Just In (Case You Missed It) - New Stuff Archives 3Q 2012

New for September 2012

LR5

Love and Rockets: New Stories #5
by Beto and Jaime Hernandez
Yes, the best time of year has arrived: the new issue of Love and Rockets is here; a little bit later than in the previous four years since the annual publication schedule of Love and Rockets in a squarebound book form was initiated in response to industry changes – notably the rise of the book store (online as well as actual) as the primary sales channel for comics, having supplanted the traditional comic book store – but now that it's here, the extra wait feels like nothing. And as for the actual contents? The big news this time around is that Beto has returned to Palomar! – but with more twists than Luba can shake her hammer at; in other words, things have not only changed, they are not what they seem. And back in LA, after the earthshaking events of the last two issues, Jaime takes readers on a detour along a scenic route that has a few twists and turns of its own. Comic books don't get any better than this.
retail price - $14.99 copacetic price - $11.99

Pompeii, Book One
by Frank Santoro
Wuxtry! Wuxtry! An all new Frank Santoro comic book: the long rumored first installment of his meditation on the axes of art: artists and patrons; money, sex and power; subject and object; the eternal recurrence of archetypes; and, of course, comics and geometry. Santoro puts his money where his mouth is – so to speak – and has created an entire book based on "the spread" – the two pages that lay open before the reader and are simultaneously taken in as a compositional whole and scanned/read as a narrative text. This is a work that must be carefully and deliberately studied in order to extract the multiple layers of signification and meaning that are encoded within the art. The parallel positioning of people, places and objects within the respective grids of the left and right pages of each spread invites analogical synthesis on the part of the reader, and it is within this synthesis that the real drama unfolds. This 32 page, magazine size, two-color risograph is a signed and numbered edition of 300 copies published by PictureBox.
retail price - $12.00 copacetic price - $10.00

The Understanding Monster, Book One
by Theo Ellsworth
Wow! Get ready for a visual feast like none other. At last we have a follow-up to Capacity, Ellsworth's phenomenal Secret Acres debut. The Understanding Monster is a full color, full size, hardcover filled with page after page of Ellsworth's trademarked, hyper-detailed, graphomaniacal renditions of psychological states that take the forms of animals, insects, monsters and ingenious, crypto-mechanical constructions that wander through a series of dreamscape interiors. During an SPX panel this month, Ellsworth was asked who his favorite artist was, and when he replied that it was Adolf Wölfi – the original outsider artist, who spent his life creating an imaginary world in words and pictures – it was an "ah-ha!" moment. Theo Ellsworth is himself very much of this mold and has gone quite a way towards creating a highly complex and detailed imaginary world of his own. Ellsworth's work will have a strong appeal to anyone who has had cause to feel shut out and so become shut in to worlds of thought and imagination – a state which a significant section of those within the comics culture must certainly have experienced at one time or another. The story of The Understanding Monster is told in a sequence of mirrorings, transformations, translations, inversions, subversions, diversions and confusions that veer from abreaction and self-sabotage to resolution and redemption. As the narrative gradually unfolds, it reveals a private internal code simultaneously to both the reader and the protagonist – a strategy which plants the protagonist's challenges navigating reality in the center of the reader's consciousness. This makes for a seriously disorienting experience which demands a large degree of empathy on the part of the reader, who is required to play a crucial part in the process of assembling the machinery of meaning as the narrative unfolds. Theo Ellsworth's comics create a fantastic fully formed world that readers will find themselves completely immersed in before they know it.
retail price - $21.95 copacetic price - $19.75

Lose #4
by Michael DeForge
Prepare to be disturbed, possibly aroused (and then, as a result, even more disturbed), disoriented (perhaps even reoriented) and ultimately challenged, by the most substantial issue yet of what is shaping up to be the most significant auteur comics series out there: Michael Deforge's Lose (the Yummy Fur of our time?). #4, "The Fashion Issue", is a big 48 pages of precisely drawn, powerfully evocative images that will render readers incapable of ever looking at fashion the same way again.
retail price - $8.00 copacetic price - $7.50

Dal Tokyo
by Gary Panter
The hits keep coming! Talk about long awaited! Dal Tokyo collects the entire 24 years of the sporadically published that first saw the publication in the L.A. Reader way back in 1983. This volume prints the strips in a luxurious 16" x 6" format that allows reader to absorb every nook and cranny of Panter's line as it meanders through the years. Whet your appetite with this 20 page PDF preview.
retail price - $35.00 copacetic price - $29.75

