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PG Previews:
November 2011
Gosh! It’s another bumper harvest of comics, graphic novels and manga this month. Far removed from the American Big Two‘s corporate desperation to perpetuate their properties at any cost, back in the real world the fully fledged medium we love is more fearless and fertile than ever. Rather than wade through forests of perfunctory product, you can choose from these goodies which I’ve gleaned for you from what’s lined up to be released in November 2011 (although actual dates may vary), all based on publisher advance listings. Happy reading ahoy, me hearties!
A.D.D.
by Douglas Rushkoff, Goran Sudzuka
& Jose Marzan Jr
DC/Vertigo
$24.99
The publisher says:
The Adolescent Demo Division (A.D.D.) are the world’s luckiest teen gamers. Raised from birth to test media, appear on reality TV and enjoy the fruits of corporate culture, the squad develop special abilities that make them the envy of the world - and a grave concern to their keepers. One by one, they ‘graduate’ to new levels that are not what they seem. But their heightened abilities can only take them so far as the ultimate search for their birth families proves to be a most harrowing discovery.
Paul Gravett says:
Not ‘Attention Deficit Disorder’ but of course the condition is related to this thriller’s gaming subject. This is not actually released till January 2012 so no previews available quite yet, but with Rushkoff writing it should be well worth investigating. Fuller review to follow.
British Comics: A Cultural History
by James Chapman
Reaktion Books
£25.00
The publisher says:
British Comics is a unique cultural history of British comic papers and magazines, from their origins in the late nineteenth century to the present day. It shows how comics were transformed in the early twentieth century from adult amusement to imaginative reading matter for children, and relates the rise of the major comic publishers and the emergence of the mighty duopoly of Amalgamated Press and D.C. Thomson that would dominate the industry for half a century. Beginning with the first British comic ‘superstar’ Ally Sloper - ‘A Selection, Side-splitting, Sentimental, and Serious, for the Benefit of Old Boys, Young Boys, Odd Boys generally and even Girls’ - whose various misadventures reflected the emergence of a middle-class leisure economy in the late nineteenth century, British Comics goes on to describe the heyday of comics in the 1950s and ‘60s, when titles such as School Friend and Eagle sold a million copies a week, and analyses the major genres including schoolgirl fantasies, sport and war stories for boys. The author charts the development of a new breed of violent comics in the 1970s, including the controversial Action and 2000 AD, and also considers the attempt of an American comic publisher, Marvel, to launch a new hero for the British market in the form of Captain Britain. He goes on to document the appearance in the 1980s and ‘90s of adult-oriented comics such as Warrior, Crisis, Deadline and Revolver and alternative comics such as Viz, and concludes by considering the work of important contemporary comic writers including Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Ian Edginton, Warren Ellis and Garth Ennis.
British Comics explains what children and adults thought of their comics and why some titles prospered while others failed, and also maps the changing structure of the comic publishing industry and how comic publishers, writers and artists have responded to the tastes of their consumers. Ultimately, the book argues that British comics are a distinctive kind of publishing that is different from (and certainly not inferior to) American, French and Japanese comics. An invaluable reference for comics collectors and fans world-wide, British Comics is a fascinating and thorough history that showcases the major role that comics have played in the imaginative lives of British juveniles - and some adults.
Paul Gravett says:
It will be interesting to see how James Chapman, Professor of Film Studies at the University of Leicester, puts together this 320-page study of Britain’s long and complicated relationship with comics, something Peter Stanbury and I tackled of course in Great British Comics. Look out for my review in a future PG Tips.
Bye Bye Babylon
by Lamia Ziadé
Jonathan Cape
£14.99
The publisher says:
Beirut in the 1970s is a paradise. Wealthy families ride escalators and fill shopping carts with imported food and luxury products from Paris and New York. Lamia Ziadé, seven years old, dreams of banana splits, American candy, flying on Pan Am Airways and visiting the local cinema. Considered by the elite the Paris, Las Vegas or Monaco of the Middle East, Beirut was in reality a powder-keg, waiting for a spark. On 13 April 1975 Lamia and her family returned from lunch in the countryside to find a city in flames. Looking back on the golden days before the war, and its immediate, devastating effects, Bye Bye Babylon positions an elegiac and shocking narrative next to a child’s perspective of the years 1975-79: of consumer icons next to burning buildings, scenes of violence and sparkling new weapons painted in vivid technicolour - war as pop. It is both a lament for a home transformed by a destructive madness, and an inventory of the concrete objects of her childhood: the objects, details and fragments of memory which combine to capture the impossible reality of war. Part artist’s sketchbook, part travel notebook and part family album, Bye Bye Babylon is a unique graphic memoir.
