Search results for ""drawn and quarterly""

Newly homeless, a group of fairies find themselves trying to adapt to their new life in the forest. As they dodge dangers from both without and within, optimistic Aurora steps forward to organize and help build a new community. Slowly, the world around them becomes more treacherous as petty rivalries and factions form. Beautiful Darkness became a bestseller and an instant classic when it was released in 2014. This paperback edition of the modern horror classic contains added material, preparatory sketches, and unused art. While Kerascoet mix gorgeous watercolors and spritely cartoon characters, Fabien Vehlmann takes the story into bleaker territory as the seasons change and the darkness descends. As with any great horror, there are moments of calm and jarring shocks while a looming dread hangs over the forest.

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A collection of graphic narratives from one of the most influential and respected visual artists of the past half centuryTalking Lines is the first-ever comprehensive collection of the work of R. O. Blechman, one of the most prolific and influential visual artists of the twentieth century. His graphic stories are at once jocular, wry, and profound. Blechman ruminates on such various topics as nuclear weapons, war, wiretapping, Christopher Columbus, Leo Tolstoy, William Shakespeare, and Virginia Woolf. His stories have appeared in the seminal magazine Humbug (edited by Harvey Kurtzman), The Nation, Nozone (edited by his son, Nicholas Blechman), The New York Times, and The New York Times Book Review.Blechman is a modern master of all things visual whose timeless intellect and stripped-down artistry propels his nonstop relevancy. He is one of the few artists who has been able to balance the commercial and the artistic. In

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Make Me a Woman offers charming vignettes about being young, Jewish, and singleIt''s easy to understand why Vanessa Davis has taken the comics industry by storm and is poised to do the same with the world at largeher comics are pure chutzpah, gorgeously illustrated in watercolors. No story is too painful to telllike how much she enjoyed fat camp. Nor too off-limitslike her critique of R. Crumb. Nor too personallike her stories of growing up Jewish in Florida. Using her sweet but biting wit, Davis effortlessly carves out a wholly original and refreshing niche in two well-worn territories: autobio comics and the Jewish identity.Davis draws strips from her daily diary, centering on her youth, mother, relationships with men, and eventually her longtime boyfriend. Her intimacy, self-deprecation, and candor have deservedly earned her many accolades and awards. Her deft comedic touch, lush color, and immediacy will set Davis apart not only as one of the premier carto

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The wife of Japan s most lauded manga-ka documents a year in their lives with her own artistry. In 1981, Fujiwara Maki began a picture diary about daily life with her son and husband, the legendary manga author Tsuge Yoshiharu. Publishing was not her original intention. I wanted to record our family s daily life while our son, Shosuke, was small. But as 8mm cameras were too expensive and we were poor, I decided on the picture diary format instead. I figured Shosuke would enjoy reading it when he got older. Drawn in a simple, personable style, and covering the same years fictionalized in Tsuge s final masterpiece The Man Without Talent, Fujiwara s journal focuses on the joys of daily life amidst the stresses of childrearing, housekeeping, and managing a depressed husband. A touching and inspiring testimony of one Japanese woman's resilience, My Picture Diary is also an important glimpse of the enigma that is Tsuge. Fujiwara s diary is unsparing. It provides a stark picture of the gender divide in their household: Tsuge sleeps until noon and does practically nothing. He never compliments her cooking, and dictates how money is spent. Not once is he shown drawing. And yet Fujiwara remains surprisingly empathetic toward her mercurial husband. Translated by Ryan Holmberg, this edition sheds light on Fujiwara's life, her own career in art, writing, and underground theater, and her extensive influence upon her husband's celebrated manga.

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A race for the Ark of the Covenant finds an exploration into the ethics and world of the international antiquity tradeWhen a great antiquities collector is forced to donate his entire collection to the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Nili Broshi sees her last chance to finish an archaeological expedition begun decades earliera dig that could possibly yield the most important religious artifact in the Middle East. Motivated by the desire to reinstate her father's legacy as a great archaeologist after he was marginalized by his rival, Nili enlists a ragtag crewa religious nationalist and his band of hilltop youths, her traitorous brother, and her childhood Palestinian friend, now an archaeological smuggler. As Nili's father slips deeper into dementia, warring factions close in on and fight over the Ark of the Covenant!Backed by extensive research into this real-world treasure hunt, Rutu Modan sets her affecting novel at the center of a political crisis. She posi

