The Completely Mad Don Martin (HC)
by Don Martin
Running Press Book Publishers
$150.00
Just about everyone who came of age during the 1960s, 70s, and 80s was influenced by MAD Magazine, and no one at MAD was more influential than "MAD's Maddest Artist", Don Martin. His immediately recognizable style - featuring bulbous noses, wild sound effects, and the legendary "hinged feet" - was filled with broad and daring slapstick and routinely broke new ground. A surprisingly quiet man, Martin's work spoke volumes as he left an indelible mark on several generations, influencing the style of many illustrators while shaping the sense of humor of countless misguided youths. For the first time ever, here is the complete collection of every piece of art Don Martin published in MAD throughout his extraordinary thirty-year tenure (1957-1987) deluxe two-volume slipcased edition. With all of Martin's strips, covers, posters, and stickers-presented in chronological order, it is nothing less than a masterpiece of comic genius. Complementing Martin's opus of published works are letters, sketches, and rare photos providing an in-depth look at the artist at work. Plus, scattered throughout are notes and original illustrations-commissioned for this volume-paying tribute to the artist and penned by MAD's most-notable personalities, including Al Jaffe, Mort Drucker, Jack Davis, Sergio Aragones and more.

"Don Martin was the one who really stood out."
Gary Larson, creator of The Far Side

"Physically he is good looking, socially he is totally uneccentric, and verbally he almost never utters 'Spap!', 'Blort!', 'Vreech!' or 'Katoonga!'."
Frank Jacobs, author of The MAD World of William M. Gaines

"The fact is my big toes stick up like that. I always draw hands with the pinky sticking out too, but my pinky doesn't do that. I draw them that way because it is a funny gesture when people have the pinky sticking out. Oliver Hardy was always doing it. It is a kind of mock daintiness. I never drew those gestures consciously, trying to be funny. My drawings just came out that way. Trying to be funny these things happened, but I don't sit down and think, 'What's funny? A toe sticking up in the air. OK, I'll do that then.' I don't work that way."
Don Martin, on big toes and pinkies, from Honk #1, 1986

The Mad Archives Vol 1 & 2 (HC)
by Harvey Kurtzman & others
DC
$49.99 each
DC Comics relaunch their attempt to reprint the all the early MAD comic book created by Harvey Kurtzman (ie issues 1 to 28 created between 1952 and 1956). Volume 1 reprints MAD #1-6 and Volume 2 reprints #7-12.

"The first time I encountered Harvey Kurtzman, I was around ten years old. The encounter took place between the covers of The Bedside MAD, a paperback collection; strange, American, the cover painting possibly by Kelly Freas, the edges of the pages dyed a bright, almost fluorescent yellow. To this day, it burns inside my head. The stories in that volume and the Kurtzman stories I discovered later brandished satire like a monkey-wrench: a wrench to throw against pop-culture's gears or else employed to wrench our perceptions just a quarter-twist towards the left, no icon left unturned."
Alan Moore, The Comics Journal #157

"Had he not existed, I'd be a dull, humorless lout working in a muffler shop somewhere, and so would practically everyone I know. I shudder to think how horrible the world would be today without that which Harvey Kurtzman begat!"
Dan Clowes, creator of Ghost World & Eightball

"Before Mad was the black-and-white magazine that has been on the newsstands seemingly forever, it was a 10-cent color comic book, primarily the handiwork of cartoonist-humorist Harvey Kurtzman, who wrote and designed every page during the publication's first four years. The first few issues featured broad send-ups of mass-entertainment genres (westerns, horror flicks, etc.), but gradually the contents shifted to burlesques of particular movies, comics, and - the year was 1952 - radio shows, entitled Superduperman, Melvin of the Apes, Dragged Net, and so forth. Kurtzman's mastery of the comics medium was a major element in the stories' effectiveness, and his humor was fresher and brasher than anything else in any medium; it became a major influence on successive generations of humorists, including the 1960s underground cartoonists and the writers of Saturday Night Live. After Kurtzman's departure, Mad was... different."
Booklist

Laika
by Nick Abadzis
:01 First Second
$17.95
Earth's First Astronaut.
Laika was the abandoned puppy who grew up to become Earth's first space traveler. This is her story. Nick Abadzis blends fact and fiction as he recounts Laika's journey - from the streets of Moscow to the Soviet space program, and then to her fateful final journey on Sputnik 2. Moving words and powerful pictures relate the history of this momentous event and the political landscape surrounding it, through the life of this small, curly-tailed dog. Poignant and authentic, Laika's story speaks straight to the heart. Read an excerpt here.