Paul Gravett says:
Beirut seems to be blossoming quite a bit right now in terms of talented women graphic novelists. I just interviewed the Paris-based Zeina Abirached in Helsinki, and Joumana Medelj here in London. Lamia Ziad’s hybrid historical journal has been a hit in France and deserves to cross over to a wider public now that it’s in English.
Hergé: The Genius Of Tintin
by Raphael Taylor
Totem/Icon
$18.95/£20.00
The publisher says:
Georges Remi, better known as Hergé, is widely regarded as the greatest twentieth-century master of European comics whose Tintin books have enchanted millions of readers worldwide. This beautifully written biography draws on Hergé‘s private letters and exclusive family interviews, bringing new insight into the man and the inspiration behind his work.
Paul Gravett says:
I met Londoner Raphael Taylor two years ago at a Comica event and was struck by his passion for studying Tintin’s creator. I gather he is polishing the final stages right now, so it’s not possible for me to review for the moment. But all being well it will coincide with the imminent Hollywood 3D blockbuster. I’ll report back on it then.
Hilda & The Midnight Giant
by Luke Pearson
Nobrow
£12.50
The publisher says:
Hilda finds her world turned upside down as she faces the prospect of leaving her snow-capped birthplace for the hum of the megalopolis. Her mother, an architect, has been offered a prestigious position in the bustling city of New Oslo that she would find hard to reject - besides which Hilda’s 90-minute trek to school every day is far from ideal. As she seeks ways to stall her mother’s decision, Hilda conspires with the beings of the mystical Blue Forest to delay the inevitable. Will they help or hinder her? More importantly, who is the mysterious Midnight Giant?
Paul Gravett says:
From Hildafolk to Everything We Miss, Luke Pearson seems to have a ‘thing’ about the unseen, the invisible, those uncanny occurrences and critters sharing our world but never being noticed by us. Hilda and the Midnight Giant pursues this fixation. Little Hilda is back, savvy and sweet, all big eyes, pointy nose, blue hair, freckles, beret and big boots. She longs to stay in the home with her Mum where she was born, high in the hills, deep in the countryside. But the local “hidden people” have other ideas and have been bombarding the household with tiny letters demanding that they leave. Hilda will have none of this but then chaos ensues as the “people of the Northern Elven Valley” start to implement their forcible eviction from the premises. Hilda’s Mum is all for moving out to the town but Hilda insists they stay. Her Mum gives in but only on the condition that Hilda finds a way somehow to befriend these elves. The eight-page black-and-white preview I’ve just seen sets up the story brilliantly and will look radiant in their finished understated palette. Channelling Tove Jansson and Hayao Miyazaki, Pearson is developing his chops still further here, crafting pages as crisp and appealing as the best all-ages bande dessinée albums of today. Hilda is the perfect plucky little heroine for this endearing 21st century folklore.
Last Days Of An Immortal
by Fabien Vehlmann & Gwen de Bonneval
Archaia Entertainment
$24.95
The publisher says:
In the distant future, Elijah is a member of the ‘Philosophical Police’, who must solve conflicts that arise out of ignorance of the Other. Two species are fighting a war with roots in a crime committed centuries ago, and Elijah must solve the crime and bring peace between their species, and confront his own immortality in the process. In a world where science provides access to eternal life and death no longer exists, why do so many want to give up on life? Serious, hard science fiction, translated from the award-winning French graphic novel.
Paul Gravett says:
Vehlmann is a French writer to watch. His Green Manor with Bodart, two volumes translated by Cinebook, is huge Holmes-ian fun and he wrote Jolies Tenèbres for Kerascoet, one of my books of the year. Here he conceives a complex, Ballardian future fable about the challenges of multi-species co-existence, atmospherically illustrated in cool blue tones by Gwen de Bonneval (he’s a bloke, btw) across 152 pages. Mark Smylie at Archaia scores again, bringing another Soleil treat into English for us.