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A captivating, revealing biography of the legendary musician and poetLeonard Cohen opens in Los Angeles on the last night of the man's life in 2016. Alone in his final hours, the beloved writer and musician ponders his existence in a series of flashbacks that reveal the ups and downs of a storied career.A young Cohen traded in the promise of steady employment in his family's Montreal garment business for the unlikely path of a literary poet. His life took another sharp turn when, already in his thirties, he recorded his first album to widespread international acclaim. Along the way he encountered a who's who of musical luminaries, including Lou Reed, Nico, Janis Joplin, and Joni Mitchell. And then there's Phil Spector, the notorious music impresario who held a gun to Cohen's head during a coke-fueled, all-night recording session.Later in Cohen's life, there's the story of Hallelujah, one of his most famous songs, and its slow rise from relative

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Lee Soyeon, Myeong-ok, and Yeonjeong are all mothers in their mid-fifties. And they ve had it. They can no longer bear the dead weight of their partners or the endless grind of menial jobs where their bosses control everything, down to how much water they can drink. Although Lee Soyeon divorced her husband years ago after his gambling drove their family into bankruptcy, she finds herself in another tired and dishonest decade-long relationship with Jongseok, a slimy waiter at a nightclub. Meanwhile, Myeong-ok is having an illicit affair with a younger man, and Yeonjeong, whose husband suffers from erectile dysfunction, has her eye on an acquaintance from the gym. Bored with conventional romantic dalliances, these women embrace outrageous sexual adventures and mishaps, ending up in nightclubs, motels, and even the occasional back-alley brawl. With this boisterous and darkly funny manhwa, Yeong-shin Ma defies the norms of the traditional Korean family narrative, offering instead the refreshingly honest and unfiltered story of a group of middle-aged moms who yearn for something more than what the mediocre men in their lives can provide. Despite their less-than-desirable jobs, salaries, husbands, and boyfriends, these women brazenly bulldoze their way through life with the sexual vulnerability and lust typically attributed to twenty-somethings.

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This Woman s Work is a powerfully raw autobiographical work that asks vital questions about femininity and the assumptions we make about gender. Julie Delporte examines cultural artefacts and sometimes traumatic memories through the lens of the woman she is today a feminist who understands the reality of the women around her, how experiencing rape culture and sexual abuse is almost synonymous with being a woman, and the struggle of reconciling one s feminist beliefs with the desire to be loved. She sometimes resents being a woman and would rather be anything but. Told through beautifully evocative coloured pencil drawings and sparse but compelling prose, This Woman s Work documents Delporte s memories and cultural consumption through journal-like entries that represent her struggles with femininity and womanhood. She structures these moments in a nonlinear fashion, presenting each one as a snapshot of a place and time trips abroad, the moment you realize a relationship is over, and a traumatizing childhood event of sexual abuse that haunts her to this day. While This Woman s Work is deeply personal, it is also a reflection of the conversations that women have with themselves when trying to carve out their feminist identity. Delporte s search for answers in the turmoil created by gender assumptions is profoundly resonant in the era of #MeToo.

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Grass is a powerful anti-war graphic novel, offering up firsthand the life story of a Korean girl named Okseon Lee who was forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese Imperial Army during the second World War a disputed chapter in 20th century Asian history. Beginning in Lee s childhood, Grass shows the leadup to World War II from a child s vulnerable perspective, detailing how one person experienced the Japanese occupation and the widespread suffering it entailed for ordinary Korean folk. Keum Suk Gendry-Kim emphasizes Lee s strength in overcoming the many forms of adversity she experienced. Grass is painted in a black ink that flows with lavish details of the beautiful fields and farmland of Korea and uses heavy brushwork on the somber interiors of Lee s memories. Cartoonist Gendry-Kim s interviews with Lee become an integral part of Grass, forming the heart and architecture of this powerful non-fiction graphic novel and offering a holistic view of how Lee s wartime suffering changed her. Grass is a landmark graphic novel that makes personal the desperate cost of war and the importance of peace.