"Nick Abadzis researched with impressive thoroughness - from the stacks of the British Library to Korolev's house in Moscow - all the facts that have come to light since the collapse of the Soviet Union. He then wove all available historical elements into an unforgettable narrative that achieves the power of myths. Cutting through the official deceit spread at the time, the story brings out the truly heroic dedication that these exceptional scientists showed, even as they lived in a climate of suspicion and fear. And Nick's imagination seamlessly filled out the personal stories, both canine and human, that bring Laika alive as a meditation on the meaning of destiny and the fragile beauty of trust."
Alexis Siegel, from the afterword

Shortcomings
by Adrian Tomine
Drawn & Quarterly
$19.95
Shortcomings, Adrian Tomine's first long-form graphic novel, is the story of Ben Tanaka, a confused, obsessive Japanese American male in his late twenties, and his cross-country search for contentment (or at least the perfect girl). Along the way, Tomine tackles modern culture, sexual mores, and racial politics with brutal honesty and lacerating, irreverent humor, while deftly bringing to life a cast of painfully real antihero characters. A frequent contributor to The New Yorker, Tomine has acquired a cultlike fan following and has earned status as one of the most widely acclaimed cartoonists of our time.

“Adrian Tomine... may be the best prose writer of the bunch. His young people, falling in and out of relationships, paralyzed by shyness and self-consciousness, take on a certain dignity and individuality.”
Charles McGrath, The New York Times Magazine

“[Shortcomings] follows moody movie-theater owner Ben Tanaka, who struggles to hang on to his Asian girlfriend while secretly lusting after white ladies. He's sad and somewhat despicable, and yet Tomine, being the understated virtuoso he is, effortlessly spins him into a Gen-X hero.” 
Entertainment Weekly

Explainers Vol 1
by Jules Feiffer
Fantagraphics Books
$28.95
In 1956, Jules Feiffer - then a relatively unknown cartoonist - started contributing a strip to The Village Voice, a small radical newspaper, which at that time was the only alternative weekly published in the US. It was the first time the American public had been subjected to a weekly dose of comics that so uncompromisingly and wittily confronted the readers private fears. Explainers if the first of four volumes collecting entire run of weekly strips from The Village Voice. Volume 1 contains nearly 500 strips originally published between 1956 and 1966 in a gigantic landscape hardcover format.

"The modern, non-editorial-page cartoon of social and political commentary was pretty much invented by Jules Feiffer."
Booklist

Essex County Vol 2: Ghost Stories
by Jeff Lemire
Top Shelf Productions
$14.95
Ghost Story is the second volume in a trilogy of graphic novels set in a fictionalized version of Lemire's hometown of Essex County, Ontario. Ghost Story follows the lives and relationship of brothers Lou and Vince Lebeuf over the course of nearly seven decades. In this volume, eldest brother Lou, now a deaf and lonely man, lives out his final days on his farm full of guilt and regret for the decisions he made that tore his family apart. From their childhood on the farm, to Toronto in the 1950's (where they both played professional hockey), Lou revisits his life, a silent observer haunted by his own memories.

"Books like this are the reason alternative comics publishers such as Top Shelf exist. Lemire uses an utterly personal, idiosyncratic drawing style, rough but completely clear, that even just-off-mainstream publishers would insist on gussying up for publication. And the simple story's slice-of-life lyricism, sparked by magic realism, is way too arthouse-movie-ish for the mainstream. But lordy, does it work!"
Ray Olson, Booklist

The Wall: Growing Up Behind The Iron Curtain
by Peter Sis
Farrar, Straus & Giroux
$18.00
Through annotated illustrations, journals, maps, and dreamscapes, Peter Sís shows what life was like for a child who loved to draw, proudly wore the red scarf of a Young Pioneer, stood guard at the giant statue of Stalin, and believed whatever he was told to believe. But adolescence brought questions. Cracks began to appear in the Iron Curtain, and news from the West slowly filtered into the country. Sís learned about beat poetry, rock 'n' roll, blue jeans, and Coca-Cola. He let his hair grow long, secretly read banned books, and joined a rock band. Then came the Prague Spring of 1968, and for a teenager who wanted to see the world and meet the Beatles, this was a magical time. It was short-lived, however, brought to a sudden and brutal end by the Soviet-led invasion. But this brief flowering had provided a glimpse of new possibilities - creativity could be discouraged but not easily killed.

