Manga

You may call them graphic novels or even comic books. Here, they are called manga. They have been a part of Japanese pop culture since the 1950s. I was surprised to see businessmen reading them on the subway when I first came to Japan. There is manga written for adults. There is manga written for kids. Naruto seems to be for everyone.

Look how thick this is! It's 730 pages. There are some that are even longer. It is 4 cm thick. Some are thicker than a telephone book. Surprisingly, they are not very heavy.

For more links for manga, do a search of Kids Web Japan. Look under manga. Kids Web Japan-- manga