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Inspired by the visual richness and cinematic structure of the Hollywood musical, Blame This on the Boogie chronicles the adventures of a Filipino American girl born in the decade of disco who escapes life's hardships and mundanity through the genre's feel-good song-and-dance numbers. Rina Ayuyang explores how the glowing charm of the silver screen can transform reality, shaping a person's approach to childhood, relationships, sports, reality TV, and eventually politics, parenthood, and mortality. Ayuyang's comics are as vibrant as the movies that she loves. Her deeply personal, moving stories unveil the magic of the world around us--rendering the ordinary extraordinary through a jazzed-up song-and-dance routine. Ayuyang showcases the way her love of musicals became a form of therapeutic distraction to circumnavigate a childhood of dealing with cultural differences, her struggles with postpartum depression, and an adulthood overshadowed by an increasingly frightening and depressing political climate. Blame This on the Boogie is Ayuyang's ode to the melody of the world, and shows how tuning out of life and into the magic of Hollywood can actually help an outsider find her place in it.

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With her startling humor, it's no surprise that Aminder Dhaliwal's web comic Woman World has a devoted audience of more than 120,000 readers, updated biweekly with each installment earning an average of 25,000 likes. Now, readers everywhere will delight in the print edition as Dhaliwal seamlessly incorporates feminist philosophical concerns into a series of perfectly-paced strips that skewer perceived notions of femininity and contemporary cultural icons. D+Q's edition of Woman World will include new and previously unpublished material. When a birth defect wipes out the planet's entire population of men, Woman World rises out of society's ashes. Dhaliwal's infectiously funny instagram comic follows the rebuilding process, tracking a group of women who have rallied together under the flag of Beyonce's Thighs. Only Grandma remembers the distant past, a civilization of segway-riding mall cops, Blockbusters movie rental shops, and That's What She Said jokes. For the most part, Woman World's residents are focused on their struggles with unrequited love and anxiety, not to mention that whole survival of humanity thing. Woman World is an uproarious and insightful graphic novel from a very talented and funny new voice.

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Julie Doucet arrived in comics in the 1990s as a fully formed cartoonist. Her comic book series Dirty Plotte was visionary both for the medium and for storytelling. Her stories are candid, funny and intimate, plumbing the depths of the female psyche while charting the fragility of the men around her. Her artwork is dense and confident, never wavering in the wit and humour of its owner. Doucet was active in comics for fifteen years before she moved on to other mediums. Her influence casts a long shadow over the medium, Dirty Plotte is quite simply one of the most iconic comic book series to have ever been created. Dirty Plotte: The Complete Julie Doucet collects the entire comic book series, including the acclaimed My New York Diary, as well as rare comics and previously unpublished material; a reproduction of the first Dirty Plotte mini comic; essays about her comics legacy and feminist influence by curator Dan Nadel and academic Martine Delvaux respectively; an interview by comics scholar Christian Gasser; and personal anecdotes from Jami Attenberg, Adrian Tomine, and more. Doucet uses the covers of this two-book box set to present an all-new comic that explores her complicated relationship with femininity and the importance of her relationships with female readers. Astonishingly honest, brutal, and funny, Dirty Plotte is a revelatory journey into a legendary cartoonist s oeuvre.

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The most anticipated issue to date of Seth s iconic comics digest, Palookaville 23 marks the culmination of twenty years of serialization: here, Clyde Fans comes to a conclusion. In this final chapter, we return to Simon Matchcard and the year 1957 exactly where we left off at the end of the first Clyde Fans volume. After his disastrous attempt at sales in the city of Dominion, we witness the out of body experience and ecstatic vision that sets Simon on his path of lonely isolation in the years to come. But of course that s not all an issue of Palookaville always feels a bit like coming home a comforting structure that promises new surprises and updates on old favourites. The next instalment in Seth s memoir, Nothing Lasts, follows him from late childhood to his high school years, from innocent crushes to adolescent brooding, all told with what has become Seth s signature anecdotal approach to autobiography. Readers will also be privy to highlights of Seth s exquisite fine-art practice paintings and drawings from two recent gallery exhibitions which transport us back to an era where style was snappier, moldings more ornate. As always, the three-part digest is care- fully designed by Seth in a call back to classic 1940s textural book design. From one of Canada s greatest artists, Palookaville 23 offers closure, while evoking excitement about what s to come.

