James Nicoll Reviews

Insomniacs After School, Volume 8 is the eighth tankōbon in Makoto Ojiro’s contemporary manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume 8 was released in 2024.

Grumpy insomniac Ganta Nakami and ebullient insomniac Isaki Magari bonded over their discovery that the only place either can sleep is their school’s observatory. Various consequences followed: to keep using the observatory, the pair had to restart the astronomy club. More significantly for Ganta and Isaki, they eventually realized that they were a couple.

Ganta cannot sleep because he fears what the next day will bring. It may be ominous that Volume 8 begins with a discussion of Isaki’s health.

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Insomniacs After School, Volume 7 is the seventh tankōbon in Makoto Ojiro’s contemporary manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume 7 was released in 2024.

In Volume 6, teens Ganta and Isaki extended their unchaperoned time together by absenting themselves from the country cottage where they were pursuing their stargazing interests. Alas, Isaki’s parents had discovered that their darling daughter was alone with a boy. They raced to the rescue. Consequences ensued.

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Insomniacs After School, Volume 6 is the sixth tankōbon in Makoto Ojiro’s contemporary manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume 6 came out in 2024.

Fellow insomniacs turned belated astronomers Ganta Nakami and Isaki Magari are pursuing their hobby in Isaki’s grandmother’s rural home. The teens were, of course, provided with a chaperone in the form of Isaki’s older sister Haya. Haya has better things to do with her time than keep an eye on two teenagers. When opportunity presented itself, Haya departed, leaving Ganta and Isaki alone.

However will two unsupervised teens fill the time?

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Insomniacs After School, Vol. 5 is the fifth tankōbon of Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume Five is 2024.

Insomniacs Ganta Nakami and Isaki Magari can’t fall asleep anywhere else than their school’s astronomical observatory. To protect access to the observatory, the pair needs to revive the school astronomy club. Their previous effort at raising the club’s profile having been sabotaged by weather, they now focus on a photography contest. 

Isaki’s grandmother’s house enjoys scenic location, rife with stunning vistas. The house is currently unoccupied. Perfect for two teens to use for their own purposes. Who knows? Perhaps astronomy will be among their activities. 

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2016’s Cat Temple’s Miss Chion, Volume One is the first tankōbon in Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. It was serialized as Neko no Otera no Chion-san in Weekly Big Comic Spirits from May 2016 to October 2018. There are nine volumes in total. There is no authorized English edition of which I am aware¹.

Suda Gen is unhappy living with his family and decides to transfer to an out-of-prefecture high school near a Buddhist temple, one that’s run by relatives. Although he knows that he stayed at the temple as boy, he remembers nothing about the temple or his kin.

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Insomniacs After School, Vol. 4 is the fourth tankōbon of Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume Four will appear in December 2023. 

Two insomniacs, Ganta Nakami and Isaki Magari, had a meet-cute in , their high school observatory, which turned out to be the sole place where either could sleep. Access to the observatory being dependent on there being a recognized astronomy club, the pair have been relentlessly working to restore the moribund club¹. This demanding effort has kept the boy and girl busy, so that they have no time to ponder just why it is that they enjoy each other’s company so. Nevertheless, their shared hobby is fun and entirely calamity-free².

In this volume: calamity strikes!

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2020’s Insomniacs After School, Volume Three is the third tankōbon of Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume Three is slated to appear sometime in 2023. 

Sleepless students Ganta Nakami and Isaki Magari have protected their access to their school’s observatory by restarting the school astronomy club. The pair has acquired some of the necessary skills. Now they must organize an event.

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2019’s Insomniacs After School, Volume Two is the second tankōbon of Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume Two is slated to appear in 2023.

I previously reviewed Volume One of this manga and you can find the review here. But if you don’t want to read the older review, here’s a recap.

Teacher Kurashiki accepted insomniac students Ganta Nakami and Isaki Magari’s perfectly plausible explanation as to why the sleepless pair were hanging out together in their high school’s disused observatory¹. She even provided the pair with a more acceptable reason to continue using the facility: re-start the school’s astronomy class.

There is a catch.

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2019’s Insomniacs After School, Volume One is the first tankōbon of Makoto Ojiro’s manga series. Serialized in Shogakukan’s seinen manga magazine Weekly Big Comic Spirits, Insomniacs After School has been ongoing since May 2019. The English translation of Volume One appeared in 2023.

Everyone at Ganta Nakami’s high school knows the tragic story of the girl who loved too much and the astronomy club that perished as a result. The lovelorn girl threw herself from a height. First the boy with whom she was infatuated languished and died. Then so did every other member of the astronomy club. The former school observatory is long disused, save only as a storeroom.

Or so almost everyone believes.

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