EotC

The Eyes of the Cat
by Moebius & Jodorowksy
This long out of print work allegorical work by the dystopian duo has now been brought back into print by Humanoids in this attractive (but over-priced) hardcover. Featuring 50 pages of stunning black and white art by Moebius in his prime, this is a work to savor. Fans of Moebius art will not be disappointed, but they may feel gouged. We have stepped into the breach here by steeply discounting this item in order to bring its price down to a level that our customers can feel comfortable paying.
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $19.95

Everything Together
by Sammy Harkham
Having devoted himself to assembling the massively influential series of anthologies, Kramers Ergot, Sammy Harkham now at last steps into the spotlight himself in this collection devoted solely to his own work. Published by PictureBox, Everything Together lives up to its title, collecting a decade's worth of Harkham's concentrated comics narratives. Opening with his minimalist meditations on personal perspective, "Napoleon" and "Elisha", the work ranges from his most sustained pieces, the epic "Poor Sailor", "Somersaulting," the upside-down-under memoir of Australian adolescence, and "Lubavitch, Ukraine, 1876", to his short, comics-insider pieces "Clowes & Huizenga", "Free Comics", "White River Junction", and "Frank S. Santoro, Sr." before closing with a pitch perfect "The New Yorker Story." 120 pages in all, printed in (mostly) muted duo-tone, black & white and full color on the ideal off-white that looks and feels like high-grade newsprint, providing full comic book frisson. Added Bonus: all copies in our original stock, which we picked up directly from the publisher at SPX, are signed by Harkham.
retail price - $19.95 copacetic price - $17.77

The Making Of
by Brecht Evens
Evens made a big splash here at Copacetic – as elsewhere – with his previous work, the Angoulême-award-winning The Wrong Place. The Making Of is an equally impressive work. Even more substantial than its predecessor, The Making Of is filled with page after page of vibrantly colored ink washes every bit as lush as it tells a complex allegorical tale of the artist's place in the community. Make sure to pick this one up and take a look; if you can't wait, here's a PDF preview.
retail price - $29.95 copacetic price - $26.95

The Crackle of the Frost
by Lorenzo Mattotti and Jorge Zentner
There is no better artist to put side by side with Brecht Evens than Lorenzo Mattotti. While Fantagraphics has been busy bringing US readers up to speed with Mattotti's neglected (here) black and white ink work, with The Crackle of Frost, they unleash a blast of what he is best known for: color. Mattotti has long led the charge for drawing comics with color as well as with line. He has carried the banner for a sensual comics with his masterful pastels that make color an equal partner with line in constituting space and realizing character in thirty years worth of work that is simultaneously wildly expressionistic and boldly fauvist, reflecting the psychological themes that the narratives address; never more so than in this tale by Zentner. There is no one like Mattotti, and the US publication of this 120 page hardcover is a cause for celebration. Jump right in with this PDF preview.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.77

Vgb

The Voyeurs
by Gabrielle Bell
Tom Kaczynski's publishing enterprise, Uncivilized Books leaps into the big time with his first nationally distributed hardcover release. The Voyeurs is Gabrielle Bell's third hardcover collection of her diary cum memoir comics. This 156 page work covers four years of her life in page after page of detailed pen and ink observations – fleshed out in full color – of her moving through the world. Frequenters of her website, Lucky (which continues to be a continual source of new work), will have come across much of the work here over the preceding years and so will have an idea of what to expect. Others can rely on Aaron Cometbus's introduction. Looking for the zeitgeist? This is a good place to start.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.22

A double dose of Roy Crane classics:
Captain Easy, Volume 3: 1938-1940
Buz Sawyer, Volume 2: Sultry's Tiger
Break out the champagne, it's time to celebrate! In a rare bit of synchronicity, we have received the latest volumes in the two concurrently published Fantagraphics series of collections penned by the father of the adventure comic strip, the one and only Roy Crane. First up is the third of the four massive 11" x 16" volumes collecting the complete run of Captain Easy Sunday pages in vibrant full color: 135 consecutive weeks of adventure comics that combine fluid cartooning with dynamic page layout, plus a couple bonus strips: one, an authentic replacement scan of an artificially recreated color scheme for a page from the first volume for which no tear sheet could be found in time for the original publication, along with a page BS2