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Inspired by a 16th-century Zen monk s painting of a hundred demons chasing each other across a long scroll, acclaimed cartoonist Lynda Barry confronts various demons from her life in seventeen full colour vignettes. In Barry s hand, demons are the life moments that haunt you, form you and stay with you: your worst boyfriend; kickball games on a warm summer night; watching your baby brother dance; the smell of various houses in the neighbourhood you grew up in; or the day you realize your childhood is long behind you and you are officially a teenager. As a cartoonist, Lynda Barry has the innate ability to zero in on the essence of truth, a magical quality that has made her book One! Hundred! Demons! an enduring classic of the early 21st century. In the book s intro, however, Barry throws the idea of truth out of the window by asking the reader to decide if fiction can have truth and if autobiography can have a fiction, a hybrid that Barry coins autobiofictionalography. As readers get to know Barry s demons, they realize that the actual truth no longer matters because the universality of Barry s comics, true or untrue reigns supreme.

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Living on the moonWhatever were we thinking? ...It seems so silly now. The lunar colony is slowly winding down, like a small town circumvented by a new super highway. As our hero, the Mooncop, makes his daily rounds, his beat grows ever smaller, the population dwindles. A young girl runs away, a dog breaks off his leash, an automaton wanders off from the Museum of the Moon. Each day that the Mooncop goes to work, life gets a little quieter and a little lonelier. As in Goliath, Tom Gauld's retelling of the Bible story, the focus in Gauld's science fiction is personal-no big explo-sions or grand reveals, just the incremental dissolution of an abandoned project and a person's slow awakening to his own uselessness. Depicted in the distinctive, matter-of-fact style of his beloved Guardian strips, Mooncop is equal parts funny and melancholy. Gauld captures essential truths about humanity, making this a story of the past, present, and future, all in one.

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Prepare to be disturbed and blown away. The stuff is remarkable, amazing.-Los Angeles TimesGood-Bye is the third in a series of collected short stories from Drawn & Quarterly by the legendary Japanese cartoonist Yoshihiro Tatsumi, whose previous work has been selected for several annual top 10 lists, including those compiled by Amazon and Time.com. Drawn in 1971 and 1972, these stories expand the prolific artist''s vocabulary for characters contextualized by themes of depravity and disorientation in twentieth-century Japan.Some of the tales focus on the devastation the country felt directly as a result of World War II: a prostitute loses all hope when American GIs go home to their wives; a man devotes twenty years of his life to preserving the memory of those killed at Hiroshima, only to discover a horrible misconception at the heart of his tribute. Yet, while American influence does play a role in the disturbing and bizarre stories contained wit

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Ron Regé is one of a handful of cartoonists in the history of the medium not only to reinvent comics to suit his own idiosyncratic impulses and inspirations as an artist, but also to imbue it with his own peculiar, ever-changing emotional energy. To me, he is unquestionably one of the greats.'' Chris WareSkibber Bee ByeRon Regé, Jr., creates his own visual poetry that sets him apart from other cartoonists as one of the most original artists to enter the medium in the past decade. His storytelling is neither linear nor altogether accessible; however, his recognizable thin line and cute characters draw you into a dreamlike, sensitive fantasy world that, as odd as it seems, is entirely realistic.

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Walt & Skeezix is the first-ever collection of the classic twentieth-century newspaper strip Gasoline Alley, and Book One is the beginning of a handsome multivolume series edited and designed by comics virtuoso Chris WareChris Ware has often cited Gasoline Alley as one of his favorite comic strips ever, and he has lovingly edited and designed Walt & Skeezix: Book One, the first-ever collection of the classic newspaper strip created by one of the pioneering giants of American comic strips, Frank King. Not only does this volume reprint the first two years of the strip in which King''s friendly and nostalgic imagination took shape but each book in the series features an eighty-page color introduction by Jeet Heer of Canada''s National Post. Each introduction will also feature never-before-seen archival photos and ephemera from the personal collection of King''s granddaughter. Walt & Skeezix is not just a collection of a cl

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A new paperback edition of the modern classic timed to the release of the Alexander Payne-produced film version. Meet Wilson, an opinionated middle-aged loner who loves his dog and quite possibly no one else. In an ongoing quest to find human connection, he badgers friend and stranger alike into a series of one-sided conversations, punctuating his own lofty discursions with a brutally honest, self-negating sense of humor. After his father dies, Wilson, now irrevocably alone, sets out to find his ex-wife with the hope of rekindling their long-dead relationship, and discovers he has a teenage daughter, born after the marriage ended and given up for adoption. Wilson eventually forces all three to reconnect as a family - a doomed mission that will surely, inevitably backfire. Daniel Clowes, one of the leading cartoonists of our time creates a thoroughly engaging, complex, and fascinating portrait of the modern egoist - outspoken and oblivious to the world around him. Working in a single-page gag format and drawing in a spectrum of styles, the cartoonist of Ghost World, Ice Haven, and The Death-Ray gives us Wilson, his funniest and most deeply affecting novel to date.

