Hayao Miyazaki Books

With the forth volume Nausicaa's story takes a tragic turn, no just for her but for all of humanity. This book moved me to tears.

I have just finished reading this series, and I must say that I am AMAZED. The books are much more philosophical than the movie (which corresponds to only the first two books), and contains many more characters that are more developed. Unlike the movie, where Nausicaa was practically perfect, and Kushana was purely evil, the book's characters are much more complex. Kushana reminds me of Lady Hiboshi from Princess Mononoke.

The tone of the series changes from beginning to end. This makes sense, as the series was written over about 10 years, with a number of hiatuses. The first two books are confusing and not terribly interesting, but the story blossoms from there.

On top of that, I don't even like manga or anime as genres. Miyazaki is truly exceptional.

these are two reviews for the two different volumes combined here.

Volume One.
Nausicaa of the Valley of the wind is one of my favorite movies. After seeing for the first time I was amazed that I hadn't seen it sooner. It had everything I like in a movie, a good premise, deep and emotional characters, amazing art work, a deep meaning, and an awesome soundtrack to boot. So when I heard that there was more to the story I went out and bought this book to see if it was as good as the movie. After waiting about a month for it to come in, I bought it on Amazon, I finally got it. I was not disappointed. Let's break this book down into categories.

Art Work. The drawing pretty much, how do they look and how much detail is put into them. Miyazaki, I have to say, is a master in his field. All his drawings are extremely detailed and you can really get a sense of the surroundings. The characters emotions are brought out almost perfectly, especially the Nausicaa herself, who is shown as a powerful, yet fragile girl. Overall the drawings are almost perfect and I don't think anybody would disagree with that.

Characters. I was already familiar with all the characters in this book, having seen the movie already. They are pretty much the same here as they are in the movie so if you've seen it, which I'm taking for granted you have, and then isn't much knew. They mostly do the same things as they did in the movie and feel the same emotions with a few fun differences, but nothing really is too different.

Story. This book follows the movie almost exactly up to the point where Nausicaa and Asbel discover the underground system under the sea of corruption, or toxic jungle as it is called in the movie. There is one big difference that I must share, the Valley of the Wind is really an alley of Torumekia, and Nausicaa goes out to fight under Kushana agents the Doroke principalities, a nation not even mentioned in the movie. Other than that it follows the same story almost to the letter.

Overall a very good and strong opening to the series. This entry doesn't really add a whole lot to the overall story if you've already seen the movie, but there are some important differences which mean you can't simply skip over it if you want to read the series.

Volume Two.
As I continue my reviews on this series I have come to Vol. 2. Nausicaa has left the Valley of the Wind to go to war with Princess Kushana of Tormekia, but on their way to the front their attack group is attacked by Asbel of Pejite. Asbel is shot down and Nausicaa goes to save him, only to be stuck under the Sea of Corruption. As the first book ends Nausicaa and Asbel are seen trying to fly out of the bottom of the Sea and get out.

This book, for those who've seen the movie, covers closely the events that take place in the second half of the movie. Here's the difference. One of the Doroke tribes, mentioned in the first book, has been driven from their lands by the Tormekia invasion and has been sent to conquer and settle the lands of the Periphery, where the Valley of the Wind lies. To do that they must first destroy Kushana's army by luring the insects out of the Sea to attack. Of course Nausicaa finds out about this and manages to not quite foil the plot, but she does save the baby Ohm larva. Much of the Tormekian army is destroyed but the Dorokes are forced to retreat. By the end of the story Kushana takes what is left of her army south to join up with the rest of her men already engaging in battle, and she takes Nausicaa with her to find the stone that controls the God Worrier.

halfway through this book it goes in a completely different direction than the movie, Nausicaa goes off to war, Asbel and Yupa foil a Doroke plan to conquer the Valley, and we are introduced to knew characters such as the Doroke Priest, who is known as the Holy One, and Ketcha, a Doroke girl who serves him. The part where the Ohm attack the Tormekian army is one of the highlights of the series, but the ending was a little odd and might feel rushed. Not the best in the series, but it is a good follow up to the first.