Lily Renée, Escape Artist:
From Holocaust Survivor To Comic Book Pioneer
by Trina Robbins & Anne Timmons
Lerner Publishing
$7.95
The publisher says:
In 1938, Lily Renée Wilheim is a 14-year-old Jewish girl living in Vienna. Her days are filled with art and ballet. Then the Nazis march into Austria, and Lily’s life is shattered overnight. Suddenly, her own country is no longer safe for her or her family. To survive, Lily leaves her parents behind and travels alone to England. Escaping the Nazis is only the start of Lily’s journey. She must escape many more times - from servitude, hardship, and danger. Will she find a way to have her own sort of revenge on the Nazis? Follow the story of a brave girl who becomes an artist of heroes and a true pioneer in comic books.
Paul Gravett says:
A Jewish American comic artist herself, Trina Robbins reveals the compelling background to one of the greatest women adventure artists in American comic books, Lily Renée, starting with her privileged upbringing, her harrowing experiences as an Austrian Jew under the Nazis and her escape to Britain thanks to a pen-pal’s sponsor and the brief window of opportunity provided by the Kindertransport programme. Adjusting to English life takes its toll on the young girl, when the woman in the household where she is assigned punishes Lily for her inability at housework by almost starving her. Running away, she walks to Leeds and finds work as a mother’s helper and then a nurse’s assistant, but suspicion of her being ‘an enemy alien’ is never far away. Finally, a Kindertransport ship takes her to New York where she is finally reunited with her parents. It’s here that Lily comes across comic books and begins her self-education in how to illustrate them. Famously, she was taken on by Thurman Scott at Fiction House Comics, where she drew such series as pilot Jane Martin and counterspy Senorita Rio who both fight the Nazis. Signing her comics ‘L. Renée’, she received fan mail from readers who never realised she was a woman. In the end, Renée was able to defeat her persecutors vicariously through her comic book adventuresses. Through one woman’s life, this graphic biography makes the past accessible and understandable, with appealing, well-researched artwork by Anne Timmons and supplementary features explaining more of the history. I just found that you can watch a short YouTube Comicology video of a recent interview about her artwork.
Mr. Twee Deedle:
Raggedy Ann’s Sprightly Cousin
by Johnny Gruelle
Fantagraphics
$75.00
The publisher says:
A magnificent collection of Johnny Gruelle‘s masterpiece, unjustly forgotten by history and never-before-reprinted since its first appearance in America’s newspapers from 1911 to 1914. The title character, Mr. Twee Deedle, is a magical wood sprite who befriends the strip’s two human children, Dickie and Dolly. Gruelle depicts a charming, fantastical child’s world filled with light whimsy and outlandish surrealism.
Paul Gravett says:
Another exciting and signficant Rick Marschall rescue job, retrieving this century-old wonder from crumbling newsprint limbo and restoring it into a deluxe hardback re-edition.
Mudman #1
by Paul Grist
Image
$3.50
The publisher says:
It’s the first day back at school for Owen Craig, and it’s not going too well. He’s been run over, got detention, and his police officer father has been taken prisoner by armed bank robbers. And now his body seems to be turning into mud.
Paul Gravett says:
Lightning strikes twice as Grist follows up his winning Jack Staff series with another reason to fall in love all over again with superheroes. Down-to-earth wit, style, intelligence, laughs, spandex and, err, ... mud - what more do you want?
Nelson
edited by Rob Davis & Woodrow Phoenix
Blank Slate Books
£18.99
The publisher says:
Nelson is a 250-page collaboration between 54 of the UK’s most exciting comic creators. It is an unprecedented experiment to create one complete story - a collective graphic novel - with all profits from this book go to Shelter, the housing and homelessness charity. Part exquisite corpse and part relay race, Nelson spans decades of British history and a myriad of stylistic approaches in telling the story of one woman’s life by 54 creators, in 54 episodes, detailing 54 days. The result is a surprising and compellingly readable book that is sad, funny, moving, poignant, ridiculous, heartfelt, and real. This is a story like none you have seen before.