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Lynda Barry's bestselling treatise on creativity, What It Is, is now available in paperbackHow do objects summon memories? What do real images feel like? What is an image? What is the past? For decades, these questions have permeated the pages of Lynda Barry's compositions, with words attracting pictures and conjuring places through a pen that first and foremost keeps on moving. Barry's What It Is demonstrates a tried-and-true creative method that is playful, powerful, and accessible to anyone with an inquisitive mind who wishes to write or to remember.In this exploratory workbook, confessional, and memoir each page is a full-color collage that is a gentle guide to the creative process packed full ofswirling collaged images with pen and ink drawings on Barry's signature legal paper. Barry's award winning book is an invigorating example of exactly what it is: The ordinary is extraordinary.

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Everybody's favorite party girl Wendy is so backWhen Wendy is nominated for the coveted National FoodHut Contemporary Art Prize alongside her friend Winona, all of her millennial dreams seem to be coming true. She lives a post-pandemic, polyamorous fine artist's lifestyle in the big city and basks in the glory of national attention with the success of her popular comic strip, Wanda.But not even achieving bona fide art star fame can hide the truth: a never-ending struggle with imposter syndrome. After she cracks in an online interview and gets dragged in the comments section, she heads straight to a local watering hole to drown her sorrows. Several lines of coke, too many drinks, and one all night rager with fans later, Wendy is ready to curse Gen Z and confront her addictions. All the while, she and Winona drift apart as a younger Indigenous artist wedges herself between them. Will Wendy's commitment to change wind up short-lived?The Wendy Aw

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Dhaliwal creates a land ruled by magic and fire, where the sky is thick with witchesA witch's work is never done when she works for the people. With the success of her town relying on her magic, demands are high. But what happens when a witch can''t keep up with the magical requests? She is burnt, of coursein a cruel ritual that extinguishes her magic and erases all her memories, making her just like everybody else. But when a burning ceremony is interrupted by rain in Chamomile Valley, a witch is left writhing at the stake. It''s up to a witch doctor and her toad friend to save the singed witch and nurse her back to health. Can they help her before her magic is lost forever?Aminder Dhaliwal's A Witch's Guide to Burning is a whimsical and humorous allegory for burnout in a society in desperate need of self-care. With a lavish blend of prose, illustration, and comics, Dhaliwal crafts an enthralling hybrid adventure story like you've never seen before. Fo

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No matter how wrong relationships can be, there's nothing quite like getting them right.Every guy's been a creep at one point or another. That's just the way it is. Or at least, that's what Cleo tells herself once she finds out her boyfriend might not be the man she thought he was. Is it possible to keep loving someone you're not sure you can trust? More to the point, should you? Once the fabric of Cleo's relationship rips at the seams, the life she had built with himabroad and away from those closest to herunravels right before her eyes. Yet, letting it fall to pieces as she walks away is only half the story.So Long Sad Love swaps out the wobbly transition of weaving a new existence into being post-heartbreak for the surprising effortlessness and simplicity of a life already rebuilt. Cleo not only rediscovers her identity as an artist but uncovers her capacity to find love where she has always been most at home: with other women.Mirion Malle da

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The final, Eisner Award-winning chapter of a legendary cartoonist s history of Japan. Showa 1953-1989: A History of Japan concludes award-winning author Shigeru Mizuki's stunning historical and autobiographical series about Japanese life in the twentieth century. The final volume picks up in the wake of utter defeat in World War II, covering the United States shift from enemy to ally. Jobs, money, and opportunity are funneled along in a bid to establish the country as a bulwark against Communist expansion. Japan thus reinvents itself, emerging as an economic powerhouse. Events like the Tokyo Olympiad and the World's Fair reintroduce the world to a much friendlier Japan, but this period of peace and plenty conceals a populace still struggling to come to terms with the devastation of their all-too-recent past. Mizuki's own struggles mirror those of the nation during this period of recovery and reconciliation. He fights his way back from poverty, rising to the rank of cartoon celebrity beloved by millions of manga-reading children. However, prosperity cannot bring the happiness Mizuki craves, as he struggles to find meaning in the sacrifices made during the war. This visionary series, told by a true man of his time, is a magnum opus fully representative of the graphic novel as world literature.