If you have seen the movie then there isn't anything new in the first half of this book for you. But don't just skip this book to save money, there are enough differences to make buying it worth wild.

Just like LOTR, children love it, but until they grow well into their adulthood, they will not be able to fully comprehend the essence of the story.
Children, both boys and girls, will love the major characters in "Nausicaa", because children can find all they wish to be in these characters, but most of them would be puzzled (or troubled!) by the development of the story. An exceptionally smart kid may be able to guess some of Miyazaki's plan of the story before he/she reaches Vol. 7, but I dare to bet, he/she will not accept that plan until he/she reaches 30.
This is a great gift to children. They will thank you many, many years later.

I've been a Miyaki fan for years! Of all of his movies and books, Nausicaa is definitely the best one! Miyaki creates a beautifully vivid world and characters that will you will most certainly NEVER forget! This is one manga series (and the movie as well) that I've never gotten tired of. Every anime fan should have Nausicaa in their collection! You won't regret it!!!

This book is beyond amazing! I love the "Spirited Away" movie and the art in this book is gorgeous and the screen clips are beautiful. Once I decided to purchase this I also picked up the "Spirited Away" soundtrack. This is a must have if you are a true Miyazaki film fan or even just a big fan of the movie itself!

It's Hayao Miyazaki again. What can I say. One of the most amazing animated film ever. And book explores so much of the movie. Amazing learning and reference book. Every animation/comic lover must have it.

The reson why I purchased this book is because of the art inside. It brought me back to the movie Spirited Away.. I ordered the book with a hardcover.. That's nice to have. The product is such fine quality. I am proud to have it and share the Art of Miyazaki with others. I know more about Miyazaki after purchasing this book.

I purchased this book thinking that it would include detailed sketches and concepts for the creation of Spirited Away. While, the book did have these elements it had far fewer than one might suspect from the cover. In fact most of the art work were stills from the movie.


Which, to me came as a great disappointment. If I wanted to see the final art of the movie I would watch the movie. Buy this book if you really love the quality of the animated scenes. Don't buy this if you feel you can gain great insight into how it was made.

i dont know what to say aside from the fact that miyazakisan is an incredible artist/storyboard creator. and bravo to everyone at studio ghibli

Is the second time I order a book from amazon and I'm satisficed with the service, I live in other country and i never had a problem.

The Art of Howl's Moving Castle is a large, hardback book, and is chock full of information and pictures from the amazing movie by Hayao Miyazaki.

This book begins with hundreds of concept sketches by Miyazaki, containing location scenes and characters with notes. The concept sketches go in order of appearance from the movie, so the concept sketches for Sophie come at the beginning, for example, while the concept sketches for Human Turnip show up near the end. There are thousands of gorgeous location scenes as well plus short bios on some of the creators of the movie and a few articles that discuss the creaters' experiences working on the film. Also, at the very end is the complete final screenplay to read through. The screenplay has a few minor changes in it from where the English actors improvised a little (especially Billy Crystal), but otherwise, is exactly from the movie.

Being a student of film and the arts, I found this book extremely helpful and interesting, because it showed the creative process of a huge movie. I would definitely recommend it to any film or arts students to browse through if they wan to get an idea of what kind of work it takes to create such a monumental film!

The only qualm I have with this book is that there were hundreds of screenshots. Not that that's bad, especially if you want to buy this book to revisit the movie, but I would like to have seen a few more sketches and whatnot, or at least a few more articles on how the particular scenes with the screenshots were made.

That aside, I fell in love with this book and was enchanted from front cover to back cover.

This book opens a world of anime art like none other. Primary characters & secondary characters are carefully drawn out and walk through a world & story created for them. As a professional artist, I found great interest in the prelimiary drawings straight through the setting concepts. This is also a great book for fans of the movie. If you loved the movie, you will love this book.

I totally enjoyed the layout and discussion in this book. I have been a Miyazaki fan ever since, "My Neighbor Totoro" which I saw when I lived in Japan. If you relish animation and all the details of this art form, you'll like the format and attention this book gives.

