'The Art of Drawing Manga' serves as an excellent resource for budding manga artists, offering comprehensive guidance on character creation, scene composition, and storytelling techniques. With clear step-by-step instructions, this book helps readers to unleash their creativity and develop their own unique style. I still can't draw, but many of my talented students enjoyed this.

Thank you to NetGalley and Quarto Publishing Group for an advanced copy.
All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I love to draw and have been working on improving, especially now that I draw more digitally.

Unfortunately, I can't draw people.

Really, I barely can manage stick people haha.

My daughter and I both love manga and the fun look of manga characters so I've been working to try and draw manga characters. I was excited when I came across this book and thought it might just be what I needed to improve.

I enjoyed all the different styles included and love the easy step-by-step instructions. My daughter has even learned quite a bit about drawing manga characters since using this book (she definitely draws better than I do!).

Definitely recommend for anyone wanting to learn or improve their drawing skills for drawing manga.

This book covers a lot more than I had expected. I thought it was just going to be showing people how to draw manga characters, which it does do that, but it also covers additional things such as page layout and composition, making this book an ideal place to start for anyone interested in learning to draw manga characters and also how to put them into manga stories.
A good book that will appeal to what is now much bigger than a niche market out there.
My thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for allowing me to read this book in return for an honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley and Quarto Publishing for this ARC!

When I looked at the title I assumed that this was going to be about drawing characters in a manga style but this book surprised me by being so much more. It has step by step lessons on page composition/layout, expressions, types of hero or villain character designing. How to choose costumers, genres, color theory. It is a fantastic resource for people just starting out making their own comics or drawing in an manga style.

I’ve been making comics for awhile so it wasn’t necessarily new information to me but it’s presented so clearly and thoughtfully that I’m going to purchase my own copy for reference. This is a must have for new artists and mangaka!

This is a great all encompassing book for people looking to learn how to draw manga. It gives a really nice detailed explanation of the basics and where to start. It also goes really in depth looking at the different aspects of faces like the hair and eyes. I really liked that they included the color section with complementary colors and the best ways to pick and stylize. I had a lot of fun doing the different expressions and practicing different characters.

A solidly illustrated piece that is nice to look at in many places and has a very surface-level instruction to it. This is not breaking any new ground, but it does provide a solid explanation for the basics. There is at least a little bit of a 'Draw the Rest of the Owl' aspect to the instruction that can't be overlooked, however.

This is a beautiful book with lovely drawings and examples for the aspiring mangaka. There are many great tips and a few pages guide the reader (artist) in step by step processes to draw faces, postures and even examples of digital art colouring. The book seems to be catered more for beginner artists who are just starting out, though there are places where it would have been great to have seen more examples/tutorials instead of a brief set of tips. That said, the examples provided are thorough and the art stunning. Talia Horsburgh is clearly a talented artist.

This was a fun book to read and learn from. However as a beginner, it was a bit hard for me to follow. The Art of Drawing Manga is written by Talia Horsburgh and is an interesting book that helps a person learn to draw manga. I was really excited for this because it said that you do not need to be an expert to try out this book. However, I am a beginner and I had quite a bit of trouble with the book.
I liked how this book was set up with a detailed introduction in the beginning. It was really helpful as I did not know anything about drawing manga. But once I got to the drawing part, it got complicated. The first thing it tried to show me how to draw was a face. But it did not really have a lot of steps so it was hard for me to follow. I did like the way the book was set up though, and I think that if a person already knows how to draw this is perfect for them.
The Art of Drawing Manga is a great book especially if you already have some drawing skills. However it would be a harder book to start with if you are a beginner. All in all, I would recommend this book but I would probably recommend it to those who already have a firm foundation in regards to drawing.

I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book which I received from the publisher through Netgalley. All views expressed are only my honest opinion, a positive review was not required.

tl;dr
A great resource for beginner or hobby artists with very nice artwork, and some incredibly useful tips. Covers a lot of ground, so doesn't manage to be terribly in depth.

About
A how-to-draw book covering manga-styled artwork with succinct notes on character design, anatomy, and page layouts. Contains several step-by-step instructions of a variety of characters to draw.

What I Liked
I've been drawing for a long time, so these days most of my art books are references, and not how-tos. However, people often ask me for suggestions for beginners, so I'm always on the lookout for a new how-to-draw book. It's always been a struggle; there are a lot of how to draw manga books on the market that just sort of... look bad. This is not one of them. The art is very cute and competently done. Poses, perspective, and other complex ideas are well-executed. The coloring is particularly good, and I am more than happy to learn from this artist. The tips that we get are very helpful. (e.g. Breaking down hair, hands, or feet, into "zones.") Anatomy is consistent, and I appreciated that there were multiple examples of most things. The step-by-step content breaks down shapes really well, and is easy to follow. Chapters cover the basics in a quick and easy to understand manner. My favorite section was how to draw hair. I love how the artist draws hair, and I'm glad I got to learn from it. Overall, I think this is a very accessible book, especially for newcomers to art.

What Wasn't for Me
Being good at something doesn't necessarily mean being good at teaching it, and I think the text of the book falls short of the quality of the art in a few places. For example, a couple step-by-step illustrations outline the shape of the body first before adding clothing, but I can't find anywhere in the text (specifically the section about clothing) that discusses why this is important. Very little time is spent on how to color, which is a shame because I adore the artist's coloring style and would like to have learned more about it. Not a lot of body types explored in the anatomy section.

I really enjoyed reading this book because it actually explains what you’re supposed to do. A lot of art books only show you pictures and they are never detailed enough. This one had at least 4 drops for each type of drawing. I also loved that it actually shows you how to outline the shape of the face and body. It’s nice to have all the steps in one book. As a beginner artist that enjoys reading manga and watching anime, this book was extremely helpful.