By joining memory and history, Sís takes us on his extraordinary journey: from infant with paintbrush in hand to young man borne aloft by the wings of his art

"Peter Sís's book is most of all about the will to live one's life in freedom and should be required reading for all those who take their freedom for granted."
Václav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic

"Peter Sís, who has entranced children and adults with his magical stories and drawings, has taken his talent to a new level. Peter, born to dream and draw, is now also teaching the tragic history of his native Czechoslovakia under communism in this beautiful, poignant, and important work for those of all ages."
Madeleine Albright, former U.S. Secretary of State

Graphic Witness: Four Wordless Graphic Novels
by Frans Masereel, Lynd Ward, Giacomo Patri & Laurence Hyde
selected and introduced by George A. Walker
Firefly
$29.95
The power of a story told through images lies in its universality. It can be read anywhere by anyone, regardless of language, making it an ideal medium for social commentary and criticism. Four rare wordless novels are reproduced here, by some of the greatest woodcut artists from the first half of the 20th century, as a testament to the roles as graphic witnesses. The stories they tell reflect the political and social issues of their times: economic depression, social injustice, war and fear of nuclear annihilation. While the context may have changed, the issues, sadly, remain relevant today. Reproduced in their entirety are:
- The Passion Of A Man (1918) by Frans Masereel
- Wild Pilgrimage (1932) by Lynd Ward
- White Collar (1938) by Giacomo Patri
- Southern Cross (1951) by Laurence Hyde

"This book contains classic wordless novels that used to be almost impossible to find (believe me, I tried)... George Walker gives them context and allows the genius of Ward, Masereel, Patri and Hyde to shine. If you care about graphic novels, if you're interested in what can be done with images, you need this book."
Neil Gaiman - more Neil Gaiman reading recommendations here.

"These wordless novels are such vital objects and still have so much to offer - beauty, brutality, empathy, a seriousness of purpose, joie de vivre, revolutionary fervor - but most of all, these books reflect the work of artists who fully believed that art can change the world."
Seth - more Seth reading recommendations here.

Emma Goldman: A Dangerous Woman
by Sharon Rudahl
W.W. Norton
$17.95
"You are a terrible child and will grow into a worse woman! You have no respect for your elders or for authority! You will surely end on the gallows as a public menace!"
Emma Goldman's childhood religion teacher

A comic retelling of the famous anarchist and radical icon Emma Goldman's extraordinary life. A Dangerous Woman depicts the full sweep of a life lived to the hilt in the struggle for equality and justice. Emma Goldman was at the forefront of the radical causes of the twentieth century, from leading hunger demonstrations during the Great Depression - "Ask for work! If they do not give you work, ask for bread! If they do not give you work or bread, take the bread!" - to organizing a cloakmakers' strike, from lecturing on how to use birth control to fighting conscription for World War I, while her soulmate, Alexander Berkman, spent fourteen years in jail for his failed attack against industrialist Henry Clay Frick.

Mome Vol 9
by various
Fantagraphics Books
$14.95
Mome is a new quarterly anthology showcasing the best new talent of this decade's rising cartoon generation. This full-color series also features an interview with one of the Mome contributors in each volume, conducted by Gary Groth. Contributors include Sophie Crumb, Gabrielle Bell, Andrice Arp, Kurt Wolfgang, Eleanor Davis, Tom Kaczynski, Joe Kinball, Ray Fenwick, Jim Woodring, Mike Scheer and Al Columbia.