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If you loved the movie, you will love this book, The Art of Howl's Moving Castle it's hard cover, with original sketches, storyboards and the final screenplay!

The book explains every step of the complex story, from the original book adaptation to the final movie. Also have quotes and articles from creators of each process (designers, art directors, supervising animators, etc.) It's like seeing the movie scene by scene with artist commentaries.

This is such a nice book that depicts the last part of the movie vividly (make sure to collect vol. 1~4 for a complete set). It's nice to have watched the movie first, and then own the book so you'll enjoy and understand the whole story even when there's no dialog. I can watch the movie over and over again, but with the books, I get to review any part of the movie any time and any where I like, and it's very lovable for all ages, boys or girls, guaranteed!

My Neighbor Totoro is great! It is a very humorous story, filled with many cute characters! The totoro series would be great for anyone looking for something to read, or just for laughs. It is truly a magical journey in every page.

very good magical story but what the heck is with BATH-TIME.in the end they all take a bath..together!i mean the dad and the two little girls..whats that teaching kids? is it teaching us its ok to do that??i dont know? but anyway beautiful pictures and a good story to tell before bath-time..i mean bed-time.

my kids loved this movie and were thrilled to get this book. In english and japanese. lots and lots of wonderful pictures. one warning first book in a series of several.

kids love this story cross the boundaries, even adults enjoy it. This is one of Miyazaki's most well known books, hard to get it now. I'm sure this story will be loved generations after generations. If you have a Japanese friend, ask him/her!

I am a big fan of anime and Miyazaki's hand in anything is well looking over. I have most of his movies on DVD, and this book makes seeing this movies over and over more a thrill. I have plans for all my fav movies of this genre to add the book if available as well.

If you're an artist or a fan of this type of work, the "Art of" series of Miyazaki's movie books are just precious, essential, exhaustive, and very satisfying.

The Art of Kiki's Delivery Service is a wonderful art book for fans of Miyazaki's film who also happen to be artists. The background paintings are phenomenal and the quality of the printing brings them out so very clearly. If you're an artist, you'll drool over the artwork.
It is a collector's item.

This book is excellent, you'll love it. I read it, and it probably the best reads I've had in a while! The shipping is fast, and priced perfect!
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I'm an artist, and I bought this book because I like to see how other artists work. This book has lots of sketches by Miyazaki, who is tremendously facile at sketching. He also adds loose watercolor washes to some pictures. I'd like to see him at work, because it all looks so effortless. There are also pictures from the actual movie, of course, and work by other artists who prepared the film, as well as a complete plot synopsis.

It's imazing book. It's very beautiful and colourful. I've bought it for my friend. She was very happy to take this as a present. In Russia this book is not present in shops.

If you loved the movie, you'll love this book.THe beautiful art and concepts makes you appreciate Miyazaki's work even more.

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RKDGQ8B47SU56 Fans of Miyazaki's movies won't be disappointed by this book. It has lots of concept art, sketches, water colour storyboards, character design and beautiful paintings of the countryside.

Some of the art are captioned by Miyazaki to give you insight into the scenes.

At the end of the book is a summary of the film's production process. There are interviews with key production staff, including the music director Joe Hisaishi.

This book is easily a classic, just like the anime movie itself.

There are more pictures on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for my blog's link.

This book has so many sketches, illustrations and conceptual drawings that one gets a better idea of how such a masterpiece came into being. A section on animation techniques shows many special effects used in the film. The overall impression is magical and very inspiring. This book will motivate any developing artist to search for better ways of expressing his/her ideas.

If you're a Miyazaki's freak, you will love this series of books.
Beautifully edited, hard cover, with original sketches and storyboards.
The Art of My Neighbor Totoro: A Film by Hayao Miyazaki, has the particularity to transport you to the movie in seconds and you get the same happy and heartwarming feelings with just watch their pages.

Also explains what a Totoro is and why Miyazaki wanted to do this movie. Characters development, full color illustrations. A must have if you are into animation.

