Dragon Ball (ドラゴンボール, Doragonbōru?) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Akira Toriyama with an anime adaptation, followed by Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball GT. The basis for the storyline took inspiration from two Chinese-related works, Jackie Chan’s Drunken Master II and Wu Cheng’en’s Journey to the West. In Japan, Dragon Ball was collected into a single 42-volume series (called tankōbon) after the manga was serialized in Weekly Shonen Jump from 1984 to 1995.
“ The setting of Dragon Ball has a sort of Chinese feel to it, but it’s not necessarily China. Exactly where it takes place is uncertain. The overall story is very simple, but I’d like to keep making up more details and illustrations as I go along. This way, I can draw anything I want to and enjoy the tension and excitement of figuring out what I’ll draw next. — Akira Toriyama, 1985”
In 2004, the manga was re-released in a 34 volume collection called kanzenban, which included a slightly rewritten ending, new covers, and color artwork from its Weekly Shonen Jump run. As of 2006, the distributing company Viz Media has released all 42 volumes (nearly matching the first Japanese set) into English-language in the United States. Viz titles the second portion of the manga Dragon Ball Z to lessen confusion for North American readers. The series is published in the United Kingdom by Gollancz Manga.
Simple, monkey-tailed Saiyan boy from outer-space Son Goku goes on a life-long adventure beginning with a quest for the seven titular Dragon Balls, befriends many different martial artists and faces various villains, goes through many rigorous martial arts training regiments and educational programs, defeats a series of increasingly powerful martial artists, dies and comes back to life several times, and becomes the top martial arts superhero in the Dragon Ball universe.
To download issues 1-5, 7-9 click below
To download issues 10-21 click below
To download issues 22-35 click below
To download issues 36-42 click below
