Light novel demographics skew towards men in their mid-twenties. Young adult reader demographics skew towards teenage girls.

They're made to be cheap entertainment that is produced, read, and disposed of quickly. Japanese light novels, on the other hand, are a little smaller than an average volume of manga and are cheaper than most other novels. Young adult novels in the US are often published in hardback or trade format, which is a larger, more expensive paperback size than the mass-market romance and sci-fi paperbacks you see at the grocery store. It's true they have a lot of similarities, but there are also some key differences between the book categories. Sometimes you'll hear light novels equated to young adult novels. Tokyopop's '100% authentic' revolution, however, removed all that work and sped up production times enormously.Īlthough their appearance may look similar on the outside, the inside reveals a different story Once upon a time (the 1980s and ‘90s), bringing manga over to the US involved carefully replacing the sound effects with English versions, flipping pages to read from left to right, and painstakingly adding color. Interestingly, manga didn't used to be so 'easy' to translate compared to novels, even light ones.

Unfortunately, not all English-published light novels pass this bar, but as the market matures and becomes more viable, publishers can invest more money in good translators and better books. It takes even more skill to create a translation so smooth that readers don't even notice it was translated. It's a very different type of translation work, and it takes a lot of skill and art to essentially re-create a novel. What was a two-word translation is now ''Watch out!' he cried as the arrow flew towards its unsuspecting target.'Īn average light novel has around 35,000 to 50,000 words, and all those words need to flow together nicely. l love you, stupid!' Light novels have those same phrases, of course, but without the accompanying artwork. An average volume of manga contains anywhere from 4,000 to 7,000 words, with many of those being nice, easy to translate phrases like 'Huh?' 'Watch out!' and 'I. What are some key differences between novels and manga when it comes to the US market? How do light novels compare with their most frequent shelving companions, young adult books? And who are the key publishers in the US? Light novels vs mangaĬompared to translating and publishing a manga volume, there's one factor that stands out from any other: the word count. Light novels have gained tremendous popularity in the US Fortunately, that's starting to change, and English releases of light novels have greatly increased over the last couple years. Light novels have been the basis of an ever-increasing number of anime series, but the books themselves have been a much-overlooked category of Japanese pop culture in the US.

English light novels