hand colored by Crane. Also included is a heavily illustrated 10 page introduction by R.C. Harvey. Next up is the long delayed second volume in the series of volumes collecting the acme of Crane's craft, Buz Sawyer. This volume begins woith a two-part introductory essay by Jeet Heer, "The Perfectionist and His Team," followed by "A Word on Comic Strip Formats" by Rick Norwood. Then we head straight into 210 pages of non-stop greatness! The majority of the book is composed of daily strips, three to a page, but, in a divergence from the first volume, this volume contains the sole storyline in the 46-year history of Buz Sawyer that crossed over from the daily strips into the Sunday strips, which have come to be know as "The Salvaduras Sundays." Whereas all other Sunday strips were titled Buz Sawyer featuring His Gunner on Bomber 13 (later shortened to simply His Pal ) Roscoe Sweeney, these Sunday strips were titled simply Buz Sawyer. This volume collects all 21 Sunday strips in this series – chronologically interspersed with the black and white dailies for a seamless reading experince – for the first time ever in color. Three cheers for everone involved. This volume is well worth the wait.
Captain Easy, Volume 3: 1938-1940 - retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $35.00
Buz Sawyer, Volume 2: Sultry's Tiger - retail price - $35.00 copacetic price - $29.75

The Steve Ditko Archives, Vol. 3: Mysterious Traveler
by Steve Ditko
Another 220 pages of comics greatness. All (but one) of these stories were published in just the second half of 1957 by Charlton Comics. Clearly, Steve had hit his stride here. This volume begins with another fascinating introductory essay by Ditko authority and series editor, Blake Bell. As with the first two volumes, genre tales abound: horror, science fiction, suspense stories ending with an EC-style twist, as well as tales featuring the first of Ditko's signature creations, The Mysterious Traveler. All presented in cleaned up, high-resolution scans. We're sorry for being a bit late in listing this one here, so to help make up for it, we're offering it with an extra-heavy discount applied. Enjoy!
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $31.99

As the days get chillier and the nights get longer, it's time to go looking for a good new book to while away those indoor hours. Here are a few candidates:

Telegraph Avenue
by Michael Chabon
A tale of husbands and wives, father and (unacknowledged) son, business and pleasure, this "intimate epic" that the Harper publicist declares to be a "NoCal Middlemarch" is centered on a used all-vinyl record store in the heart of Berkeley, CA. Tempting, to say the least.
retail price - $27.99 copacetic price - $24.75

Skagboys
by Irvine Welsh
The prequel to Welsh's best known novel, Trainspotting. Find out how Renton, Begbie, Tommy, Sick Boy and Spud got that way.
retail price - $26.95 copacetic price - $24.75

NW
by Zadie Smith
Ms. Smith's "tragi-comic" novel follows the lives of Leah, Natalie, Felix and Nathan in the northwest of London. It is a tale of "the modern urban zone" and the people who do their best to make a go of it there.
retail price - $26.95 copacetic price - $24.75

Love Goes to Buildings on Fire: Five Years in New York That Changed Music Forever
by Will Hermes
This in-depth account of the musical explosions that occurred in mid-70s NYC that "is the first book to tell the full story of the era's music scenes and the phenomenal and surprising ways they intersected" is now in paperback. Cover by Mark Alan Stamaty!
retail price - $16.00 copacetic price - $14.75

HMW

How Music Works
by David Byrne
Anyone who has already read the aforementioned book named after a Talking Heads song might like to check out that band's frontman's long simmering magnum opus, which has at last been published in a deluxe edition by McSweeney's.
retail price - $32.00 copacetic price - $28.75

Items from our September 2012 listings may now be purchased online at our eComerce site, HERE.

