Story and Art by Minako Uchida
Copyright © 1993-1998 Minako Uchida
Published by Bamboo Comics
Volumes 1-4 and continuing

Pop-cyberpunk, a virtual reality city, female hacker-turned engineer (bug hunter), bizarre monster-bugs, cute side-kick, male foil: these are the beginning elements that set the style and place of the series called "Boomtown."
The main character is one Akeru Takebe. The back cover of the first volume gives this brief profile of her:

"XX Year The Contract Engineer #2 Akeru Takebe The aptitude of disposing Bug / Level A How ever risky the Bug is, She can dispose absolutely. Inclination/ Getting over the Fear, Showing sound judgment. Attention. She has an inclination to be in HOT BLOOD. Her aggression exceed the limit frequently. All the Man keeping Akeru at a distance, where more Angelic. Be flexible, Akeru!"

She is one of a bunch of engineers who help maintain code-order in the virtual city called "Boomtown." Akeru is the daughter of one of the primary developers of Boomtown (referred to as "B.T." in the story.) It was her rebellious nature, her love of and aptitude for computers, and her rather bizarre family life (including a desire to be noticed) that made her hack her father's work. When she finally gets his attention instead of the expected backlash he is pleased and over time she becomes an "engineer" for C-Wisdom, the company who developed Boomtown. In this role she hunts down "bugs" in Boomtown that are disrupting things—usually by the side effect called "noise" that unravels the structure of the virtual city. These bugs usually appear as... bugs. Sometimes though they are more fantastical or whimsical in nature, such as a 30 foot tall giant rabbit. When Akeru and Zerra (her computer) learn of one of these they box it in with a bunch of seals and return order to that part of Boomtown.
Zerra is Akeru's computer. In Boomtown she appears as a miniature cute female just over 1 foot tall wearing shorts and a t-shirt that always has "Zerra" written on it. Akeru created Zerra to aide in her efforts in Boomtown. As such, Zerra exhibits a rather impish behavior and can be rather annoying or cute.
Akeru's main companion both in the real world and in Boomtown is another hacker-turned engineer called "Oz." He and Akeru met shortly after her run-in with her father. Oz is the same age as Akeru, hangs out with her, and helps her on various assignments. They have an almost relationship going too.
Real people, or "users" can only spend so much time inside of Boomtown; they have an allotted limit. This would leave to a rather bit of a ghost town if that is all there was in this city. So, C-Wisdom-sha has created a race of AI's called "X-Y-Z People" (referred to as "XYZ-P") who you can recognize as such by the characteristic dot in the middle of their forehead. These AI's are truly that. Individuals who can even show emotion. They populate Boomtown and give it a personality. Birdy, the owner of a bar that Akeru tends to visit a lot is one of the first people she met in Boomtown and regards him as a friend.
Frequently Akeru's job may do with mediating relationships between people and the XYZ-P. Sometimes she has rather unusual cases—like a recurring one involving an XYZ-P named Alice who was created by a hacker called Jack who is still at large.
The story is more or less episodic but it builds upon itself. Things progress and various arches build out of the series of "Trips," which is how the chapters are labeled. Most of the Trips tend to resolve quickly without lasting angst that weighs down the reader. Do not count on the series for any real technical depth—it is all cyber-pop candy. Still it remains entertaining. Although there is a fair amount of kanji, helpful furigana are provided in places that should carry most beginning readers through.
The art is quite fine. The characters in the foreground have good definition and they remain well defined throughout the series. Uchida Minako relies quite a bit on ziptone to add more dimension to the characters. You get the feeling that without the tone everything would appear extremely flat. The backgrounds however tend to remain extremely simple and linear. Every now and then we get a scene with some good perspective or some good edgy detail but most of the creativity is spent on rendering the characters, their expressions, costumes and postures.
Overall it is a fairly enjoyable story. Mildly engaging but not at all draining on the reader. Perhaps a tad difficult to approach for those who are still learning kanji. Luckily most of the kanji that is difficult is fairly easy to look up and the grammar remains simple.