I’m late on posting about this, but I know that many of you are aware of Tokyo Pop’s announcement of closing it’s North American offices on May 31st.
announced that it will close its North American publishing division next month.
The Beat reports that the company’s Los Angeles offices are to close on May 31, while Tokyopop’s German-based offices will continue to run alongside the film and television division.
Tokyopop founder and CEO Stu Levy released a personal statement confirming the news, and thanked the company’s fans for helping bring manga to the US.
But do you know what this means for yaoi fans? BLU Manga will also be closing. Jennifer over at The Yaoi Review has more on this.
I can only say this is truly sad, though not entirely surprising. The manga industry is a fragile, especially since it’s a niche market. But it didn’t need another blow like this, especially since Borders is closing, which was a large carrier of manga. Particularly for yaoi fans, many publishers that produce yaoi manga are gone now. BLU Manga was the most successful one.
