u/Kitchen-Couple-9842

1)Battle Angel Alita-the first manga I bought. Contrary to what you might expect though this isn't technically the one that lead to me buying tons of manga. I am a longtime reader of American comics and though I'd seen manga(rarely-my area was very limited manga-wise prior to B&N opening a store here) I'd always found it hard to get into what I guess you'd call the stereotypical "Shonen" manga style. But I watched the Alita movie and wanted more so I bought vol 1, then after reading it I bought the rest. The art took some getting used to but I really enjoyed it. Still though, at the time this was still just a temporary detour from US stuff. Which leads to...

2)Elfen Lied-Jump a few years down the line, and the US comics scene has changed. Editors overruling writers, creative teams put on books where they know nothing about or even actively dislike the character they are writing, countless "major events"(ie wanting you to buy issues of series you don't normally buy so as not to miss key event developments), reboots, resets, creative team reshuffles, rising prices...I was wanting to try something without these issues. I remembered Alita and thought "hey maybe I'll look into that manga stuff again". I don't even recall what lead me to this particular one but, despite it's flaws, it was different enough to hold my attention and I liked that it was a complete, self contained story with one creator from start to finish. And the price was very reasonable too. This was the sort of things I was looking for. And even the art didn't take as much getting used to given some of the artists the US companies had been hiring. So basically, while Alita unlocked the gates, Elfen Lied fully opened the door. From there...

3)Higurashi When They Cry-THIS is the one that absolutely hooked me. The atmosphere, mystery, suspense...totally unlike anything I'd read in the west(and I didn't just read Marvel/DC) and I was fully locked in. I bought and read 2 volumes and as soon as I finished the second I got online and ordered the remaining 24. Besides it's importance to my early collecting it also represents my longtime love of horror as a genre.

4)Girls' Last Tour-My favorite series. Not my usual sort of read-not action packed, not intense or scary, just 2 characters wandering and trying to survive in the ruins of their world. But the dialogue, the vast loneliness conveyed by the art, the increasing sense of sadness as the story nears the end...just liked how all of it was handled very much. Plus I'm pretty fond of sci-fi so this represents that genre too.

5)Puella Magi Madoka Magica-My first anime adaptation and my first magical girl series(sure I later got Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura, etc, but Madoka got picked first). Love the anime so I wanted to get the adaptation and all the spinoffs, so got this quickly(now only missing Tart Magica and Homura Tamura).

6)A Silent Voice-First time I really stepped out of my wheelhouse. Prior to this, even including US comics I'd never read a straight up romantic drama story. Action, horror, sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, crime drama...but nothing like this. It's still not my top go-to genre but it DID open the door for me to branch out in what I was willing to try.

7)School-Live Vol 6-First rare/OOP manga I actively made an effort to find. I wanted to read the series and every vol but 6 was on Amazon. But 6 wasn't available anywhere except Ebay at crazy prices I wouldn't pay. So I kept searching till one day while browsing Amazon Japan for something unrelated I was like "woudn't it be funny if Amazon Japan had the English version?" so with NO expectations they actually would, I did a quick search and there it was, ~$20, ships to US. Haven't clicked an "add to cart" button so fast in my life.

8)A Cat is a Cat in Any Life-Not much to say, other than that THIS of all things is the first(and still one of the very few) isekai series I ever bought. It also serves to represent my interest in cat manga.

9)Nichijou-First(and still my favorite) comedy series I bought. A lot of comedy is hit or miss for me but this one I like a lot.

10)Girl From the Other Side-Not gonna comment on the series itself just wanted to shout it out as probably the best looking edition in my collection.

11)Otorimonogatari-Only here cause I also read light novels and wanted to include one. I was actually reading this at the time so it was handy.

12)Monstress-Despite my earlier complaints I DO still love western comics. I may not be reading many current runs but there are characters, creators, and story arcs that I love immensely so I had to include one western series here. For that I went with one of the few currently ongoing series I'm still reading, Monstress. Interestingly the artist is Japanese and the (stunning) art is actually more manga-esque than many American series.

And 2 more I left off:

13)Death Note-First box set. Box sets aren't really a thing with western comics so I thought the idea was nice. Plus there's bonus stuff and the price was crazy($65 sale price at Amazon). Was too lazy to get it down off the shelf heh.

14)Fruits Basket-My first shojo. Meant to include it here but forgot.