This isn’t manga, but Frédéric Boilet considers himself a manga author. This brand of comic is put into the nouvelle manga category, a mixture of French and Japanese influences. Boilet moved to Japan in 1993, and since then he has been bringing the two worlds of Bande Dessinée and manga together in his own unique creations. Yukiko’s Spinach is widely regarded as his most popular work, and also only one of the few published in English.
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Upon reading, it is difficult to establish whether Yukiko’s Spinach is a work of fiction, or a biographical tale. The comic book is about a manga author (who has a striking resemblance to Boilet) and one of his former models who is also his lover.
This comic is a story of intimacy. The majority is Yukiko and the main character simply talking to each other, or looking at each other. Instead of focusing on action, Yukiko’s Spinach pays attention to communication, and tries portray the unique experience of a French person in love in a foreign land.
But it doesn’t seem foreign, everything just seems so natural. With the way things are written and drawn, it seems like the manga version of a reality TV show, albeit far less tacky. No, this is much more elegant than that.
It doesn’t feel like you’re reading a comic, it feels like you’re with someone you love.
Boilet’s work is very different from most of the manga you’ll find in a bookstore. This is something deeper than most of that stuff, this is human.
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