Featuring, in order of appearance: Paul Grist, Rob Davis, Woodrow Phoenix, Ellen Lindner, Jamie Smart, Gary Northfield, Sarah McIntyre, Suzy Varty, Sean Longcroft, Warwick Johnson-Cadwell, Luke Pearson, Paul Harrison-Davies, Katie Green, Paul Peart-Smith, Glyn Dillon, I.N.J.Culbard, John Allison, Philip Bond, D’Israeli, Simone Lia, Darryl Cunningham, Jonathan Edwards, Ade Salmon, Kate Charlesworth, Warren Pleece, Kristyna Baczynski, HarveyJames, Rian Hughes, Sean Phillips & Pete Doree, Kate Brown, Simon Gane, Jon McNaught, Adam Cadwell, Faz Choudhury, JAKe, Jeremy Day, Dan McDaid, Roger Langridge, Will Morris, Dave Shelton, Carol Swain, Hunt Emerson, Duncan Fegredo, Philippa Rice, Josceline Fenton, Garen Ewing, Tom Humberstone , Dan Berry,Alice Duke, Posy Simmonds, Laura Howell, Andi Watson, and Dave Taylor.
Co-editor Rob Davis says:
What was the idea? It was quite simple really. We would take a single life from birth (in 1968, the year I was born) up to the present day and give each comic creator a single day from each year, to create a life story from snapshots. I was inspired by the notion of a host of creative people, whose work I loved, coming together to create not just a story but a complete person. With every story being done year by year in order, the novel would grow out of the storytelling instincts of all these creators. Of course, a game of consequences is fun to watch and to be part of, but the game element wasn’t key in the vision Woodrow and I had for this book. Above all, we wanted to create a novel. As editors, we were determined to keep a close eye on the evolving story for consistency and vision, helping everyone to rise to the challenge as we occasionally steered the ship away from the rocks. We asked that people trusted their instincts and we, in turn, trusted our own. I think we’ve succeeded. Fifty-four people have created a single story, pulling from their own lives, their experience as storytellers and their skills as image-makers. I don’t know that any other medium could pull this off. This book is a testament to what comics truly are, and to the fact that people who make comics do it out of love of this form.
Paul Gravett says:
Here is an emphatic, celebratory demonstration of the exceptional quality and diversity of British comics creators today, all 54 of them complete writer-artists (ok, apart from Sean Philips), as capable with words as with images, whether with complementary or contrasting graphic approaches, united to bring to life one life-story year by year. My fuller review will have to wait for now, as I’m still processing this achievement, but having just read the hands-on co-editors’ two opening tales, from 1968 and 1969, I sense already our leading lady Nelson (yes, she’s a girl) is wide-eyed and getting ready for the world. The “idea” of this book is a brilliant solution to the sometimes directionless, mish-mash variety of comics anthologies of short stories, the pick-and-mix selection that means you might choose not to read one or more stories because you don’t like the artwork. In Nelson, you have one big story in many episodes and you can’t really miss out any of them to fully enjoy it. Much more than the sum of its parts, much more than merely 54 graphic short stories about a single protagonist, Nelson is probably the most rewarding collective, cumulative, multi-voiced graphic novel that you will come across, in Britain and quite possibly anywhere this year. The Cartoon Museum in London will be hosting a launch do for it, another part of Comica 2011 Festival, on November 22nd.
Nobrow 6: The Double
by various
Nobrow
£15.00
The publisher says:
Nobrow 6: The Double will be an entirely new incarnation of our biannual journal as we double the number of pages to include comics and graphic short stories. At 120 pages it will not only present the very best of illustration talent out there, but also devote half of its pages to the world of comics, where we will showcase talent from the established as well as the new, all the while keeping true to our Nobrow spot colour aesthetic. With contributions from Tom Gauld (The Gigantic Robot), Kevin Huizenga (Ganges) and Malachi Ward (Utu) as well as new narrative work from Nobrow stalwarts Jon McNaught (Birchfield Close, Pebble Island), Jack Teagle (Jeff: Job Hunter) and Luke Pearson (Hildafolk) it will be sure not to disappoint. The theme of this issue The Double explores the sinister concept of the Doppleganger, one which has appeared in literature and mythology since our earliest written records. From Greek and Norse Mythology to Shelly, Dostoyevsky, Donne and Goethe the idea has held the human imagination, fascinating and terrorising us in equal measure. Now we turn it over to 60 illustrators and graphic storytellers to interpret it as they wish, each, taking on one double-page spread.
