-
Review: In Clothes Called Fat (with emphasis on comparison to Kyoko Okazaki’s Pink)
I wanted to take some time to discuss Moyoco Anno’s new comic In Clothes Called Fat late last year, and I’m finally getting around to it now. Recently, Katie Skelly wrote a thoughtful review of In Clothes Called Fat and compared it to Kyoko Okazaki’s Helter Skelter, a seminal josei manga of the 1990s. After having…
-
Review: Days Longer Than Long Pork Sausages by Gabriel Corbera Back in the days of dial-up internet, I played MUD (multi-user dungeon) games on my PC’s telnet console. These games were complex worlds built of nothing but words and the player’s imagination. Whether you were throwing magic missiles at rats to grind those early levels…
-
Review: Mimi and the Wolves, Acts I and II by Alabaster Late in 2014, Matt from Hic and Hoc sent over a bundle of recent comics, and it’s only now that I’m starting to get around to reading everything. The first step to solving a problem is admitting that you have one, so there it…
-
Review: Rough Age by Max de Radiguès
Earlier last year I took some time to review Max de Radiguès Bastard #1 from Oily Comics. I liked the comic’s flow and Radiguès’ delicate line. Thankfully in 2014 we got a bit more of his work from One Percent Press, a collection of the 2009-2010 L’âge dur, translated as Rough Age. The comic has…
-
Review: mini kuš! #29 – Remember This? By Disa Wallander The kind folks at kuš komiksi, the Latvian comics art anthology, recently sent 8 of their most recent minis and I’ve been poring through them in my small moments. The kuš minis seem perfect for those in-between moments, but despite their small stature (each full…
-
Review: Mutiny Bay by Antoine Cossé 2014 has been something of a breakout year for Breakdown Press. The London-based micropress has published an expansive slate of challenging and ambitious comics, including the work of Antoine Cossé. Mutiny Bay is a historical drama and a retelling of the 1520 Easter day mutiny on Ferdinand Magellan’s Spanish-backed…
-
Review: Benson’s Cuckoos by Anouk Ricard Benson’s Cuckoos is my first encounter with the work of Anouk Ricard, a French cartoonist who is also the celebrated author of the Anna & Froga children’s books. Benson’s Cuckoos, despite sharing the same anthropomorphic characters and loose, blocky illustration style as Anna & Froga, sheds off much of…
-
Review: Nothing Whatsoever All Out in the Open by Akino Kondoh
It seems like it has been a whole lifetime ago, but once during the middle of the worst of the economic downturn, Top Shelf Comics put together a 400-page anthology of 10 years worth of alternate comics from the AX magazine. Akino Kondoh contributed two short stories for the anthology as well as its cover.…
-
Review: Monokuro Kinderbook In the early-to-mid 2000’s Kan Takahama was one of the key creators involved in the Nouvelle Manga movement that gathered Franco-Belgian and Japanese comics creators. The results of that movement have been published in part by Fanfare/Ponent Mon, and comics such as Japan as Viewed by 17 Creators as well as Sweet…
-
Review: The Understanding Monster – Book Two, By Theo Ellsworth Of the alternative comics I’ve read so far, there are many that have used autobiographical elements to create strong personal stories. But none of those comics have plunged so deeply into the creator’s psyche as Theo Ellsworth’s series The Understanding Monster. Through the surreal travels…
-
Review: Fish, by Bianca Bagnarelli Bianca Bagnarelli’s illustration work captured my attention earlier this year, so I was happy to hear that she was having a book published through Nobrow Press’ 17×23 line, a series of comics that features short stories by young talented cartoonists. The line has a sparseness to it, which requires a…
