Company Profile

Vertical translates the best contemporary Japanese books. We select our popular novels, graphic novels, and quality nonfiction from a rich, variegated stock: Japan’s huge and vibrant book market.

In fields like animation and video games, Japanese entertainment thrills people worldwide. The Japanese book world’s offerings are equally entertaining. Until now, however, most Japanese books translated into English have either been literary classics or introductions to traditional culture meant for a limited circle of Japanophiles. Vertical publishes exciting titles that require no prior knowledge of Japanese culture and are not intended to primarily familiarize readers with it; we choose good reads with universal themes.

Read different. Read Vertical.

Contact

Vertical, Inc.
info@vertical-inc.com

What They Say

“Vertical represents what every designer wants. They’re fearless, they’re smart, they want to be challenged, they want to challenge the marketplace. ”
—Chip Kidd, Print Magazine

“Five years ago, an energetic, chain-smoking Japanese entrepreneur named Hiroki Sakai arrived in New York with a new and bold (and some said crazy) idea: to market Japanese popular fiction in North America. Sakai was not what one would call a literary man, nor did he speak much English. Yet he knew the book-selling business in Japan and was confident that Japanese literature could be commercially successful abroad…
A good story, after all, was a good story anywhere…”
—The Globe and Mail

“Thank goodness for Vertical, Inc. with its translated texts for the everyman… While Japanese pop culture has become ubiquitous in the Western entertainment industry, the Japanese book market in translation has been dominated for the most part by so-called literary classics. No more. Vertical, Inc. is about to change all that. ”
—AsianWeek

“Fans of genre-oriented fiction have to check out the incredible new selection by Vertical, Inc.… they are making available the best Japanese fiction for English readers.”
—Las Vegas Weekly

“Vertical approaches the (manga) market from a very different perspective. They are an outside player to the usual machinations of the industry, and have breathed into it a new life.”
—Anime News Service

“Vertical Inc.’s publications offer a wider, more contemporary view of modern-day Japan beyond the clichés and the tourist propaganda. We should welcome such a brave contribution to publishing.”
—Japan Times