But I’d love to see more geared to Tween boys.

But I do agree that we need more of them. Some of the titles you mentioned are very good. If Kodocha or Sailor Moon was still available, I would add that too (My library has a very good manga selection, and they somehow got the whole Kodocha collection). Sugar Sugar Rune in particular is very fun, edgy, and meaningful without veering into the teens, while still be lots of fun for all ages.

Well, because girls in that age groups have an aspiration to grow up fast so they often put older main characters.

However if you read manga for high schooler the characters are the same age. Same for manga targetted to university students, office ladies, housewives. etc

It’s only manga for elementary school girls that have older characters than that age group as heroines.

Fun fact: the manga of hell girl (jigoku shoujo) which Del-Rey rates as being for older teen is actually aimed at elementary school girls. It is serialized in Nakayoshi in Japan (CCSakura, Magic Kngiht Rayearth, Sailor Moon)

Nenena

Yes, there are a lot of sports shoujo manga that were very popular like Ace wo Nerae, Attack No1 etc yet they are not licensed. And horror shoujo manga too, shoujo manga just defies American stereotypes of what girls like (they don’t like horror, sports, sci-fi)

However about sports manga this is true for shounen manga too, publishers think that sports manga does not sell in the US. Sports manga is also an important part of shounen manga but is very rarely localized, which gives the impression to US readers that shounen manga is only DBZ or Naruto-like fighting.

the girl who leapt thru time– might also suitalbe for tweens.

http://www.madman.com.au/actions/periodicals.do?method=home&periodicalId=320

there’s an anime , not sure when it’ll be licensed cuz this one kinda look like a cine-manga sort of thing. i’ve watched teh anime which is immensly suitalbe for tweens. i’m not sure if the manga expands on it or not. but worth a look.

if the anime’s ever out you should try to get it for your library. it’s a wonderful story, funny and poignant at the same time. and high production quality. i’m suprised it’s not yet available to purchase in US.

also just want to say hi we met at comiccon ^__^.. i “leapt” to your page thru MangaBlog.

grace

Recently, at my prompting, we created a graphic novel section, and I’ve been having a hard time with manga, which is what will really drive interest there. Obviously, some of our concerns are different (we don’t have the shelf space to commit to the umpteen volumes of, say, Fruit Baskets or Naruto), but I’ve encountered much the same quandry.

I find the rating systems to be crappy–meant as much to tease interest by over-rating as anything else, in my opinion. But I have found some manga that I like. A recent book is Shoulder-a-Coffing Kuro from Yen press, which is cute but has something more going on. But it may straddle age groups in an interesting-to-me-as-an-adult way, rather than satisfying what that age group wants. I just recently discovered Translucent myself, and am glad you mention it–maybe I’ll take a chance and order some for the store.

I wish more shoujo sports manga were translated. There are a lot of sports titles that star middle-school-age heroines, and they do a good job of combining sports drama with coming-of-age stories. Some do touch on the subject of body changes, but they generally tend to avoid the blatant sexual content that shows up in other titles. But I don’t know what the likelihood of seeing shoujo sports titles translated really is. I still sense a lot of skepticism about the idea that girls would want to read about sports in the first place.