Paul Gravett says:
It’s here, the brand new format for Nobrow’s anthology, now accommodating the coolest in comics in 30 stories in double-page spreads, as well as the coolest in illustration. Don’t miss the launch party for this on Thursday November 3rd, with many contributors attending, which also opens this year’s Comica Festival in style.
Professor Munakata’s
British Museum Adventure
by Hoshino Yukinobu
The British Museum Press
£14.99
The publisher says:
Professor Munakata’s British Museum Adventure is the first ever manga published by the British Museum Press and the result of a great collaboration between the Museum and leading Japanese artist, Hoshino Yukinobu. The story revolves around Hoshino sensei’s most famous character, Japanese ethnologist Professor Munakata Tadakusu who has dedicated his life to unravelling the mysteries of Japan’s past. When the Professor travels to Britain for the first time to deliver a special lecture at the British Museum, he is quickly and unexpectedly drawn into a criminal plot that endangers the museum and its famous collections. The threats appear to stem from repatriation claims - but do they? And who is demanding the objects’ return? Professor Munakata eventually uncovers a conspiracy embedded in the very heart of the museum.
Paul Gravett says:
You may have the caught the wonderful Hoshino Yukinobu exhibition held at the British Museum in 2009. I also had the honour of interviewing this remarkable mangaka during his research visit to the Museum - you can read my full article and interview with him here. So it’s a thrill that this unexpected connection and collaboration between an esteemed museum and a major author of Japanese comics has finally come to fruition in this 264-page volume. I have been kindly asked to introduce Nicole Coolidge Rousmaniere, a co-translator and co-ordinator of this project, who will be speaking about this project on Friday November 25th at the British Museum at a special launch evening in association with Comica Festival. Rousmaniere provides an new interview with the author in this book and Timothy Clark adds an opening essay, ‘From Ukiyo-e to Manga: Japan’s Mischief-making’, to provide broader context. As for the story itself, it’s an unlikely but highly entertaining merger of archaeological erudition and action movie, with a 16-page climax in colour as a mysterious gang smash the glass roof of the Great Court and hold the Museum to ransom to force the repatriation of the Rosetta Stone. Maybe Hollywood could cast Bruce Willis in the Professor’s role?
Pros Stress 2
by Han Hoogerbrugge
BIS Publishers
£16.99
The publisher says:
This is the second album of Pro Stress, the hilarious but also sometimes uncomfortable daily comic by Han Hoogerbrugge. In the work of this draftsman/animator, the artist wrestles with the humour in everyday life and investigates his obsessions, neuroses and feelings. Stress is one of the emotions which Hoogerbrugge thrives well on, in contrast to most people. Stress gives him a kick, making him able to do many things at once, achieving a workflow in which many new ideas crop up. Pro Stress 2 collects over 200 new short cartoons. Besides the protagonist, who has always been an alter ego of Hoogerbrugge himself, the comics depict such famous figures as Sylvio Berlusconi, Vladimir Putin, Karl Lagerfeld, the Pope and many more, playing their parts alongside heroes from the first volume, like David Lynch and Quentin Tarantino.
Paul Gravett says:
Be warned - his claws are out! These three-panel gag strips by Dutch enfant terrible Hoogerbrugge (surely that’s a pen-name?) amuse and disturb in equal measure. You can get a celebrity-stuffed 16-page issuu taster including Lynch, Tarantino, Burt Reynolds, Keith Richards, a bluebird and a polar bear.
Robot
Stanislaw Lem, Andrzej Klimowski & Danusja Schejbal
SelfMadeHero
£14.99
The publisher says:
Lem (1921-2006) is best known for writing the science fiction masterpiece Solaris. Schejbal adapts Uranium Earpieces in which a paranoid king forces his subjects to wear suits of glowing uranium alloy. Can a young inventor, Pyron, find a way to free the people from this evil tyrant? Klimowski tackles The Sanatorium of Dr. Vliperdius set in a world increasingly populated by robots. Our hero visits Dr. Vliperdius’ institution, but its patients soon turn against him. Can he escape the sanatorium after learning its dark secret?
