Message to Adolf, Part 1
Though published previously in English in eight smaller paperbacks, Tezuka’s political thriller, presented here in the first of two handsome hardcovers, deserves another look. Though he’s most celebrated for creating the enduring favorite Astro Boy (and is about on a par in Japan with Walt Disney here), Tezuka created a wealth of stories in a career that essentially defined the visual language of modern manga. This work, serialized in the 1980s, weaves an intricate story of three Adolphs. As a Japanese reporter tries to uncover documents that would devastate the ascendancy of Hitler’s Reich, two young boys in Japan—half-German Adolph Kamil and Jewish expatriate Adolph Kaufmann—test the limits of friendship, family, and loyalty. Purists may object to the fact that this book is “flipped” (mirrored to read left to right), but the approachability factor could rope in readers who don’t normally go for manga and who will find a master artist and storyteller in full flight. --Ian Chipman