BIRD KISS

TOKYOPOP

CARTOONIST: Eun Ah Park

TRANSLATION:  Jihae Hong

ENGLISH ADAPTATION:  Sarah Dyer

ISBN:  1598164910; softcover; Romance/Teen Age 13+

208 pp., B&W, $9.99

Nachsung Academy goes from kindergarten through high school, and there’s quite a bit of drama going on at the junior high and high school wings.  Ban Miyoul (last names are first) is a boy-crazy junior high student smitten with the tall, dark, and handsome high school student, Ghun Guelin.  Guelin, however, barely notices Miyoul, but her childhood friend, Woo Heerack, does notice Miyoul because he’s been in love with her since they day they met 10 years ago.  Miyoul may be embarrassed of Heerack’s attention, but a rival girl, Che Rosa, finds herself besotted with the scrawny boy.

Miyoul spends her time trying to track Guelin.  He’s a member of a mysterious boys-only organization known as “The Slipper Club,” and Miyoul wants to find out the location of The Slipper Club’s secret meeting place.  Once there, she plans to force her way in and make Guelin notice her.  While she’s busy scheming, she does take time to notice Rosa’s attraction to Heerack, but she doesn’t notice that her old friend isn’t staying the nerdy boy he’s always been.

A few years ago, The Comics Journal published an interview with John Romita, Sr. (#252 specifically), a mainstay at Marvel Comics for over three decades.  Best known for his work on The Amazing Spider-Man, Romita also drew romance comics for DC Comics, and TCJ reprinted a few examples with the interview.  At the time, I wondered if anyone still produced that kind of beautiful art for romance comics that Romita once did for DC.  Yes, it’s still done, but it’s published outside of the U.S.  Thank goodness for shojo manga.

BIRD KISS, the latest addition to TOKYOPOP’s extensive library of shoujo (manga for girls), is also manhwa (comics from Korea).  Drawn by Eun Ah Park, Bird Kiss is filled with the kind of lovely art that makes romance comics seem… well, romantic.  There’s plenty of super-deformed and chibi, but overall, Park’s work is the art of beauty.  Park knows how to draw comics that create a visual narrative, and there’s also a zippy energy to her work that turns Bird Kiss into a page-turning, romantic potboiler.  Bird Kiss (of which TOKYOPOP has published two volumes) is also a reworking of the “The Frog Prince” fairytale.

Park (Sweety Gem) lavishes her characters with beautiful looks.  Even the men are pretty – some of them bearing the kind of dark, masculine, elfin beauty that had female fans swooning over Legolas from The Lord of the Rings films.  Often, she places flower patterns in the background to signal that love is in bloom.

The English adaptation of Bird Kiss by Sarah Dyer is superb.  She retains what is important in this manga and the important story elements in many manga – the emphasis on feeling and on psychology.  Dyer, however, also creates a solid plot and narrative line for those who want a story where something’s happening.  Combine a solid adaptation with the hearty-stirring beauty of Eun Ah Park’s art and we have in Bird Kiss the best that high quality romance comics can offer.

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