Nana, Vol. 1 (Nana, #1)

by Ai Yazawa

A chance meeting on a train to Tokyo sends two girls named Nana on a collision course with destiny!

Nana "Hachi" Komatsu hopes that moving to Tokyo will help her make a clean start and leave her capricious love life behind her. Nana Osaki, who arrives in the city at the same time, has plans to score big in the world of rock'n'roll. Although these two young women come from different backgrounds, they quickly become best friends in a whirlwind world of sex, music, fashion, gossip and all-night parties!

Nana Komatsu is a young woman who's endured an unending string of boyfriend problems. Moving to Tokyo, she's hoping to take control of her life and put all those messy misadventures behind her. She's looking for love and she's hoping to find it in the big city.

Nana Osaki, on the other hand, is cool, confident and focused. She swaggers into town and proceeds to kick down the doors to Tokyo's underground punk scene. She's got a dream and won't give up until she becomes Japan's No. 1 rock'n'roll superstar.

This is the story of two 20-year-old women who share the same name. Even though they come from completely different backgrounds, they somehow meet and become best friends. The world of Nana is a world exploding with sex, music, fashion, gossip and all-night parties.

• ISBN10: 1421501082
• ISBN13: 9781421501086
• Publish Date: 6 December 2005 (first published 3 March 2008)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Viz Media, Subs. of Shogakukan Inc
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 192
• Language: English

Reviews

[celinenyx]

Nana #1 consists of two stories, one following a sparkly high school girl named Nana, and one story following a punk lead vocalist Nana. From here on I'll be referring to them as Barbie and Punky.

We start out with Barbie, who has an affair with a grown man she knows almost nothing about. When he ends things, she's having a hard time getting over him. Barbie always falls head over heels for older guys, and usually within the first ten seconds of meeting them. Influenced by her best friend, she tries being best friends with a guy for once.

Punky is the archetypical character with a bad past. She sings in a band, where her boyfriend is the lead guitar. Her boyfriend has his big break, and leaves for Tokyo, leaving Punky behind. She is forced to make some tough choices.

Although Barbie is superficial and annoying at times, I liked her part of the story best. Punky's just didn't have the same amount of humour and heart. I felt that Punky didn't have anything that made her unique in any way, and I didn't feel invested in her story.

Some issues I had with the story probably stem from the fact that I know absolutely nothing about Japanese culture, and some story lines just got a bit weird for me. At one point a male character doesn't say "I love you" to a female character, because that's apparently the Western way, but instead just kinda says it by kissing her. I'm not much of a romantic, but I did find this a bit lame. It's easy to kiss someone, but it takes balls to tell someone you love them. But I guess that kind of sentiment doesn't agree with the Japanese view of masculinity.

Nana is entertaining, especially Barbie's half of the novel. I might read a few more in the series, as my library has them, but I'm not sure whether I'm hooked enough to read the full 21 volumes of this manga. Also, the author didn't finish the series, and might never write the last volume. I don't want to become invested in a series that might not get an ending.