New for August 2012

NB7

NoBrow 7
editing, art direction and design: Sam Arthur and Alex Spiro
This is the second of the new NoBrow double-sided, flip-cover format. Half fabulous doublepage-spread illustration, half way cool four-page comics stories, NoBrow 7 is all good. This volume's theme is "Brave New World" and all the various interpretations that can be made of that theme. The comics section is full of surprises, beginning with a new one-pager by the elusive Joost Swarte it continues with page after muted, flat color page of fresh, new work by the likes of Michael DeForge, Eleanor Davis, Joseph Lambert, Luke Pearson, Jillian Tamaki, Tom Gauld, and many others including yet another stylistic experiment from Anders Nilsen, before finishing up with a dash of continuity in the clever recapitulative pair of "Space Cadet" strips by a new-to-us creator, Andrew Rea, that combines the theme of last issue ("The Double") with this issue's "Brave New World." On the illustration front, there are thirty vibrant spreads by a group of amazing artists the name of most of whom will be unfamiliar to Copacetic customers – now – but after checking out their work here, they will transformed into names worth remembering; among them, Angie Wang, Ana Galvañ, Céline Desrumaux, Sergi Solons, Lotta Nieminen, Mayumi Otero and Robert Mackenzie – just for starters.
retail price - $24.00 copacetic price - $22.22

DoDDoR

Days of Destruction Days of Revolt
by Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco
Released practically in tandem with Sacco's Journalism, reviewed way back in our June listings, we somehow failed to get around to mentioning it here until now, for which we apologize. Days of Destruction Days of Revolt takes a novel hybrid approach to long form reporting, combining Hedges's five lengthy essays describing the lives and living conditions in Pine Ridge, South Dakota, Camden, New Jersey, Welch, Wes Virginia, Immokalee, Florida and Liberty Square, New York City with Sacco's vividly detailed illustration – most are large, full page and double page splash in size – and straight-up comics pieces, which are six to fourteen pages in length and are the real deal. Hedges and Sacco "set out to take a look at the sacrifice zone, those areas that have been offered up for exploitation in the name of profit, progress, and technological advancement. They wanted to show in words and drawings what life looks like in places where human beings and the natural world are used and then discarded to maximize earnings."
retail price - $28.00 copacetic price - $25.00

NSL

No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics
edited by Justin Hall
This 300+ page survey represents the most substantial collection of this burgeoning branch of comics to date. Starting off with a concise, eight page introduction providing some background and history (and noting his decision to include only comics from "the Western world", pleading the vastness of queer manga), editor Justin Hall then proceeds to provide a chronological celebration of LGBTQ comics that covers a wide swath of the work done under this banner, beginning with proto-gay cartoons by Joe Johnson and ranging from pioneering early efforts by Trina Robbins, Roberta Gregory, Lee Marrs, Joyce Farmer, through post-AIDS-era – but by no means AIDS-centric, the opposite in fact – strips by newbies and veterans including Howard Cruse, Tim Barela, David Wojnarowicz, Jerry Mills, Jennifer Camper, Dianne DiMassa, Alison Bechdel, Craig Bostick, and up to the 21st century with works by Joey Alison Sayers, Edie Fake, Maurice Vellekoop, Ellen Forney, Ariel Schrag, Tim Fish, Eric Shanower, Carrie McNinch, as well as editor Justin Hall himself – who is an accomplished and widely published comics practitioner himself – and many, many others. No Straight Lines covers all the bases. ADDED BONUS: the first five copies sold will include a signed and numbered customized bookplate by Justin Hall indicating the book's being purchased from Copacetic Comics; this bookplate is inserted loose into the book and may be affixed or otherwise used (as a bookmark?) however the purchaser deems fit.
retail price - $34.99 copacetic price - $29.75

The Other Sides of Howard Cruse
by Howard Cruse; introduction by Jay Lynch
Howard Cruse is pretty much universally considered the leading pioneer of gay comics, having founded the early underground comic book anthology series, Gay Comix, penned the ground-breaking graphic novel Stuck Rubber Baby, and produced the long-running Wendel series for The Advocate, but as with everything involved with personal identities and labels, there is more to being gay than being gay. The Other Sides of Howard Cruse provides a look at three decades (the '70s, '80s & '90s) worth of Howard Cruse's comics that are not specifically gay-themed. The comics here – most long out of print – range far and wide, and taken together create a multi-faceted self-portrait of the artist. The bulk of this – about 100 pages – takes the form of his long-running Barefootz series that originally appeared in a number of Alabama(!)-based publications. These works took a variety of forms ranging from 1/2-page and full-page strips, to longer – up to ten pages – stories. The collection is rounded out by another 100 or so pages of Cruse's observations-in-comics of the world around him, ranging from thoughts on comics to UFOs to tooth care and more. Yes, certainly these observations are made from and informed by the perspective of being gay, but by being so, they help provide a well-rounded, multi-dimensional portrait of gay consciousness. So it is fitting that this collection has been released to more or less coincide with No Straight Lines.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.22