Paul Gravett says:
Andrzej Klimowski was talking to me about his passion for Polish SF author Lem and for this project earlier this year when we were both invited to the Ligatura Comics Festival in Poznan, Poland. The glimpses I saw then were striking, so I’m looking forward to this. Plans are afoot to launch it appropriately at the Science Museum’s new Robot exhibition.
Sandcastle
by Pierre-Oscar Lévy & Frederik Peeters
SelfMadeHero
£14.99
The publisher says:
Early morning on a perfect summer’s day, people begin to descend on an idyllic, secluded beach. Amongst their number, a family, a young couple, a refugee and some American tourists. Its fine white sand is fringed with rock pools filled with crystal clear water. The beach is sheltered from prying eyes by green-fringed cliffs that soar around the cove. But this utopia keeps a dark secret. A woman’s body is found floating in the waters, which brings these thirteen strangers together to try and unravel the riddle of the sands and escape the beach alive in this tense, fantastical mystery.
Paul Gravett says:
Since Swiss auteur Peeters was first hailed for Blue Pills, his autobiographical memoir of his relationship with a woman with AIDS, he has gone on to produce plenty more first-rate fictional graphic novels, in the crime, SF and fantasy genres, but sadly none have made it into English, until now. Highly recommended and hopefully Peeters will make it over for a Comica event later this year.
Shaky Kane’s Monster Truck
by Shaky Kane
Image
$14.99
The publisher says:
Get your motor rolling and head out along comic book route 666. Taking its stylistic clues from the Silver-Age of comics, this limited edition, signed and numbered graphic road movie by comics legend Shaky Kane, pans out over 50 continuous panels, taking the reader on a hallucinogenic journey into the very hinterland of popular culture.
Paul Gravett says:
Great to see this privately sponsored project, a wild and crazy yarn told across one continuous background, getting a more mass-market edition. Shaky Kane was in many issues of Escape Magazine and has made an impressive “comeback” working with David Hine on Bulletproof Coffin, also at Image, and set to rise again in a sequel entitled Bulletproof Coffin Disinterred. Check out this YouTube trailer for Steve Cook’s rib-tickling mockumentary on Kane’s crazed career.
Tangles:
A Story About Alzheimer’s, My Mother & Me
by Sarah Leavitt
Jonathan Cape
£12.99
The publisher says:
What do you do when your outspoken, passionate, and quick-witted mother starts fading into a forgetful, fearful woman? In this powerful graphic memoir, Sarah Leavitt reveals how Alzheimer’s disease transformed her mother Midge - and her family - forever. In spare black and white drawings and clear, candid prose, Sarah shares her family’s journey through a harrowing range of emotions - shock, denial, hope, anger, frustration - all the while learning to cope, and managing to find moments of happiness. Tangles confronts the complexity of Alzheimer’s disease, and gradually opens a knot of moments, memories, and dreams to reveal a bond between a mother and a daughter that will never come apart.
Paul Gravett says:
Sarah Leavitt was one of the coolest cartoonists I met during the Comics & Medicine Conference in Chicago last June. Her book has been a real hit in her native Canada and now makes it into UK bookshops from Cape. I’ve yet to read it in full but commend it to you highly. Sarah will be over to promote the book in November, attending both Comica Festival in London and the Graphic Medicine conference and weekend convention at Though Bubble Festival in Leeds.
The Adventures Of Hergé
by Jose-Louis Bocquet, Jean-Luc Fromental & Stanislas Barthelemy
Drawn & Quarterly
$19.95
The publisher says:
The Adventures of Hergé is a biographical comic about the world-renowned comics artist Georges Prosper Remi, better known by his pen name, Hergé. Meticulously researched, with references to many of the Tintin albums and complete with a bibliography and mini-bios for each of the main “characters”, the biography is appropriately drawn in Hergé‘s iconic clear line style as an homage to the Tintin adventures that have commanded the attention of readers across the world and of many generations. Seven-year-old Hergé first discovered his love of drawing in 1914 when his mother gave him some crayons to stay out of trouble. He continued drawing in school when he fatefully met the editor of XXe Siècle magazine, where Tintin first appeared. His popularity skyrocketed from the 1930s through post - World War Two. Hergé was perceived by some to have aided the Nazi government in Belgium by continuing to publish Tintin in a government-sanctioned magazine, and he was briefly imprisoned in the aftermath of the war and narrowly escaped execution.
