. Each has a reminder of the past: a butterfly-shaped birthmark on their thumbs. When the marks touch, they catch a glimpse of their shared past, though what they see doesn't always match. Tsubame insists that he and Kanoko are fated to be together. By the time Kanoko finds out it's not true, it's too late: she's already fallen for him. The "butterfly" friends must reconcile their ties to the past with their present desire for fun and romance!

Guilt-Na-Zan is a vampire aristocrat who was sealed into a cross by Kyouji's ancestor more than 100 years ago. Now Kyouji has revived him--although his soul was resurrected into a cute female doll and can only transform into his real figure when he sucks blood from Kyouji's sister Tonae... But when you combine Goth clothes and hot vampires, slowly but surely everyone will start to feel like one big family! -- Tokyopop

A man and a woman are working together in their own business. Not very interesting, you say? And if they are ghost sweepers, professional exorcists exterminating evil spirits and demons? Huh, not inventive enough? Then what if the man is a total pervert, beyond hope of any salvation, and the woman is a total hottie? And there are more babes to come! What? Sounds like a standard harem manga? Ok, then let's suppose that the woman is as avaricious as the man is perverse And she knows how to use her charms to force the man into suicide missions for a starvation wage. Still missing something? Then how about a dark, hidden scheme that has been running for ages, which of course can't ignore the woman, who is one of the most powerfull ghost sweepers alive? From Baka-Updates: Overdevelopment and crowding in Japan has forced many of its indigenous spirits and ghosts to lose their homes. Due to problems caused by the homeless spirits, a new profession was created, the Ghost Sweepers (GS). Private exorcists for hire; they serve only the highest bidder to survive in the cutthroat corporate world. Among this, the Mikami GS Company, led by Reiko Mikami and her two assistants, the teenage boy Tadao Yokoshima and the ghost girl Okinu, is said to be the best. The manga setup is scenario-to-scenario, with many plots intertwining classic Japanese culture and modern day realities, with occasional references to Western influences. In between these plots are some longer story arcs where new characters are introduced and the existing characters are further developed. There is no one ongoing storyline, therefore the plots are character-driven and serve to gradually develop characters, especially the main protagonists. GS Mikami Gokuraku Daisakusen!! won the Shogakukan Manga Award for sh?nen.

From Adachi's Universe: We start with our main protagonist, Shichimi, bidding farewell as he readies for his journey into Edo (on our Earth, Edo was the old name of Tokyo before it became the capital of Japan). His mother has just died, only leaving him a walnut and a request for him to go to his half-siblings. Shichimi bids farewell to a sternly old man, who is a firefighter. We can tell this from the symbol on his cloak. This symbol is also on Shichimi's cloak. Upon reaching the town of Edo, Shichimi meets a mysterious man, who ridicules the peace of the world as an illusion.

From Tokyopop: To honor CLAMP's 15th anniversary, CLAMP no Kiseki: The Ultimate Collection features full-color pages, exclusive material, 6 pages of new, never-before-seen manga, and limited-edition collectible figures!

From Tokyopop: Sasshi's world is in disarray. His best gal pal, Arumi, is about to move away, and his Osaka neighborhood is being demolished in the name of urban renewal. However, this little neighborhood has some surprises under its concrete -- it's actually a portal to parallel universes. And when this section of the city is leveled, the portal is cracked wide open. Sasshi and Arumi soon find themselves being hurtled from one strange world to the next! Making matters even more surreal, is the fact that these worlds seem to spoof and mock popular movies, video games, manga and anime!

The angel Alexiel loved God, but she rebelled against Heaven when she saw how disgracefully the other angels were behaving. She was finally captured, and as punishment sent to Earth to live an endless series of tragic lives. She now inhabits the body of Setsuna Mudo, a troubled teen in love with his sister Sara. Setsuna's misery mirrors the chaos among the angels, and their combined passions threaten to destroy both Heaven and Earth.

Gi-Hyun encounters a talking chick one day. The talking chick, whose name is Bok, claims that Gi-Hyun is his master in their previous lives. Bok (The talking chick) has been reborn as a chicken in order to fullfil his duty which he failed in his previous life. His duty is to protect Gi-Hyun from the assassin who killed him in his previous life. And so, their ordeals begin.

From Tokyopop: Gods and demons wage a neverending battle with the mortal realm as their battlefield. As with most longstanding feuds, the reasons are no longer important--hatred is a way of life. But it is foretold that one would arise who could restore harmony between gods and demons. Enter Raenef...heir to a set of demon royalty, he is hardly courtly material. The demon king assigns Eclipse to be his tutor, to mold Raenef into proper demonic shape. The two begin a journey of discovery and are soon joined by a human knight and a god-blessed priest. From Mari Lex: As a demon lord in training, poor Raenef just doesn`t seem to make the cut. With his unbelievable innocence and neivity, not to mention unbearable cuteness dispite trying to look scary, he only agreed to become a demon lord for the free food. Will he ever become a successful demon lord???

From Tokyopop: This fantasy adventure fairy tale is based on an adorable sweet girl named Yuuki Wakasa. She's just your typical 5th grader and big sister who's responsible for her three little brothers. One day while walking home she catches a red magic stone that mysteriously falls from the sky. Yuuki soon discovers the stone's magical powers when she looks in the mirror and sees a reflection of a beautiful dark-haired girl who reveals to Yuuki the secret powers of the stone: it allows her to travel from the human world to a dream world known as Takamagahara. Yuuki then realizes that she is the 'chosen one' who must save the Sun from being destroyed in the dream world; otherwise both worlds will fall into complete darkness forever ...

When Yuna Lee's mother moves to Germany to pursue a music degree, she's left to stay with her father, a university professor, and her three older brothers, who are fiercely overprotective of her. During her summer vacation, she visits her mother in Germany, where she falls off a cliff and is rescued by Rieno, an 18-year-old knight living in the land of Phantasma. Rieno makes a deal with Yuna: If he saves her life, She must come with him and be the Queen of Phantasma. After agreeing, she goes back home, only to return to Germany some months later, and is whisked away to Phantasma by Rieno. Now, she must cope with being the Queen of Phantasma, while forgetting the world she came from.

In this story, we’re treated to a twisted, gothic-horror remix of the classic Cinderella story as re-imagined by a shounen author for a shoujo audience, where we find, in the end, that nothing comes free, and if it sounds too good to be true, well, there’s usually a catch. (You’ve never seen Cinderella like this!)

Long ago, a witch named Red Ridinghood fell in love with a man named Wolf, but he broke her heart. She set a curse on their descendents… should a Wolf ever fall for a Ridinghood, they will turn into a wolf!

In this four-page extra from "Blood Hope", Hakuou explains to Hisae why they need to make love every night. - tatereed

Alice is a dream decipher. She notices that the class president has been sleeping a lot in class recently, so together with her rabbit partner, she enters his dream and hope to find out the cause...

The great warrior Leon Manas, son of the legendary Nathan Manas, now carries the powerful sword Brumhart. Though this blade is coveted by many, only the heirs to the House of Manas can wield it. But that doesn’t stop the sinister from trying. Ernan, once trusted knight of the House of Manas, murders his commander, robs him of Brumhart and orders the death of Leon’s only son, Zian. But the men sent to perform this infanticide come up against a mysterious figure in a dark cloak who defeats them only to disappear with the child into the thick of the Tass Forest. Sixteen years later, Ernan has become a feared tyrant, but still has not been able to unsheathe Brumhart. Thus begins the tale of this desperate king and the young boy who would become one. Note: This Manhwa is based on the MMORPG