"A much-needed packaging of this decade's ascendant cartoon generation."
The Onion

I Keee You!!: A Collection Of Overheards
by various
Atomic Book Company
$7.95
A collection of overheard snippets of conversations illustrated by many of the finest indie comics illustrators. What have we overheard in the bathroom? On the street? In bars? In our own homes? In stores? At restaurants? As people talk into their cell phones, to their friends and, in some cases to no one at all. Have we overheard you? Could be. Includes contributions from Allison Cole, Andrew Goldfarb, Androo Robinson, Anne Thalheimer, Barry Rodges, Ben Claassen III, Bernie McGovern, Brian Ralph, Bruce Orr, Carrie McNinch, Cole Johnson, Delaine Derry Green, Diana Tamblyn, Emily Flake, Grant Reynolds, Greg The Zine Librarian, Hawk Krall, Jamie Dee Galey, Jeff Plotkin, Jeffrey Brown, Jen Michaelis, Jim Siergey, Joe Decie, Joe Tallarico, Joel Orff, Joshua W. Cotter, Kelly Froh, Lee Cooper, Mark Burrier, Martin Cendreda, Matt Fagan, Max Hallinan, Michael S. Bracco, Mike Weibel, Missy Kulik, Nell Taylor, Nick Bertozzi, Patrick Tianen, Peter S. Conrad, Rich Howell, Ryan Claytor, Sarah Becan, Suzanne Baumann, Tim Winkelman, Tom Chalkley and Tom Williams.

White Rapids
by Pascal Blanchet
Drawn & Quarterly
$19.95
Winner of the Best Book prize for the Quebec comic industry awards, Pascal Blanchet's graphic novel is a compelling account of the rise and fall of the small northern town of White Rapids. In the first English translation of his work, Blanchet blends fact and fiction as he weaves together the official history of the town and snapshots of the quotidian life of its residents. Founded in 1928 in an isolated region of Quebec forest, the town was conceived and constructed by the Shawinigan Water & Power Company to function as a fully-equipped, self-contained living community for workers at the nearby dam and their families. Intended as an incentive to lure workers to the remote and inaccessible region, White Rapids provided its residents with all the luxuries of middle-class modern life in a pastoral setting - until the town was abruptly shut down in 1971, when the company changed hands. Blanchet's unique, streamlined, retro-inspired aesthetic draws on Art Deco and fifties Modernist design to conjure up idyllic scenes of lazy summer days and crisp winter nights in White Rapids, transporting the reader back to a more innocent time.

"Just seeing an old deserted building or an old chair in the garbage makes me feel blue, not because of the object, but because I'm thinking about the people around it, about the memories that will disappear with that object."
Pascal Blanchet

"Blanchet appears to have the soul of the archivist. From subject to style, it's about rendering the ephemeral."
Canada's National Post - Read the full review here.

"...the elegance of its aesthetic is sure to propel him to the forefront of cartooning culture."
Walrus Magazine - Read the full review here.

The Nightly News
by Jonathan Hickman
Image Comics
$16.99
An act of violence spirals out of control to encompass the entirety of the news media, a cult emerges from the errors and retractions that have ruined careers, marriages and even lives. Under direction from his cult master, The Hand leads an army of followers committed to revolution, willing to die for their cause.

"A comic created with pure creative rage! A tour de force in graphic design as story and I loved it!"
Brian Michael Bendis

"A totally unique thriller."
Brian K Vaughn

Emo Boy Vol 2: Walk Around With Your Head Down
by Steve Emond
Slave Labor Graphics
$13.95
"Emo Boy is about a high school kid who is so overly emotional and self-absorbed that his emo manifests itself as random superpowers that serve no purpose but to destroy things, harm others, and make Emo Boy even more emo. It's a very negative spiral. Emo Boy is a loner, hated by most of the school, and has a shady past. He's known only as Emo Boy and is scoffed at by most of the school, aside from his best friend Maxine, whom he lives with. In the first few issues, he's had his first kiss (which resulted in a girl's head exploding), gone to a Cheezer concert and gotten into an emo duel with the lead singer, and nearly committed suicide. He's pissed off a bunch of people."
Steve Emond discusses Emo Boy at The Pulse. Read the full interview here.

Hello, Me Pretty
by Line Gamache
Conundrum Press
$15.00
Hello, Me Pretty is the English edition of Té malade, toi! and is the story of the author's mentally disabled sister and their adventures growing up in a small community just outside Montreal, with Expo ‘67 and the FLQ crisis as part of the historical backdrop. It is a story of people's intolerance and lack of understanding, but mostly a story about being different. It is also a valuable glimpse into one family's personal trials and tribulations, woven into the tapestry of Quebec's rich culture and history. Line Gamache completed a degree in visual arts at Concordia University in 1989. She is known as a painter, a sculptor, and an experimental artist.