Paul Gravett says:
You may have read this before in a previous Drawn & Quarterly squarebound anthology but this is the expanded, latest version, shrewdly timed to coincide with the expect Tintin-adulation ignited by the Spielberg & Jackson movie. Not an “officially” approved biography but a series of life-changing events in graphic vignettes which build into a revealing portrait of Georges Remi. Check out this online six-page preview.
The DFC Library:
Baggage
by The Etherington Brothers
David Fickling Books
£9.99
The publisher says:
Baggage by The Etherington Brothers tells the tale of Randall, a happy-go-lucky but disaster-prone lost property officer working for the Tram service, deep in the heart of Triptych City.Randall’s weary boss has presented him with an impossible ultimatum: either he locates the owner of the oldest item stored in the immense lost property warehouse by the end of the day, or he’s out of a job! So begins an adventurous journey through a wondrous city. Randall’s enquiries attract a myriad of bizarre, often amusing, and sometimes dangerous characters. Clues are uncovered where and when he least expects them, and help arrives from the strangest of quarters. But wherever Randall goes, trouble is sure to follow. Will he succeed in his impossible mission? And even if he does, just how much of the city will be left standing?
The DFC Library:
Super Animal Adventure Squad
by James Turner
David Fickling Books
£9.99
The publisher says:
Super Animal Adventure Squad by James Turner comprises two hilarious stories for you to enjoy. Join Agent K, Bearbot, Irwin, Rex and Beesley as they battle to solve two thrilling crimes. In ‘The Teatime of Doom’, our heroes are faced with a Level 6 Cake Emergency as cakes suddenly disappear from bakeries across the country. Without a mid-afternoon treat, the very icing of society would dissolve! Can the SAAS recover the precious pastries in time, or will they come to a sticky end? In ‘The Case of the Baboon Bandit’, pirates have stolen the world’s most valuable treasure, the Jade Baboon of Rangoon. Does the squad have what it takes to defeat the Dread Pirate Green Beard? Cutlasses, cookery and comedy capers abound in this brilliantly funny follow-up!
The DFC Library:
The Boss
by John Aggs & Patrice Aggs
David Fickling Books
£9.99
The publisher says:
Meet the crime-fighters from Class Five in The Boss by John and Patrice Aggs. When Nas and Bella overhear a crook planning a daring robbery at the castle, they know just who to tell. The Boss is the smartest kid in school. Never outsmarted or outwitted, he’s marshalled his class into a crime-fighting unit that could run rings round Interpol. And with the class heading for a field trip to the castle that very day, it’s the perfect chance to find out what the thieves are up to - and just maybe catch them red-handed… Will the thieves pinch the priceless prize, or have they met their match in the boy known only as ‘The Boss’?!
Paul Gravett says:
The thoroughly modern school story by the Aggs’ son-and-mother team and Turner’s demented critter capers are two more highlights from the much-lamented British kids’ weekly comic The DFC to get the classy, European hardback album treatment. While these serials were addictive to follow week by week, it’s altogether more handy and powerful to read them compiled like this. Then, on top of these, Los Bros Etherington serve up a delightfully dizzy new storyworld in Baggage, presumably intended for The DFC but as far as I know never seen. This Bristol-based dynamic duo must be among the hardest-working creative partnerships in UK comics, with a new series lined up for the awesomely anticipated Phoenix, a sort of successor to The DFC, rising from its ashes, and Britain’s brand new weekly comic for children, launching January 7th 2012.
The Sigh
by Marjane Satrapi
Archaia Entertainment
$9.95
The publisher says:
Rose is one of three daughters of a rich merchant who always brings gifts for his girls from the market. One day Rose asks for the seed of a blue bean, but he fails to find one for her. She lets out a sigh in resignation, and her sigh attracts the Sigh, a mysterious being that brings the seed she desired to the merchant. But every debt has to be paid, and every gift has a price, and the Sigh returns a year later to take the merchant’s daughter to a secret and distant palace.
Paul Gravett says:
Discover Satrapi before Persepolis in this 56-page album, illustrated in colour like Persian miniatures, originally published in 2004 by Bréal Jeunesse.
