Gisèle Alain Creator Sui Kasai Has Passed Away

Manga creator Sui Kasai passed away on September 12. Family members shared the news on Kasai’s X account, noting that funeral services had already taken place. Kasai is survived by wife and fellow manga creator Ao Ogino.

Kasai is best remembered for the series Gisèle Alain, a quiet and carefully observed story set in early 20th-century France. The manga follows Gisèle, a young teenager who manages an apartment building and helps the people around her work through their difficulties. Kasai launched the series in Kadokawa’s Fellows! magazine, which later became Harta, in 2009. The manga went on hiatus in 2014 when Kasai’s health declined and never returned to publication. The fifth compiled volume, now the final one, was released in 2015.

Kasai had been working on a Gisèle Alain side story at the time of passing. Editors at Harta have said they plan to find a way to share that work with fans in some form.

Beyond Gisèle Alain, Kasai also created the Tsukiyo no Toratsugumi anthology of short manga, published by Kadokawa in 2011. The short manga The Story of Carocheila ran in Harta in 2018 and was collected in two volumes that same year. Kasai also contributed a number of one-shot stories to various Harta issues over the years.

My take: Gisèle Alain is a genuinely lovely piece of work, slow and unhurried in a way that is rare. It is a real shame the series never reached its conclusion, but what exists of it is worth reading and remembering.