Nothing Better Vol 1: No Place Like Home
by Tyler Page
Dementian Comics
$15.00
2007 Xeric Grant Winner
College is the best time of your life - or is it? Jane has left home for the first time to attend a small Lutheran college expecting to make friends and lasting memories until she finds out her roommate is her complete opposite in almost every way. Katt means well, but her views on partying, boys, and even religion begin to drive Jane crazy. The two girls struggle to find their place not only as roommates, but as individuals trying to construct their adult conception of relationships, education, religion, sex, secrets, family, home and ultimately, of themselves. In their first few months at St. Urho College it quickly becomes apparent to both Jane and Katt that there's more to college than just going to class. This might just be the best time of their lives, even if they don't realize it yet.

"Nothing Better is good stuff. A compelling read with strong characters. Tyler Page knows what he's doing."
Terry Moore, creator of Strangers In Paradise

Poison The Cure Vol 1
by Jad Ziade & Alex Cahill
The New Radio
$9.00
In a future where political mire has wrought a global and terminal emergency, Poison the Cure is the four part story of the confusion and desperation one young man and his friends face in seeking a peace that may come too slowly. Their struggle is documented by three aliens from the future who come to discover what's left, and to find out what happened.

"Something So Familiar and The Last Island were little one-shots because they were experiments. I'm really happy with the way they came out, but they were small and without words because I wanted to accustom myself to making comics in a way that was controlled - so as not to go overboard. Poison The Cure is totally different because it's Jad's story. It's gonna be long because Jad has a taste for things that develop slowly. We want the events in this story to have some breathing room. But it might not be epic in scope. When it's all done I think some people will be surprised that a ton of stuff didn't happen. It'll be long, but we will not have crammed that much in. But to answer the question, I jumped into Poison because I knew Jad was a superstar in waiting and I wanted the opportunity to work with him and to get The New Radio off the ground together. Also, the work I have planned for after Poison is so vast in scope that I knew I needed Poison as a primer and as a lesson from Jad in how to make things work."
Alex Cahill discusses Poison The Cure at Newsarama. Read the full interview here.

Cairo (HC)
by G. Willow Wilson & M.K. Perker
DC/Vertigo
$24.99
Written by G. Willow Wilson, a Cairo-based journalist, Cairo is action-adventure that brings the ancient and modern Middle East together with a twist. A stolen hookah, a spiritual underworld, and a genie on the run change the lives of five strangers forever in this modern fable set on the streets of the Middle East's largest metropolis. This magical-realism thriller interweaves the fates of a drug runner, a down-on-his luck journalist, an American expatriate, a young activist, and an Israeli soldier as they race through bustling present-day Cairo to find an artifact of unimaginable power, one protected by a dignified jinn and sought by a wrathful gangster-magician. But the vastness of Africa's legendary City of Victory extends into a spiritual realm - the Undernile - and even darker powers lurk there.

Army@Love Vol 1: The Hot Zone Club
by Rick Veitch & Gary Erskine
DC/Vertigo
$9.99
Equal parts blistering battle action, sensuous soap opera and pitch-black satire... Army@Love is where comedy collides head on with tragedy when a New Jersey National Guard unit is deployed indefinitely to a never-ending series of wars in the Middle East. These citizen soldiers range from kids fresh out of high school to middle-aged corporate managers - and the modernized military has gone into take-no-prisoners marketing mode in order to motivate them. And you won't believe what it takes to become a member of the Hot Zone Club.

"...the series I'm following religiously right now is Rick Veitch's Army@Love. I read the collection of the first six issues on the train down to SPX, and enjoyed it even more as a collection than I did in the single issues. Army really reads like a 21st Century update on Dr. Strangelove, except as an acidly funny, cutting satire of the current war and the information consumption that characterizes American culture. That's one I can't wait for between issues, and when I get them, that I can't even wait to get home to read. I've gotten lots of odd looks on the subway for laughing aloud at this comic."
Charles Brownstein, Executive Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, from an interview with The Comics Reporter - read the full interview here.

