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Review: Roly Poly: Phanta’s Story by Daniel Semanas
There are some books published every year that have a visual impact, books that say, “pick me up and read me!” One look at Roly Poly: Phanta’s Story, and you can see why this is one of those books. The book has a strong visual sensibility, beautiful colors, and a style influenced by cyberpunk and…
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Review: Giant Spider & Me, Vol. 1-2, by Kikori Morino
I’m fascinated by Giant Spider & Me, a recent release from Seven Seas. It’s genuinely unfathomable to me how a book like this got greenlit, because it’s about as unfocused a premise as possible. Giant Spider & Me is a grab bag of concepts; it’s a post-apocalypse setting, a slice of life story, a cooking…
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Review: Eternal Friendship by Anouck Durand
(This review of Anouck Durand’s Eternal Friendship was originally published by The Comics Journal on March 14th, 2018. You can find the original review here.) From the perspective of a reader of comics, the graphic novel is a mature aspect of the world of book publishing. But the larger literary world is hesitant to put unique and…
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Review: Incision, by HTMLflowers
It’s been hard to approach HTMLflowers’ latest work, mostly because of how ruthless and unsparing it is. I read Incision a few months ago and made this comment about a month ago. Grant Gronewold (HTMLflowers is his nom de plume) challenged me to review it. It took awhile, but here we are. Incision isn’t really…
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Review: Mother’s Walk by Lauren Weinstein
Lauren Weinstein’s Normel Person, which migrated to Popula after the closure of the Village Voice, has been a powerful reflection on the state of the world. I’ve been drawn to her work this year, and it was exciting to learn that she would be contributing to Youth in Decline’s Frontier series. Over the last few…
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Review: A Projection by Seekan Hui
I’m trying to get a little more reading done as we get deeper into the fall convention season. This summer has been tough for me personally, but I’m excited to move into the fall. SPX is just a week away, and a lot of major releases are coming out at that show. (Sadly my backlog…
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Quick Picks #11 – More Manga
Quick Picks is an occasionally written series of microreviews of books I’ve read over the past two weeks. This episode contains 3 manga microreviews.
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Review: Outside With The Cuties by Mariana Pita
I’m always excited to learn about cartoonists from other parts of the world. Mariana Pita is a cartoonist whose work has slowly started to break through into the English-speaking market. Her comic A Day was originally submitted to the Comics Workbook 2015 competition,and she has a new minicomic coming out this fall from kus. In…
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Review: Yellow Light #1 by Raziel Puma
I’m glad that there’s a tradition of short story anthologies in comics. In comics you can accomplish a lot in a few simple pages; it’s a medium well suited to the format. The last few years have been great for short story collections, and this year also looks good – we’ve got Carolyn Nowak’s first…
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Review: Dull Margaret, written by Jim Broadbent and illustrated by Dix
When I heard that Fantagraphics was publishing a graphic novel loosely based on Dulle Griet, the 16th century oil painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, I was intrigued. Bruegel’s art has always been fascinating to me because of its scope and its sheer chaos. Every painting I’ve ever seen of his work seems packed to…
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Review: Grip #1 by Lale Westvind
I’m used to reading Lale Westvind’s comics in small doses. Her comic Yazar & Arkadaş, which I reviewed last year, was only 28 pages – but it packed a significant punch. Westvind’s work has an intense physicality and her comics are breathtaking in their scope, power, and drama. Earlier this year, Perfectly Acceptable Press published…
