The majority of the works of Naoko Takeuchi were originally published in Nakayoshi magazine, a monthly “phone book” magazine which has been running for over 50 years, and which features strictly girls comics targetted for the elementary school age set. Each book is between 300 and 500 pages long, and comes with a small bonus item or toy called furoku (付録); usually this prize is related to the magazine’s most popular series at the time of its printing.
Nakayoshi had two major spin-off magazines; one is “Nakayoshi Deluxe”, which is a smaller publication. Typically Nakayoshi Deluxe issues are about 300 pages long, do not contain furoku items, and usually do not contain famous series. It is a smaller book used mainly to promote up-and-coming girls comic artists. Naoko Takeuchi got her start in Nakayoshi Deluxe and most of her earlier works can only be found in its issues.
The second spin-off publication of Nakayoshi’s was a magazine called “RunRun”. This was also a smaller publication, usually between 300-400 pages in length, but it would sometimes contain furoku items. In contrast to Nakayoshi Deluxe, RunRun magazine was usually a “spotlight” publication for already well-known artists to showcase series that were either too “adult like” or too “specialized” to be run in Nakayoshi. Unfortunately, after a run of under 10 years, RunRun magazine went bankrupt. Most of the titles within it were never released in tankoubon format, and so unless you own the magazine, you probably can’t find copies of many of its unique stories anymore. Because of this, issues of RunRun magazine are incredibly difficult to find, and also very expensive.
Nakayoshi is owned by Kodansha LTD. Like other monthly comics periodicals, issues are only available for a limited amount of time, and there are only a limited number of copies made. Once they are sold out, issues do not go out for a second printing. It is tradition in Japanese book stores to throw away or burn all of the monthly phone book magazines on New Years Day, and Kodansha LTD does not keep any stock of its old issues in warehouses for back order. So as you might imagine finding old issues of Nakayoshi, Nakayoshi Deluxe, or RunRun is a very difficult task, particuarly if you live outside of Japan.
Thanks to the generosity of an anonymous donor, we were able to find and purchase the vast majority of Nakayoshi, Nakayoshi Deluxe, and RunRun magazine issues which feature the works of Naoko Takeuchi. sassypants678 has written an extensive database which tracks her progress, and shares information about which issues of each magazine contain each chapter of each series of Mrs. Takeuchi’s comics.
Below you can find digitial copies of our entire Nakayoshi magazine collection. Please enjoy!