Parade (With Fireworks) #1 of 2
by Michael Cavallaro
Image Comics
$3.50
In 1923, Italy was pulling itself from the wreckage of one World War while unknowingly plummeting toward another. The nation seemed to be holding its breath, and the slightest perceived transgression could result in violence. On the evening of The Feast of the Epiphany, it did. Young Paolo is caught between a rowdy group of local Fascist Party members and his family. The choice he is about to make will change his life forever.

"I grew up hearing my parents' and grandparents' stories about their lives in pre and post WW2 Italy and finally decided to start writing them down. I'm taking one of these as the subject of my Act-i-vate project and calling it Parade (with fireworks). Ultimately, it'll be part of a larger work titled Seven Years Without The Sun."
Michael Cavallaro

The Mice Templar #1
by Bryan Glass & Michael Avon Oeming
Image Comics
$3.99
In the small village of Deishun the Blacksmith, a Diminutive mouse named Karic is born. As he grows, he learns the tales of the past and he dreams of a distant season yet to come, when he might no longer live in fear...

"The passion and dedication put on every single page of this comic is exactly what any comic reader would ever want."
Brain Michael Bendis

"A real thing of beauty. I believe THIS is the book Mike Oeming was meant to do."
Mike Mignola

"This new style Mike's adopted is even prettier than his old one, and we may just all have to kill him now for making the rest of us look lazy."
Mark Miller

Clockwork Girl #1 of 4
by Sean O'Reily, Kevin Hanna & Grant Bond
Arcana Studio
$0.99
A nameless robot girl has recently been given the gift of life from her creator, while exploring the wonders of an ordinary world she meets an amazing mutant boy and they share a friendship that must overcome their warring families…

"Romeo and Juliet was definitely an inspiration in this project. Another big influence for me on this was my biological education and the transition I made in my life towards technology. My first degree is in biology and physics, while my training and experience have been in technology. It was the blending of these two disciplines that I had fun with in creating some of the world and defining some of the characters. In addition, Kade has been getting darker and darker – and I don't foresee it letting up – and I really needed an all-ages outlet where I could tell a tale that my daughter and her friends could read."
Sean O'Reily discusses Clockwork Girl. Read the full interview here.

30 Days Of Night: Beyond Barrow #1
by Steve Niles & Bill Sienkiewicz
IDW Publishing
$3.99
After years of attacks, and several without, the citizens of Barrow have become united against random attacks on their city by the undead. Unfortunately the same does not apply outside of Barrow or the rest of the mysterious Arctic Circle.

"I've known Bill since I first started in comics. As a matter of fact, he did the cover for Fly In My Eye, the second book and first major book I ever published. We've been friends ever since. We ran into each other recently at the New York Comic-Con. Bill and I started talking and he said he was looking to do some new kinds of stuff and I mentioned to him that I had a 30 Days pitch that wasn't, how should I put this, milking the idea. I really think I came up with a new, cool, original 30 Days. A new take on things. Bill got really excited about it and here we are."
Steve Niles discusses working with Bill Sienkiewicz. Read the full interview here.

"I thought the ideas Steve came up with are just great. I grew up on Creepy and Eerie and Vampirella and stuff like that. I just love horror stuff, but in my career there hasn't been much horror done lately that I felt was done well. The projects I'd be offered would have horror elements in it, but it was usually more super hero stuff. Or it would be gore for gores sake and you wouldn't ever get to know the characters. This story is something different."
Bill Sienkiewicz discusses working with Steve Niles. Read the full interview here.

Kirby: King Of Comics (HC)
by Mark Evanier
Abrams Books
$40.00
Jack Kirby created or co-created some of American comic books' most popular characters including Captain America, The X-Men, The Hulk, The Fantastic Four, The Mighty Thor, Darkseid, and The New Gods. More significantly, he created much of the visual language for fantasy and adventure comics. There were comics before Kirby, but for the most part their page layout, graphics, and visual dynamic aped what was being done in syndicated newspaper strips. Almost everything that was different about comic books began in the 1940s on the drawing table of Jack Kirby. This is his story by one who knew him well - the authorized celebration of the one and only 'King of Comics' and his groundbreaking work.

