drama with a good amount of feels and mystery no romance focus something shortNausica of the Valley of the Wind . Relatively short , but not that short . A definite classic , and one I would recommend without reservations . There ' s a pretty wide consensus that this is A Good Manga , and it ' s relatively mainstream in the West , too there ' s a Ghibli film of the first part of it , after all . Honorable mentionsThe Scarlet Chair . Very short and quite good . Pretty unknown , though . Canariatachi no Fune . Super short , very recent , pretty good . Spirit Circle . More romance than the others , but still isn ' t a romance manga . Quite good , and covers a lot of ground . Annarasumanara . A manhwa rather than a manga , but very , very good . A coming of age story . EDIT Monster was mentioned above it ' s also good , but a bit long . I overlooked Taiyou no Ie also mentioned above that would also be a good pick . Miiiight have a bit too much romance , but I don ' t want to pretend I know your sister ' s tolerance for that lol . While I have not read it , I have never , ever heard of anything about Yotsuba ! having anything ecchi . but can never be sure with those japs # yotsuba