Venus

Venus
by Gilbert Hernandez
Rejoice! A Beto Hernandez book for kids: Venus is a durable hardcover edition, built to stand up to multiple readings, yet still bearing a pint-sized price. This 96-page square-format volume collects all the original Venus strips that ran in that Fantagraphics foray into comics for kids, Measles, at the turn of the millennium (1999 - 2001). And, even more importantly, it starts off with an all-new 24-page story, "The World of Venus" done specifically for this volume. Anyone not already familiar with the adventure of Venus and her pals can check out this 9-page PDF preview. Comics fun for the entire family, from la casa de Hernandez to yours.
retail price - $9.99 copacetic price - $8.88

AE4

American Elf 4
by James Kochalka
This volume involves an appropriate (planned?) double entendre in the number 4: this is both the fourth volume in the series and contains four complete years of Kochalka's daily sketchbook diary strips that are published online as American Elf. This volume contains the entirety of the years 2008 through 2011 – 1,461 strips in all! No one captures the quotidian quite like Kochalka. There's always a moment in a day that sums it up somehow. Photographer, Henri Cartier-Bresson forged an æsthetic of "the decisive moment" in choosing the exact split second in which to open the shutter and capture the scene on film. Cartoonist, James Kochalka reflects back on each day and chooses "the definitive moment" that sums it up.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.22

Injury #4
by Ted May & Co.
It took a Kickstarter grant to make it happen, but the long awaited fourth issue of Ted May & Co.'s Injury is now at last on the Copacetic new comics rack. This 36 page issue is dominated by its lead off tale of heavy metal high school highs, "A Birdsong Shatters the Still." Iron Maiden and detention figure prominently in Ted May's comics re-imagining of a true story by Jeff Wilson. The Beast Biplane saga continues in "Blades of Grass", with story and layouts by Ted May and finished art by Mike Reddy.
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.55

Tales Designed to Thrizzle #8
by Michael Kupperman
Snugly resting next to Injury #4 on the comics rack, Tales Designed to Thrizzle #8 is another dose of wacky wackiness from the demented mind and skillful pen of Mr. Kupperman. This time around we have "Red Warren's Train & Bus Coloring Book" (yes, you actually could color these pages in, if you dare...) "Murder, She Goat", a Kupperman spin on Agatha Christie mysteries, "Great Men of History: Bertrand Copillon, A.K.A. 'The Scythe'", a loony bit of history (think Monty Python), and "Moon 69: The True Story of the 1969 Moon Launch – Brought to You by Roman Pizza Garden Style Ranch Dressing." Need we say more?
retail price - $4.95 copacetic price - $4.44

DQ3

Dungeon Quest: Book Three
by Joe Daly
Joe Daly is clearly on a roll here. This volume is twice the length of the the first two in the series, and he is really stepping up his art game. Daly is now, for all intents and purposes, the face of South African comics to American readers of independent, creator-owned comics, and he is really blazing a trail here that we hope others from his homeland will follow to our shores. Anyone who has been reading C.F.'s Powr Mastrs, Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit, and/or Charles Burns's new series that began with X'ed Out would do well to take a look at Dungeon Quest, as it shares aspects with each of these and, while representing somewhat of a synthesis, can stand quite comfortably on its own in this company as a work of art and story, in terms of both quality and accomplishment. And, while drug use had been more or less implicit in the narratives of the aforementioned American series, Dungeon Quest explicitly connects its own quest driven narratives to getting high in an instructive manner. It is also more explicit – after the manner in which being stoned can enhance bodily and sensual awareness – in its depiction of (primarily, but not soley, male) sexuality and how, when it is channeled into a questing orientation, it tends toward violent resolutions, and so engages readers in a process of deconstructing this long standing driver of the vast majority of heroic fantasy narratives. Knowing that some of you will need more convincing, Fantagraphics has provided this generous 22-page PDF preview. Check it out.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.77

The Underwater Welder
by Jeff Lemire
It's heartening to learn that all the while he has been churning out work for hire for DC and Vertigo, Jeff Lemire was also simultaneously working on a personal work to follow his widely acclaimed Essex County trilogy. Lemire is the sole creator (i.e. he scripted, pencilled, inked and lettered it) of this 220 page black and white work that has been published by Top Shelf in a French-flapped edition in the standard 7" x 10" format. The Underwater Welder is another tale of Canadian blood, sweat and tears that is "equal parts blue-collar character study and mind-bending mystery... about fathers and sons, birth and death, memory and reality and the treasures we all bury deep below the surface."
retail price - $19.95 copacetic price - $17.77

