I am so proud to announce – (somewhat late – as we got published a few months ago!) – the publication of Manaka Made Simple – a collaborative effort between five internationally acclaimed teachers and authors. The book has had a very positive response and has received some very positive reviews.
We also had some rather lovely news this month. Manaka Made Simple won a book award! We entered the Global Book Awards Contest and were judged in their Health—Alternative Medicine category. We got the Bronze!
This is quite an accolade. The competition is designed for a broad wellness market, but our book is a niche within a niche within a niche: a single style of Japanese acupuncture, in the acupuncture category of Alternative Medicine. Yet alongside books written for much wider audiences, they recognised the quality of our book.
Manaka Made Simple presents the pioneering work of Dr Yoshio Manaka—one of the most innovative figures in modern Japanese acupuncture—in a structured, step-by-step format designed for real clinical use.
Dr Manaka was a medical doctor, researcher, and polymath whose work bridged biomedical science and traditional acupuncture. Nearly forty years ago, Chasing the Dragon’s Tail presented his research-based approach and introduced what later became known as the Four-Step Protocol. Manaka Made Simple, Vol 1 distils and organises this wide-ranging work, making the system clinically accessible in a clear, step-by-step format for practical use.
Written by an international team of senior clinicians and teachers, Manaka Made Simple, Vol 1 reflects the authors’ shared experience of teaching Manaka’s work in real clinical settings. The writing is warm, direct, and conversational, distilling Manaka’s methods into a clear, teachable system while preserving the spirit of inquiry that defined his work.
Background chapters place Manaka’s system in its historical and research context, offering clear, well-informed essays on the development of Japanese acupuncture, palpation, and moxibustion. These chapters stand as valuable reference material in their own right, making the book useful not only to practitioners using Manaka System Acupuncture, but also to those wishing to deepen their understanding of Japanese acupuncture and moxa more broadly.
Alongside this reference strand, the core clinical chapters focus on palpation, pattern recognition, and treatment strategy, presenting Manaka’s Four-Step Protocol in a clear, practical format designed for direct use in the clinic. Together, these two threads—clinical application and contextual reference—make Manaka Made Simple, Vol 1 both a hands-on manual and a lasting professional resource.
The book is supported by a downloadable clinical quick-reference guide, allowing practitioners to access key abdominal patterns visually while working in the clinic. This companion resource reinforces the book’s role not only as a text to be read, but as a tool to be used.
To order your copy, either ask your local bookshop to order it or else order directly from Amazon:
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