The word is out — and Amazon Canada and Lissa over at Kuriousity beat us to the punch! D’OH!

Ah well, you’d have read about it in the May issue of YEN PLUS (hitting bookstores right around now!) in JuYoun’s Editor’s Letter anyway. Yes, I can indeed confirm with great pride and enthusiasm that PANDORA HEARTS has been “rescued” by Yen Press. Still more, we have Jun Mochizuki’s previous title, CRIMSON SHELL, added to our list as well. Now what you won’t have heard elsewhere — unless you already snagged your copy of the magazine and studiously read JuYoun’s letter in which case more power to you *gasp* — is that you won’t have to wait until December to read PANDORA HEARTS. Nossir! That’s because starting with the June issue, we’re going to begin serializing the series in the pages of our beloved YEN PLUS!We are super-excited to be adding PANDORA HEARTS to the mix of the magazine, and we sincerely hope you’ll be similarly enthused!

That’s it for now except to say that if you haven’t already stopped by our EXTRAS tab on the site be sure you do to get your latest dose of the funny from our webcomic preview of this fall’s TOXIC PLANET. It may not be manga, but it is pure goodness. New strips every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, so enjoy!

Wow, it’s really easy to get so caught up in the day-to-day happenings around here — especially since YEN PLUS started up — that you forget you have a direct link to talk to people about the latest goings on at Yen Press in semi-real time. So…just what is going on at Yen Press?

Well, the big news this weekend of course is the New York Anime Festival! (Hooray!) I dunno. As much as we love SDCC, I think we all really enjoy our “hometown” cons — NYCC and NYAF — in particular. Maybe it’s just because we don’t have to worry about our luggage being lost. It happened to poor Tania and myself last year at Anime Expo. I think it was the one show where I couldn’t in good conscience make snide comments about the progressively worsening odor in the hall that weekend. But I digress…

The big happenings for Yen this weekend at NYAF? Well, it you haven’t yet been introduced to our new monthly anthology, you’re in luck! We’re going to be giving away copies of the first issue to get people off on the right foot! Events? Sunday we have the Yen Press Panel at 12:30 in Room 1A24, and we’ve got a couple very cool licensing announcements planned that we think will make for some very happy fans! (I always love reading the speculation online about what people think we might announce. Last time, I think SOUL EATER was the big guess, and of course several people were correct!) I’m also on the State of the Manga industry panel Sunday morning. At least it’s not too early…

Now the really big question around our offices is whether or not intern Abby will complete the Maka costume she’s been working on so she can do a bit of cosplay at the booth. NYCC earlier this year was her big debut as Max from MAXIMUM RIDE, so of course we’re piling on the peer pressure to make her top herself. See, Abby? Now the pressure has gone public…

Beyond the con this weekend, there can of course be only one thing on the minds of the Yen Press folks in the immediate future: HARUHI!!! We’re counting down to the release of the first volume of the manga next month, and we couldn’t be more excited! The book is looking beautiful. As is our constant aim, we’re republishing the book with all of the original color pages from the Japanese tankobon intact, but as a special bonus to everyone eagerly awaiting the novels next Spring, we’re also inserting a sneak preview of the novel at the back of the manga. We really could not be more excited about finally making Haruhi available in print form to fans here, and we hope you’ll all turn out to support it!

That’s it for now. I’m off to confront the pile of books waiting on my desk, but if you’re attending NYAF this weekend, be sure to stop by the Yen booth and say hello!

Glanced at the calendar this morning and can hardly believe that it is only 15 days until New York Comic Con at the Javits Center! (Do you have your ticket??) Everybody in the office here is buzzing with activity in preparation, and we’re all very excited for a variety of reasons. In a lot of ways, NYCC will be the one year anniversary of Yen’s debut! Okay, technically it was in February last year so it’s a bit more than a year…but NYCC 2007 is where we got to proudly announce our debut list. I think it was Ed over at MangaCast who said something to the effect that we’d dropped a bomb on the show. (Very nice!)

Well this year it’s going to be a whole different show for Yen. We’ve got a booth! We’ve got panels! We’ve got a very special guest that we’re flying over from Germany to make her North American debut! Oh, and have we got announcements… Annoucements galore! So many things that we’ve been dying to disclose for so long now, and at last we get to spill!! You’ve been dying to know the rest of the lineup for the YEN PLUS anthology? Just a couple of weeks, my friends, and all shall be revealed! Trust me when I say that the stuff we’re going to be announcing this year is going to be MASSIVE!

If last year we dropped a bomb on NYCC, this year we’re nuking the place.