GC1

The Graphic Canon, Volume 1
edited by Russ Kick
This 500 page large format anthology is the first in a series that presents "the world's great literature as comics and visuals", "from the Epic of Gilgamesh to Shakespeare to Dangerous Liaisons" in black & white and full color comics and illustration. The contributor list read's like a who's who from the past, present and future of comics, including the likes of Will Eisner, Robert Crumb, Rick Geary, Sharon Rudahl, Seymour Chwast, Hunt Emerson, Peter Kuper, Andrice Arp, Edie Fake, Matt Wiegle, Aidan Koch – whose adaptation of Shakespeare's Sonnet 20 is a revelation – and Rebecca Dart – whose twelve full page illustrations of Milton's Paradise Lost channels Charles Burchfield through Chuck Jones to create an epic synthesis that will knock your socks off. Some of the works in this collection have been seen before: notably, the Crumb, Chwast, Eisner and Emerson contributions are reprinted and/or excerpted from previously published works. Most – by a large majority – are new to this volume, however, and make it well worth a look. And this is only the first of three volumes! Some parents reading this might be prompted to think, "Hey, this would make a swell way to get the kids interested in the classics of literature!" Thus we must duly note that there are some graphic depictions of sexuality contained within the pages of this volume. And while they are very modest in number, making up only a tiny minority of the pages (certainly less than 5%), they are there. The primary culprit here is Aristophanes's Lysistrata, which just about everyone read(s) in high school, and so should have some idea what to expect; it is adapted by a woman artist and is not prurient in its presentation, but is graphic. Only Noah Pfarr's adaptation of Donne's "The Flea" makes any attempt to heat things up. Even Crumb's take on Boswell's London Journal in quite tame by his standards, so there's little if anything to get incensed about here. It's more or less an issue of where to draw the line agewise. We'd recommend holding off on this to any readers under 13; it's probably too much for them in any case, regardless of sexual content.
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $29.75

PV5

Prince Valiant, Vol. 5: 1945-1946
by Hal Foster
Another fabulous volume of Hal Foster at his prime. Readers will savor page after glorious, oversize, full color page of excellent quality, high resolution reproductions of two full years worth of Prince Valiant Sunday pages from the closing months of the second world war and the dawning of the post-war era. This volume starts off with a heartfelt forward by comics artist and illustrator extraordinaire, P. Craig Russell and closes with a brief look at "Foster the Illustrator", compiled and annotated by Brian M. Kane, who also contributes a brief commentary on Aleta as the "Water Nymph of the Misty Isles."
retail price - $29.99 copacetic price - $25.00

CoU

Jack Kirby DC Omnibuses:
Challengers of the Unknown
Fourth World, Vols. 1, 2 & 3 (4 forthcoming)
Kamandi, Vol. 1 (2 forthcoming)
OMAC 4W1

by Jack Kirby w/ (for the most part) Mike Royer, inks
DC – or at least a core cadre consisting, primarily, of designers Robbin Brosterman and Louis Prandi along with their associate editors and production managers – has really done a commendable job of presenting their classic Kirby comics properties. It really presents quite a quandary to promote the sale of work wholly created by an artist – and one of the all-time greats, no less – that is wholly owned by a behemoth of a globe spanning corporation like Time Warner, but it seems like a proverbial case of throwing the baby out with the bath water to purposefully ignore such magnificent work out of spite at the injustice of it all. We are confident that "time will out" and Kirby will still be read and respected when Time Warner is gone and forgotten. But we can't wait around for that moment: there is just so much Kirby greatness out there – don't cheat yourself. And, to be perfectly honest, there is an easy way to beat the corporations at their own game here: simply buy the original comic book back issues rather then the new trade collections here (while that is cost prohibitive in the case of the Challengers of the Unknown issues, you can beat the system by buying the comic book format reprints that were issued in the 1970s; these are a bit difficult to track down, but they're out there!). You get the originals, which may very well increase in value, and Time Warner gets no further cash: it's win-win! And for those of you who simply prefer book format editions and/or simply don't have the time and money to track down the original issues, these are finally editions worthy of the work they present, so there's no need to wait any longer now that this material is being treated with the respect it deserves. We can only hope that the corporate powers that be at DC / Time Warner (whose fortunes, it must be said, are currently far less tied to Kirby's contributions than those of Marvel / Disney) are being appropriately generous in the sharing of the revenue via royalty payments with the Kirby Estate.
retail prices - $24.99 - $39.99 copacetic prices - $22.22 - $35.00

