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Among teenage girls and young women in Japan, Ringo to Kedamono [The Apple and the Beast] is a hot-selling comic. The story line is somewhat unusual; it's basically a romance between two young, androgynous males--but it's standard fare for the "boys love" [BL] genre of Japanese comic books, or manga.











For Japanese aficionados of this sort of stuff, there is a more convenient and discreet way to stock up on the latest stories without running to the bookstore: downloading them to a cell phone. That's helped this type of manga reach beyond the female otome--or "maidens," as they're known--who are the genre's die-hard fan base. "Women and girls in their teens, 20s, and 30s like BL for their portrayals of innocent love," says Toshiki Fujii, a manager in the cell-phone content division at Nagoya-based Media Do. "But now those who might have been coy about walking into a shop can find what they're looking for online."











The surge in readership is symbolic of how Japan's struggling comic book business is adapting in the Internet era. And for a business that's less than four years old, cell-phone comics are showing a lot of promise. The number of sites has exploded from a handful back in 2004 to more than 300 today. Officials estimate there are about 10,000 stories available and that hundreds more are being added every month.











Instead of Print? The average e-comics buyer spends roughly $15 a month, buying up several episodes. For an episode that runs about 10 pages, consumers pay anywhere from 25 [in black-and-white) to $1 [color]. That's roughly comparable to the thick weekly magazines, which normally have 10 episodes per issue and sell for around $3.











Last year, Japanese consumers spent an estimated $20 million to view manga on handsets, according to Tokyo research firm Impress R&D. Manga now accounts for half the books that publishers sell for cell phones. "Our sites sell a combined 10 million episodes every month," says Katsuyuki Kobayashi, a deputy general manager at NTT Solmare, which runs the Comic-I and Comic C'moA sites, Japan's biggest online stores for cell-phone comics.











Some publishers have even begun bypassing print channels altogether: In March, Wonder Comic, operated by Takarajima Wondernet, launched XX [pronounced "ex cross"], the first manga to debut on mobile phones, and the teaser for a movie release.











Triple-Digit Gains The good news for publishers is that those Net-savvy readers aren't yet curtailing their spending on real-world goods. "Many are still loyal comic book readers who use downloads as a way to try something they might not normally buy," says Shuta Suzuki at publisher Shueisha.











To be sure, manga is still a sliver of Japan's $3.4 billion cell-phone content market, which is dominated by music and games and will likely soon be overtaken by video. It's also a fraction of the $1.9 billion domestic market for anime, the country's iconic cartoons. But no sector in either of those industries can compete with the triple-digit gains of mobile-phone manga.











User-friendly technology has been a big help. Most cell phones sold now sport super-clear screens and tap into Japan's super-fast, third-generation [3G] networks, which have flat monthly rates for prolific e-mailers and Net surfers. So sifting through comics libraries won't strain the eyes, and downloading data won't add up to a fat monthly bill.











Action Words and Sound Effects But for many comics fans, the transition to e-comics is all about the reader experience. Clicking through a story on a handset is not much different from the way readers' eyes would scan over a comic book. "The picture on the screen almost always pans right to left, top to bottom," says Sawato Yoshii, head of global business planning at Celsys, whose Comic Surfing is the industry's leading software.











Consider an episode from Lupin the 3rd, a manga about a gang of thieves led by Ars ne Lupin III. Click, and the title page shifts to a scene with Lupin facing a cop. Click: The screen pans to the left, then back to reveal that Lupin is surrounded by an entire police squadron. Click: The phone vibrates and blares sound effects, as Lupin jumps and feints his way out of trouble and action words splash across the screen. Click: Line by line, a description of the next scene appears.











While teenage boys and nerdy grownups, or otaku, are the manga industry's biggest backers, they're not the majority among mobile-phone readers. When Toppan Printing launched the country's first Web site for mobile manga downloads in late 2003, it focused on big-name titles favoring male readers. As other publishers and distributors entered the fray, it was the comics for girls and women--boys love and another category called teen love--that lit up the charts.











Going Overseas The gender demographics of NTT Solmare's site are now 50% male, 50% female, reckons Impress R&D's Toshihiro Takagi. Most other heavyweights, such as publisher Shueisha's Keitai Shueisha and Shogakukan's Keitai Shogakukan, are skewed heavily toward a female audience, with a 70-30 split, he says. That's why many sites rank selections for female readers and are adding content as fast as they can.











It's unclear whether mobile-phone manga will be Japan's next big cultural export. But manga promoters view the spread of 3G networks globally as a big opportunity. Celsys' Yoshii says he has met with wireless carriers, cell-phone tech makers, and online distributors in Korea and the U.S., a crucial first step in getting Japanese content onto cell phones overseas. "We want to talk with Amazon (AMZN) and [cell-phone operating system software developer] Symbian about a nonexclusive deal," he says.











Meanwhile, publishers are scouting the ranks of amateur cartoonists for a Hayao Miyazaki [of Princess Mononoke fame] of the small screen. This fall, Takarajima Wondernet will dangle $45,000 in prize money to aspiring artists in Japan's first-ever cell-phone comics contest. A few established comic book artists, such as Hideo Yamamoto, who created the cult hit Nozokiya [Voyeur], are even trying their own hand at made-for-mobile-phone manga. You may soon be watching one on your very own small screen.