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From toddler antics to doctor appointments, Keiler Roberts breathes humour and life into the fleeting present. Keiler Roberts affirms her status as one of the best autobiographical cartoonists working today with The Joy of Quitting, a work encompassing 8 years of hilarious moments in the author s life, mined from the universal. It spans her frantic child-rearing, misfires in the workplace, and frustrating experiences with the medical system. In one strip, the author and her daughter Xia have itchy scalps. Roberts asks her husband to check her hair and all she gets is the cursory remark that he just sees a bunch of bugs. In another, Xia describes her oddly shaped poop in precise detail. We then see Xia sitting at the breakfast table telling the family that she recently learned the word nuisance and everyone agrees it s a good word for her to know. As Xia grows from toddler to big kid, the family evolves and its dynamics shift in subtle ways, changes that pass all too suddenly in real life captured forever with Roberts s keen observational humour. The Joy of Quitting is Roberts magnum opus of domestic comedy, highlighting how she continues to work within and expand the rich tradition of autobiographical comics. Again and again, Roberts shows us that most meaningful moments or gestures often don t have any meaning at all.

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The satirical saga of three artists seeking recognition. But there can be only one Artist. A novelist, single, forty-four years old. A painter, divorced, forty-six years old. A musician, single, forty-two years old. On the outer limits of relevancy in an arts culture that celebrates youth, these three men make up the artist group Arcade. Caught in circular arguments about what makes real art and concerned about the vapid interests of their younger contemporaries, none of them are reaping the benefits of success. But there s always another chance to make it. When it comes time, out of the three, who will emerge as an acclaimed artist? More important, when one artist s star rises, will he leave the rest behind? Following Yeong-shin Ma s hit manhwa, Moms, this plunge into artistic friendships is as hilarious and infuriating as it is real. With absurdist style and off-beat humour, Artist simultaneously caricatures and complicates the figure of the artist. The friendships between the three are impassioned and mercurial, resulting in conflicts about fashion choices, squabbles with foreign children, and changes in one another's artistic fortunes for better and worse. As the story progresses we see the ways that recognition or lack thereof moulds each character s outlook, whether they will be changed by the scene or end up changing it to fit their ideals.

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A deeply emotional visual representation of a teenager s confusion. Still reeling from the death by suicide of his drug addicted father, Travis moves in with his grandmother to become her caretaker as she battles cancer. Meanwhile he tries to live a typical teen life of pulling pranks, occasional shoplifting, dating, and endless drives through the twisting backroads of Central Massachusetts with Nirvana s Nevermind as the soundtrack. When the police intervene after a prank backfires, the boys realize that their time as children is rapidly disappearing and they may never fully understand each other as they move apart. After his Lynd Ward Prize-winning graphic novel, King of King Court, explored the power that parents hold over their children s emotional lives, Travis Dandro employs his signature dream imagery and crass humour to tell the story of teenage independence and resilience as he prepares to head off to art school. Hummingbird Heart is a detailed and stylish account of a time of great uncertainty. Dandro s densely crafted pages create a deeply emotional experience as his story swings from character confrontation to finely-wrought domestic detail a slapstick cafeteria destroying brawl gives way to the beautifully rendered flight of the impossible hummingbird.

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The classic book featuring Maybonne Mullen and her little sister Marlys is back in print! Lynda Barry captures all the glorious magic and excruciating pain of junior high school in this Ernie Pook Comeek collection from the early 90s. The star of this collection is 14 year old Maybonne who relays the angst and insecurity of life through hand scrawled diary entries, class assignments, and letters, in cursive with doodle and bubble letters. Of course, there is the ever-annoying yet adorable little sister Marlys who never fails to read her big sister s diary. Barry deftly portrays the capricious nature of teen friendships, adolescent peer-pressure, and the kill or be killed nature of a middle school s social scene in her signature style. No one but Lynda Barry can so naturally zero in on the joyous urgency yet heartbreaking poignancy of childhood. In an authentic teen voice full of diffidence and melodrama, the bespectacled and freckled Maybonne relates all of life s indignities on equal measure. Heartbreaking stories of a broken home, child molestation, an alcoholic absentee father and a bitter mom emerge between strips about home ec class, summer vacation, and babysitting, illustrating Barry s peerless ability to make the reader both cry and laugh.

