NANA - heard of it a lot of times that it was a good manga But i didnt really like the summarie and also didnt like how it was drawn. Now I love it. It is one of my favourite mangas!!! Cant wait for the update!

I love all demographics so there is no unexpected for me.
What is unexpectedly is that i have given Red River a 7/10 and finished it even if it is a clear smut manga that fails history. It has naked military leaders mud wrestling towards the end, at least one multiple days lasting sex session and gratuitous nudity after all. This is the only such manga i can recommend that comes to mind. I blame it on the suspenseful story a lot of good drama and a very decent leads. It is also surprisingly violent. The ending is very nice too and resolves everything I wanted. The clear art has it´s moments but did i mention the endless/pointless nudity? So girls want to read about contently naked women (and men of course) too i guess.
Some retarded stuff like the multiple rape attempts, the love triangle that anyone can figure out after volume one, some very melodramatic deaths, a cringe worthy subplot about miscarriage and the unneeded time travel stuff did not need to be here but even if the journey is flawed i can still recommend it. Her next best and very similar Yume no Shizuku, Ougon no Torikago turned into a 6/10 so i kicked it.
I am now putting this up as a review.

I also read EU/US comics and am a librarian.
Manga-Masters, My ANN-Lists + Imdb

Kirai

Hoo boy! Kirai manages to tick every single item on my pet peeves list. Terrible art? Yeap. Stereotypical leads? Yeap. More cliches than you can shake a stick at? You gotcha!

But I still can't help going back to it again and again whenever I need a pick-me-up. Ugh.

Hobbies include impersonating fictional characters and sucking on ketchup packets.

For Josei, it would be Shigeshoushi. Normally medical-related stuff kind of grosses me out and I avoid it, so I never thought a series about an embalmer could be so gorgeous and emotional and end up being one of my favorite series.

Shoujo is usually less surprising as I love a lot of shoujo, but I'd probably say Ouran High School Host Club. I watched the first episode of the anime a long long time ago when I first got into anime and really didn't like it, so I didn't expect to find the manga so utterly hilarious and charming.

This is such a great prompt, I'm looking forward to seeing more replies that could maybe help get me over the fence on a few that I'm still holding off.

There are a few that I initially kept giving up on but then ended up enjoying:

Ashita no Ou-sama Had been on my radar for a while, but the cover art and thematic context (showbiz) were a turn-off. Can't remember what motivated me to finally give it a go, but I'm glad I did. The "showbiz" element was more down-to-earth than I expected, and overall it was a refreshing, uplifting read.

Gokusen Stayed away for same reasons as above, but x100. The art and panelling were a serious turn-off, and the MU description gave me the impression that it was going to be some typical shoujo high school romcom, just with even more cliches, setups, and skyhigh slapstick. Out of sheer desperation I pushed through the first few chapters with its host of ugly characters, and then ended up reading the rest in one sitting. Had a meal, took a nap, and reread it again. It did have all the things I feared, but the dynamics between the two main characters won me over, and I found the humor rather subtle and multi-layered.

Basara Had no issues with the art because i had already read 7 Seeds. Shied away from this one for a long time because I thought I wouldn't enjoy the shounen-like epic fantasy-adventure type of narrative that the MU description suggests. It actually turned out to be a little too shoujoesque for my liking, and would not be in my list of "to reread very few years" if it were not for one particularly memorable and well-developed character.

Zankoku na Kami ga Shihaisuru Kept seeing this at the top of the Josei lists, but initially I just couldn't get past the overly dramatic opening or the eyes of a thousand sparkles art style. Gave up on it several times, before one fateful winter break when I suspended judgement and pushed through the first chapter, and then found myself finishing the entire series in a single 30-hour sitting. Since then I have reread it five or six times, it is my favorite manga by a significant margin. I'm still not a huge fan of Hagio Moto's faces, but they work remarkably well (can effortlessly distinguish between a large cast of characters), and her storytelling, subtlety, panel design, and illustrative flair is out of this world.

Kyuuso wa Cheese no Yume o Miru and Sojou no Koi wa Nido Haneru Probably takes the prize of "saw the art, decided just nope". But, thanks to its strong opening (jumps right into the situation, no set-up or other BS), it wasn't difficult to quickly fall in love with everything else this story had to offer. I find the pace and storytelling style to be very refreshing, like a more sane version of works by MOTONI Modoru

The manga Mars was a discover I made about 10 years ago. The artwork, the storyline - I got hooked on everything with this manga.
Skip Beat! I really struggled reading the first few chapters, left it in a corner then started reading again; I don't know why but then, the timing was spot-on and I still adore it.

akaiito
kimi ga kirai na koi no hanashi
bonnouji
i didn't expect to see them or even like them 😀