This book is excellent. It combines great concept art, poster art and background info on the Nausicaa movie and manga by Hayao Miyazaki. The attention to detail and research undertaken to create Nausicaa and the world she inhabits is breath taking. The progression of basic ideas (wanting to do a Japanese period drama anime of 'Beauty and the Beast') to final concept (creating 'Nausicaa' as we see her today) was especially interesting to me. This book is a high-quality coffee-table book. The only downside is that many of Miyazaki's comments on his work are especially self-deprecating. Cheer up mate! Highly recommended. 10/10

I don't know if the other Art of Nausicaa book found at Amazon is similar or the same. Can anyone help there?

I received this item some days ago, and it's far beyond what I expected to see, the size is big enough to fully appreciate the beauty of every image (each one is complemented with commentaries from Miyazaki himself).

This is, in my opinion a must have for any Nausicaa fan, there are individual sections for the movie and the manga, and even a section for other images, always in the Nausicaa universe.

It's so amazing, well worth the price

it's 35 days since shipping and I still have no package.
I am in russia, maybe that's why it is so long.
or it might be simply lost in post offices.

It has been a present to my girlfriend, and she loved it! The quality of the illustrations is awesome and Miyazaki comments are bright.

I ordered this more out of curiosity than anything else, expecting a fairly slim volume on a par with the Nausicaa comics: instead, it comes in as a pretty hefty tome, with many of Miyazaki's covers and "thinking out loud on paper" moments. His commentary (mainly captions to each image) is humble and reveals an intriguing glimpse into the mind of one of Japan's most famous and prolific Anime directors. I mean seriously, you'd never read a Pixar or Disney director apologies about "I didn't want to do a magazine cover, but the art director was insistent", or even revealing his intent to use Oni as main characters early in preproduction (yeah, those never made it to the final film).

If your child (or you!) likes the movie they'll love the picture book! It is basically frames from the film with the (simplified) story. It is a lot longer and mroe in depth than I had realized but my 2 year old (!) is enthralled by it... This is the longest/thickest book he will sit still to read.... Highly recommend as a gift! OR for long car ride/air/train trips

This book contains the entire storyline of the movie in both text and illustration and hits all the key events with perfect focus. The 'illustrations' are taken directly from the movie but are very crisp and high quality - not like some books that have poor quality movie stills. Our kids love this movie, have a home made soot-sprite mobile in their bedroom, and are crazy about this book. This is a really nice quality hard cover book and is much better than the comic book version in my opinion. Price is very cheap for what you get.

This book is very adorable and follows the movie well. If you like the movie you will like the book.

The book pretty much follows the story of the movie and is full of movie photos. It's a bit long for a childs book, but my kid loves it and we read it every night.

So if you're kids love the movie and want to see it over and over again, buy and read them the book instead.

We love these books. I have read these so many times in Japanese and I wanted our kids to read them, too. So I got them in English.

This is a great Manga series and I'd love to see the movie too. Nausicaa meets monks warns her that the apocalypse is coming soon. Nausicaa tries to find a way to stop it.

Miyazaki's graphic novels are MUCH better than the animation. More depth and better story resolution. Visually stunning with tremendous thought and meaning.

I have just finished reading this series, and I must say that I am AMAZED. The books are much more philosophical than the movie (which corresponds to only the first two books), and contains many more characters that are more developed. Unlike the movie, where Nausicaa was practically perfect, and Kushana was purely evil, the book's characters are much more complex. Kushana reminds me of Lady Hiboshi from Princess Mononoke.

The tone of the series changes from beginning to end. This makes sense, as the series was written over about 10 years, with a number of hiatuses. The first two books are confusing and not terribly interesting, but the story blossoms from there.

On top of that, I don't even like manga or anime as genres. Miyazaki is truly exceptional.

Now that we are past the middle of this story (this is volume for of 5) the action picks up quite a bit. No Face, the spirit that young Sen let in earlier has turned into a disaster, determined to eat whatever food the bath house has to offer and paying in showers of gold. On the down side, however, the spirit has a tough time differentiating staff from the food, throwing everything into chaos.

