American interest in manga -- the Japanese word for comics -- hit an all-time high this year with the release of Masamune Shirow's Ghost in the Shell, an eight-issue miniseries from Dark Horse and Studio Proteus. Though heavily ordered by comics specialty stores, the series sold out instantly. In order to satisfy demand, Dark Horse and Studio Proteus are collecting the miniseries into a single volume in December.

"Ghost in the Shell is pure cyberpunk," said Toren Smith, co-translator of the series. "It has fascinated readers around the world because it explores the line between man and machine in a super high-tech world. It asks difficult questions about what it means to be human in the first place."

Shirow's Ghost in the Shell has also spawned a multi-million-dollar animated feature film, which is slated for a January 1996 release in the United States and Japan.

The Ghost in the Shell trade paperback contains 368 color and black-and-white pages and features a painted cover by manga master Masamune Shirow. Like the comics series, this trade paperback contains each of Shirow's pages color-corrected to the colors of the original Japanese editions. Ghost in the Shell will arrive in comics shops and bookstores on December 26, 1995.