A really fun little manga, a bit episodic but I liked learning all sorts of little known facts about animals

When God created animals, they didn't do it alone. Enter: Heaven's Design Team! This is the team that gets animal assignments from God. The cast is as varied as their creations. Each designer has their best designed animal from horse, to frog, to snake which they incorporate into every design since it's creation (hey, if it worked once, right?). Each chapter focuses on the creation of an animal. Given an assignment of "cute" the team might create the Koala for example. The episodes are formulaic: get the assignment, discuss the various aspects they want, test the animal out, potentially on an island on Earth, get Divine Approval. In this volume readers follow the Animal Design Team, but also meet the Bug Design Team.

It is very much a manga title from character designs to manga tropes. Each character has a quirk and lives up to it. The elderly designer only wants to design horses (which actually works out for the seahorse). The other creator wants to create poisonous creatures (she is a cute and frilly Goth, aka Gothic Lolita).

Yet, it is the character designs that make this a hard book to pin down and recommend. (Upon further research it is recommended for ages 14-17 which I'd agree with). Most of the men/male identifying characters are muscular and tall plus the rotund, teddy bear character. Most of the women/female identifying characters are, well, Shonen-type women plus the Chibi Goth Girl. Shonen-type women tend to be short skirted, big chested, and cleavage showing women. They are there and then you get to the swimsuit chapter (hence how I know the men/male identifying characters are muscular, granted, this could be a shojo thing to because one absolutely looked like the love interest in a Shojo manga...I digress).

On the flip side this is a fantastic STEM title. At one point, I realized that what I was reading was the STEM process. It models the plan, design, and implementation stage over and over. It models failure and changing things after a failed test. There are explanations as to why certain elements worked or failed. Between sections, there are fact pages about the animals covered. Granted, it becomes a bit of a slog after a while due to the repetitive nature of the STEM process, but the educational component is the strongest part of this work. This is great for introducing STEM to readers who prefer manga. I only wish it was aimed at a wider audience because younger readers inclined to books like this would love this. Also, there is no cohesive story either (some references to previously designed animals), but overall, it is super formulaic and repetitive.

Overall, this is a great manga to add to STEM collections at the secondary level, college level, and teen library collections as needed. It's been recommended for ages 14-17 and I would even add college students and adults would enjoy this if they prefer non-fiction comics.

Love manga where you can learn stuff from. Heaven's design is mostly about, to design the animals on earth, love that.
Also have an anime, also great.

This is honestly just one of my favorite manga that's come out in the last few years. I love the sort of divine take on evolutionary biology. As a reader who once thought of becoming a zoologist, this book made me giggle and smile the entire time I read it. The art is lovely, the characters are delightful, the interesting concept is just wonderful. I'm eager to see how the series continues.

This manga is super whimsical!! I love the concept of creations having to go through approvals & demos!!

I will say, I can see myself getting bored after a couple of volumes.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the e-arc.

More than telling a storyline it is more like a parody of how God decided to create certain animals. So in this manga we follow a group of Angels and designers who create different animals and God decides to aprrove them or not. We see why kelpies, unicorns and pegasus can't exist because some of their anatomical characteristics would not be safe for them if they were real.

It's a funny manga that anyone can read (recommended for 12+,), full of interesting and weird facts about some animals. I've learned a lot. So it also serves as a fictional educational story.

Heaven's Design Team is a ridiculously funny manga based on a crazy premise. Part office comedy, part mad scientists/designers bizarreness, it's a great fun for everyone. My only complaint is that the characters are somewhat cliched, but that's to be expected from a book such as this one.

This is probably one of the most unique manga premises I've ever read. I had an absolutely fantastic time reading this, and found myself chuckling about it hours after putting it down. Little things in my daily life remind me of this manga all the time now. It's a really funny concept, and great for anyone who wants a good laugh. If you love comedy manga or anime, you should definitely give this one a try!

Our store doesn't carry much manga, but this is certainly one we might, just because it's silly and fun. The premise is very amusing, and I can see especially the younger crowd enjoying it.

Super fun title that was a perfect addition to our library collection. Thank you for the review copy!

When I first started reading I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about this, but I ended up loving it! I think this is a super fun Manga. I loved slowly learning more about each member of the design team and all their little quirks. I also love the attachment they all get to the animals they create. I also really love the art style and I think it depicts the story really well. I'll definitely be continuing in this series!

*I voluntarily read and reviewed an ARC of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. *

This book is so funny and yet also educational. It does have religious characters (angels, god is slightly mentioned as he approves their designs, etc.), so take care there if you think it might not be your thing, but do know it isn't super detailed or involved. This story follows the angels who've been delegated to create the animals of Earth. The process shows a little bit of science as they do trial and error and talk about what features of the animal will help it do certain actions.
At the end of each chapter there is more in-depth information about the animals created -- yes the created animals are real! -- and there are really interesting facts.

Very fun and I will read more!

In heaven’s Animal Design Department, designers are tasked to create a variety of new animals daily under unreasonable requests of their client: God. This series is funny, exciting, and features animals that can be found in encyclopedia entries. Heaven Design Team is your next go-to trip to the zoo or aquarium but 100 times better.

Could this manga BE any cuter??? It's a super silly premise: God doesn't have time to design animals so he outsources the job to a team of angels (who are all for some reason named the same as Roman Gods) with very unique personalities. As they compete to create animals, the reader actually learns a bunch of facts about the real-life animals they talk about!

A funny story with good story and character development. I don't know if i'm going to continue the serie but it was a funny reading

Overall I did enjoy this manga. However, I am not sure if I would want to read this as a series unless there was potential for an overarching storyline. Though the concept is fun and the execution was well done, it started to become a bit redundant and took me much longer to read than normal. Usually I can finish a manga volume in one sitting but this took me days to finish because I would lose interest.

I liked learning more about the animals and I learned some pretty interesting factoids that may come in handy some day if I ever do a Trivia Night but it felt like that's all it really had going for it. The angel's and animal designer's personalities and stories get lost in the oversaturation of animal creating. I just wish that there was a little more substance to the characters themselves. Though they have unique characteristics as well as likes/dislikes I wanted more of that.

I will say that the art is absolutely stunning and that's what really drew my interest to begin with. But, unless this series has more story mixed in, I think I will pass on it.

This manga answers the question “What were they thinking of when they designed the giraffe?” Turns out it was a committee, and this manga is a look at the day-to-day life of God’s R&D department. This motley team of designers brainstorms requests from above, tests prototype animals, and gets into hilarious arguments. While their creations seem unlikely, all the animals that get final approval are real, and each chapter ends with factual information about them.

A fun, engaging book with some good character development. The story has some funny moments and definitely will suggest this to friends who like light hearted manga.

my netgalley arc broke, reached out and was unable to figure out the problem, very disappointed because i very much was looking forward to this.

I enjoyed the quirky and fun “inspiration” for how animals were designed. The characters are a little over the top but for this type of story it doesn’t grate in the way it would normally.

With the education section (about the animals mentioned in the chapters) at the end, plus nice art, funny stories as to how they test these out before approval for earth this is a charming easy reading manga.