As this is going on, Sen sees a white dragon being chased across the sky by paper birds. This is Haku, the young mage, who is badly wounded in his efforts to steal magic. Surprisingly, Sen shows fierce loyalty to her friend, courageously facing the dangers of the bathhouse in order to save his life. The girl has come a long way from the spoiled child who first happened into this strange work.

When I first found this series, the film was still unavailable to US audiences. As such they were the only option for English speakers who wanted to see Miyazaki's latest work and get a sense of the flow of the film. They do this quite well for what is essentially a still medium, spending a lot of frames building a chain of movement. This is done with cels from the film, so the normal comic approach doesn't prevail. When I look at the illustration, I think of a parent reading a book to a child and pointing to a string of pictures as, say, a dragon twists and loops in the sky.

Indeed, this set is perfect for that purpose. It is also a delightful memento of a wonderful film. Miyazaki's imagination is always stunning and unique. There are many good anime artists, but fewer great artists who happen to do anime. Film or no film, I intend to own the entire set.

This is another GREAT book of Miyazaki's. The pictures are beautiful... the story is cute... what more can I say?

Imagine being a typical, slightly self-centered 10-year-old girl, and suddenly finding yourself the only human employee at the Abura Ya, a bathhouse for the spirits. Your parents have turned into pigs, and if you cannot find a way, they will eventually become snacks for customers of the resort. Your employer is a giant old woman named Yubaba, who drives a hard bargain and intends to make you work every moment.

This is Chihiro Ogino's lot in the manga version of Hayao Miyazaki's 'Spirited Away.' Certainly a tough role for an adult to deal with, one cannot help but admire Chihiro (now called Sen) for her fierce determination. In the world of Abura Ya she manages to find friends like Haku, a teenage boy with magical powers, and Lin, the co-worker who looks after Chihiro and helps her snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

In this third volume Chihiro starts her job as a bath attendant, performing the backbreaking labor of scrubbing floors and baths and waiting on customers. When an awesome stink spirit shows up for a wash, no one wants to go near it. Naturally, Chihiro gets stuck with the job. What ensues is a surprise for all as Chihiro discovers that she has strange friends in even stranger places.

Some notes. These beautifully colored manga are done in Japanese order [right to left, top to bottom]. At first, this is a bit confusing, but after a while, it gets to be fun. In addition, it preserves the effect of the original manga page layouts, which really is the best way to present them. Japanese sound effects are left as is, but a translation guide is included.

Having little or no will power, I have succumbed to the temptation to pick up more of these little specialty manga created from the cells of Hayao Miyazaki's latest anime creation, 'Spirited Away.' This film has been a runaway bestseller in Japan, and is due for release in the US shortly. When I bought the first volume as a novelty, my greatest concern was that the books would 'spoil' the plot. However, after reading two volumes, I find I'm even more interested in seeing the film, which looks every bit as remarkable as 'Princess Mononoke,' another Miyazaki hit.

These are the story of Chihiro Ogino, a young girl whose parents have inadvertently wandered into a bathhouse for spirits and been turned into pigs. Chihiro is determined to rescue them and discovers that she must find a job in the bathhouse or suffer the same fate of her parents. This volume is the story of her quest for employment, starting with the spider-like Kamaji who runs the hot water system to the giant Yubaba who is the matron of the resort. One has to admire Chihiro's determination, even though she is actually a bit irritating in a little girl way. Of course, I might be a bit self-centered and panicky if I found myself in the comic version of Motel Hell.

The styling is classic Miyazaki, with great work on the expressions of both the human and non-human characters. These last come in every shape and type imaginable. The dialog is minimalist. Often, the plot is moved forward by the visual story, full of both menace and sight gags. Another thing I like is, since the sound effects are in Japanese, someone has gone to the immense trouble of providing a frame-by-frame translation of them. Just the thing for an adult who wants to read these aloud to a child.

One warning. These manga done in Japanese order [right to left, top to bottom]. At first, this is a bit confusing, but after a while, it gets to be fun. In addition, it preserves the effect of the original manga page layouts, which really is the best way to present them. If these manga aren't over-distributed, then they may very well be eminently collectable.