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A wormhole into a fleeting romance told in a mind-bending first-person chorus. Time Zone J is Julie Doucet s first inked comic since she famously quit in the nineties after an exhausting career in an industry that, at the time, made little room for women. The year is 1989 and twenty-three-year-old Doucet is flying to France to meet with a soldier. He s a man she only knows through their mail correspondence, a common enough reality of the zine era, when comics were mailed from cartoonist to reader and close relationships were formed. Time is not on their side the soldier is just on furlough for a few days but the two make the most of their visit and discuss future plans, maybe even Christmas in Doucet s city, Montreal. Based on diary entries from the whirlwind romance, the passion and high emotions of youth before you know the limits of love, before you know the difference between love and lust seep through the pages. In contrast to the tryst, Doucet draws herself today, at fifty-five. After years of being in a crowd of men, Doucet compulsively returns to drawing, creating an alternate universe that foregrounds women. The pages of Time Zone J overflow with images pulled from past and present, faces and people that have inspired Doucet across more than three decades of creative work.

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An immigrant weaves a new, surreal americana, complete with bubblegum fights and bomb queens. Rarely does a new talent arrive in the medium as unmistakably distinct as Rumi Hara. With immersive art and a clear-eyed storytelling rhythm, her uncategorizable debut, Nori, put her playful cartooning on display. Her new collection, The Peanutbutter Sisters and Other American Stories, delights with equal mischievousness. The Peanutbutter Sisters is a glorious balance of contradictions, at once escapism and realism; science fiction and slice of life. Two students explore the urban landscape while following Newton Creek, the polluted Queens-Brooklyn border. As they do, they plan a traditional Japanese play with contemporary pop culture. Another story features an intergalactic race of all living things set in the year 2099 and is a dazzling treatise on the environment and journalism. Yet, sometimes the fantastical collides with the quotidian in the same story. A man struggling with vertigo during quarantine encounters a world of sexual revelry whenever he has a dizzy spell. The Peanutbutter sisters ride a hurricane into NYC and yet aren t able to hitch a ride back with a whale due to a heavily polluted ocean. Hara s magical realist tendencies and diverse cast of characters all contort the tropes of the American comics canon. Yet above all else, her innate control of the comics language her ability to weave the absurd with the real on such a charming and commanding level is refreshingly unrivaled.

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Unvarnished. Punk. The New York Times. King-Cat Classix collects material from the first fifty issues of John Porcellino s King-Cat Comics as they appeared in self-published, handmade zines throughout the 1990s. These strips span Porcellino s dynamic evolution from saturated, punk drawings to his characteristic refined minimalism, revealing his work as nothing short of a catalyst that has inspired artists like Chris Ware in the emerging literary comics scene. In the inky drawings featuring beloved pets, awkward teenage one-night-stands, and everyday blunders, we see a nascent style steeped in truth and transparency one that continues to ring true today. Porcellino s mind is spread out on the page, with an uninhibited id running wildly about dreams and sexual fantasies, not unlike the gritty, stabbing pen strokes of Julie Doucet. He sketches fragmented moments and glimpses of interaction that seem to reflect the very manner in which we process memory: we are made up of a stream of consciousness, captured in fleeting mental images, and Porcellino externalizes that messy internal reality. Follow along the path of Porcellino s dynamic evolution and relish in the inspirational power of this groundbreaking collection.

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The Sky is Blue with a Single Cloud collects the best short stories from Kuniko Tsurita s remarkable career. While the works of her male peers in literary manga are widely reprinted, this formally ambitious and poetic female voice is like none other currently available to an English readership. A master of the comics form, expert pacing and compositions combined with bold characters are signature qualities of Tsurita's work. Tsurita s early stories Nonsense and Anti provide a unique, intimate perspective on the bohemian culture and political heat of late 1960s and early 70s Tokyo. Her work gradually became darker and more surreal under the influence of modern French literature and her own prematurely failing health. As in works like The Sky Is Blue with a Single Cloud and Max, the gender of many of Tsurita's strong and sensual protagonists is ambiguous, marking an early exploration of gender fluidity. Late stories like Arctic Cold and Flight show the artist experimenting with more conventional narrative modes, though with dystopian themes that extend the philosophical interests of her early work. An exciting and essential gekiga collection, The Sky Is Blue with a Single Cloud is translated by comics scholar Ryan Holmberg and includes an afterword cowritten by Holmberg and the manga editor Mitsuhiro Asakawa delineating Tsurita's importance and historical relevance.

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