Manga Series: “Salad Days” by Shinobu Inokuma (Volume 10-18)
(I have split this manga series into two posts, because of some weird Wordpress bug. Click here to go to the previous entry that contains Volume 1-9)
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SALAD DAYS
Author/Mangaka: Shinobu Inokuma
Genre: Drama, Romance, Slice of Life
Plot Summary: Love is something that is fresh… like salads. Days when people experience love are days that will never be forgotten… These precious memories are “salad days”.
Salad Days is a large collection of short stories about people and their first love, or finding new love. Although almost all of them are unrelated some characters in previous stories reappear as a support character or as a main character if the author chooses to write more stories about the character.
Volumes: 18
Review: Despite this being mostly a romance manga series, I liked it a lot. The slice-of-life aspect of the series is very interesting and somewhat realistic, and the art is very good. I like the fact that not all stories contain the proverbial “happy ending” that we have come to expect in drama/romance manga, and the fact that all the characters seem to be interconnected by locale and/or history makes it very consistent and very enjoyable, since there is already a backstory to most of the characters when they recur in other stories.
Since this is a collection of short stories, almost all of them are self-contained, except for a few characters whose storie are ongoing. Again, I like that some of the stories don’t have the predictable happy conclusion, but they are not depressing, either. The underlying theme in this series is hope. I rarely recommend works based on romance and drama, but this series is one of my favorites in that genre, and is highly recommended for those who like slice-of-life, romance manga.
(Click on the manga image below to download them, or check this list)
 Volume 10 |
 Volume 11 |
 Volume 12 |
 Volume 13 |
 Volume 14 |
 Volume 15 |
 Volume 16 |
 Volume 17 |
 Volume 18 |
How to open and read the manga:
- First make sure that you have CDisplay Comic Reader installed. To download CDisplay, click here. Follow the instructions on how to download and install CDisplay Comic Reader.
- Download the desired manga by clicking on its manga cover or link above. Remember the location where you saved the downloaded manga.
- You can start reading the manga using two ways:
- Right click on the manga file, and choose Open With, and then click on Choose Program (if the CDisplay application isn’t one of the choices). Scroll down either the Recommended Programs or Other Programs and locate CDisplay (or it can say Sequential Image Display”), and choose it. Your manga will automatically show up and you can start reading.
- You can start the CDisplay application (which will bring up a blank white screen). Right click anywhere, and choose Load Files (or L). Navigate to where you saved the downloaded manga, choose it, then click Open. Your manga will now show up and you can start reading.
Some of the common hotkeys for CDisplay:
- Pg Up (previous page)
- Pg Down or Spacebar (next page)
- Ctrl L (next volume/chapter; if the manga you’re reading has reached the end, and you already have the next volumes already downloaded)
- Ctrl K (previous volume/chapter)
- Shift P (choose a page to jump to using the page meter)
- C (brings up the Configuration Options, for advanced configuration)
- Arrow Keys (scrolls the manga left/right/up/down if it’s oversized)
IMPORTANT: Since this is manga (Japanese comics), it is read from RIGHT TO LEFT.
ENJOY!
