Photo of a hand holding a manga. Cover reads, "Shonen Sunday. CROSS GAME. Matsuri Adachi. (Volume) 1." There is a simple four leaf clover outline between 'cross' and 'game.' Each leaf looks like a heart. A young boy and girl stand back to back against a solid orange background. Both are wearing summer clothes: T-shirt and sleeveless top. We see them from the waist up. He wears a catcher's mitt and holds a baseball. His look is a little scruffy. He has a determined little-kid frown. She leans against him with her shoulder-length hair down. She's relaxed, but interested in something happening off in the distance. Neither character is drawn to be sexy. Both are normal children from modern real-life Japan.

Photo of a two-page spread. Largely without text or detailed backgrounds, we see a pitcher striking out a batter. The artist uses cinematographic framing so reading the manga feels like a movie. She also employs masterful inking techniques to convey characters' whipcrack-fast motions. (I am in freaking AWE of this artist's skills.) Panel 1: A young woman in a baseball uniform stands on the pitcher's mound, ready to throw. High thin clouds behind her as we look up at her. Panel 2: An older boy in a batting helmet, shown from the shoulders up and the brim of his helmet down, holds his bat, ready to swing. We're close enough to him to see his concentration. The background swirls with the glow of his competitive spirit. Panel 3: Tight shot of just her thigh lifting her knee as she winds up. We can see the dirt crumbling off her cleat. Panel 4: A sharp bolt panel that frames the batter's Coach's face. (He's the bad guy.) He is suddenly unpleasantly startled by what he sees. He frowns behind his sunglasses. Panel 5: Full body shot of our gal, the pitcher. She's let it fly! The world is a blur of motion lines, her pitching form incredible, she's focused and shooting the ball towards home plate like a cannon. SECOND PAGE Panel 1: Very thin panel. We only see his eye, which doesn't react. Panel 2: A broader panel. We can see his body from the knees up; he hasn't moved. There's a streak of white blasting past his strike zone. Panel 3: Huge block letters spell out the sound effect, "WHOOMP." The second 'o' is the ball hitting the catcher's glove. Panel 4: Tiny dark panel of one of the batter's teammates' faces. He is bug-eyed. "HUH?!" Panel 5: Four boys from the batter's team stare in amazement. We see them from the shoulders up. Two of them speak. "No way." "That's way faster than before."

The depth of feeling in this manga is unfair. I don't have enough room. But in brief... It's about love. Of a girl, of baseball, of your team, and of your dreams. It is so visceral and natural. You breathe in these characters. You see the whole world through them.

#manga #sports #ICriedSoHard