"I don't think it's any accident that... the entire Marvel universe and the entire DC universe are all pinned or rooted on Kirby's concepts."
Michael Chabon

"At all levels of society, all over the globe, Charles Schulz and Peanuts had a profound and lasting influence on the way people saw themselves and the world in the second half of the 20th century. It's now been exactly a year since Schulz's death, and I still see a gap on the long shelf of Peanuts literature for a full-scale biography that places Schulz where he belongs - in the pantheon of American cultural achievement. For me, it's a privilege and pleasure not only to explore the life and art of this seminal figure with the cooperation of his family and associates, but also to be in partnership with a house that early on shaped my ambitions. Thirty-two years ago, as a 10-year-old wearing a brand-new Linus sweatshirt, I loved to investigate my grandfather Ordway Tead's files and papers and books in his office at Harper & Row and at home. More than anything in the world, except maybe my Linus sweatshirt, I loved feeling my way into another person's past life and being allowed to live its strangeness. Last summer, when Schulz's family invited me into his book-lined studio at One Snoopy Place in Santa Rosa, California, the aroma in that room was the same as that which I recall from my earliest excavations at Harper's - the unfading smell of paper and ink."
David Michaelis

"In coming years, when Charles Schulz's artistic accomplishment is seen as the singular, revolutionary and purely American thing that it is, this biography will surely be one of the main reasons why. Fifty years of Peanuts comic strips are here gently turned over to reveal the thready biographical tapestry which stitched together the lightly-knotted ink lines of Charles Schulz's little repertory company for almost two-thirds of his life [Schulz] once suggest[ed] that anyone who wanted to know anything about him as a person could find all the answers in his comic strip; [now,] David Michaelis' book provides just this unprecedented and very adult key to Schulz; the moving and surprising revelations appear chapter after chapter, page after page. For this complicated generous, humble yet fiercely serious artist, Michaelis has written a like biography, exhaustively researched and respectful, presenting a man worthy of awe as he was disarmingly human. Even if you already love Peanuts, after you read this book you will come to know and more deeply understand the unquestionable genius that went into every single line that Charles Schulz ever drew."
Chris Ware

"In the '80s he was one of the 10 highest-paid entertainers in America, right up there with Oprah and Michael Jackson. In fact, if by artist we mean someone who paints or draws, it's no stretch at all to say that Charles Schulz was the most popular and most successful American artist who ever lived. He was also, to judge from David Michaelis's new biography, one of the loneliest and most unhappy."
The New York Times - Read the full review here. You can also watch Charles Schulz on the Charlie Rose show here.

Comic Art #9
Buenaventura Press
$19.95
In this issue:
- A separate 80-page booklet titles Cartooning by Ivan Brunetti
- An essay by novelist Tom DeHaven on Dick Tracy creator Chester Gould
- A career spanning profile of Kaz
- A visual biography of Abner Dean
- An exploration of Jesse Marsh with Gilbert Hernandez and Adrian Tomine
- A visual autobiography by Jerry Moriarty
- An essay on the early cartoons of Lyonel Feininger

"The most heartbreakingly idealistic thing I've ever seen."
R. Crumb

"Each new issue of Comic Art makes my tiny cartoonist heart flutter."
Matt Groening, cartoonist and creator of The Simpsons

Back Issue #24
TwoMorrow Publishing
$6.95
Celebrating comic books of the 1970s, 1980s and today.
In this 'magic' themed issue:
- An interview with artist Michael Golden examining Micronauts, The 'Nam and Dr. Strange
- Gene Colan and Paul Smith talk Pro2Pro
- Frank Brunner discusses his stint drawing the Sorcerer Supreme
- Carl Potts and Kevin Nowland feature in a Dr Strange art gallery
- A tribute to the late, great artist, Marshall Rogers
- And more...

Uzumaki #1
by Junji Ito
Viz
$9.99
Kurozu-cho, a small fogbound town on the coast of Japan, is cursed. According to Shuichi Saito, the town is haunted not by a person or being but a pattern: uzumaki, the spiral - the hypnotic secret shape of the world. It manifests itself in everything from seashells and whirlpools in water to the spiral marks on peoples bodies, the insane obsessions of Shuichi's father and the voice from the cochlea in our inner ear.