1493

1493
by Charles C. Mann
This widely heralded work takes a look at the transformation of the globe by trade and commerce in the wake of the voyage of Columbus to the Americas in 1492.
retail price - $17.95 copacetic price - $16.75

NND

The New New Deal
by Michael Grunwald
You wouldn't know it from the reports in the mainstream media, but the Obama presidency has made moves that are transforming the country and actively adapting it to 21st century realities. Extry, Extry – read all about it! – in Michael Grunwald's The New New Deal.
retail price - $28.00 copacetic price - $25.00

Items from our August 2012 listings may now be purchased online at our eComerce site, HERE.

New for July 2012

GaS-LR

God and Science: Return of the Ti-Girls
by Jaime Hernandez
Yes, this volume does indeed collect Jaime's contribution to the first two issues of the latest incarnation of Love and Rockets: New Stories. BUT, God and Science is not just any old reprint. NO! It is an expanded edition with 30 (count 'em) new pages of material that expands several scenes, adds at least one new one, includes the covers to the apocryphal issues in which these stories are supposed to have originally appeared, and continues the story with an all new epilogue! Together this makes for a definitive revision of what is surely one of the most original takes on the superhero genre. Weaving the tropes and conventions of classic Silver Age and (although to a lesser extent) Golden Age superhero comics into the whole cloth of the "Locas Universe" featuring Maggie & Co. gives Jaime – and his readers – access to wholly unique perspectives from which to view, comment upon, and, ultimately, transform the genre. God and Science gives us a look at what is actually happenning when we read comics, specifically those containing a strong element of fantasy – but the insights here pertain to all. Aspects of our identities are forged in our imaginations. Which aspects? are they fixed or in flux? Reading comics triggers our imaginations and connects us to our identities. Jaime explores this process by collapsing and conflating the normally separate and distinct levels of "reality" and "fantasy" into a single integrated experience. THIS is a comic book: expert, entertaining, enriching and enlightening and fun!
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $15.95

Wizzywig
by Ed Piskor
A fictionalized historical account of the rise – and, to a point at least, the fall – of the hacker ethos that is an inextricable component of our internet age, Wizzywig is Pittsburgh-based cartoonist, Ed Piskor's solo graphic novel debut. The first three parts of this epic work were self-published by Piskor beginning in 2008, whereupon it developed a well-deserved following among the silicon valley cognoscenti. The work as it appears here not only (finally!) completes the story, but the previously published parts have been extensively reworked. All is combined together in this cleverly designed hardcover edition that retails for a fraction of the combined cost ot the original self-published editions. Long before personal computers developed their current ubiquity, rebellious sorts were digging into the controls and logic employed by "Ma Bell" to manage the telecommunications systems of the time. When the age of the personal computer first dawned, "Phone Phreaks" soon evolved into proto-hackers, before gradually flowering into full blown hackers that gave rise to a new subculture. In the characters of Kevin "Boingthump" Phenicle, Jr. and his media liaison, Winston Smith, Ed Piskor has distilled the essence of the evolution of the hacker culture into this pair of rogues and tells their tale in a solid straightforward narrative that is by turns humorous, dramatic, hair-raising and sad. Piskor is a practiced cartoonist who has two full-length graphic novel collaborations with the legendary Harvey Pekar under his belt (Macedonia and The Beats). He has solid old school chops that amalgamate the language of the comic books he grew up with and possesses a sharp satiric edge. Wizzywig is an engrossing read that provides some hard won insights into the motivations and ambitions of the downtrodden underdog and how these manifested themselves at this particular crossroads of technological change.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic intro special price - $15.95

Uncle Scrooge: "Only a Poor Old Man"
by Carl Barks
The fabulous Fantagraphics project to collect the complete classic Carl Barks comics featuring the "Disney" Ducks – which could more accurately be described as the Barks Ducks – continues with this volume devoted to Barks's most famous creation, Uncle Scrooge. "Only a Poor Man" collects the entirety of the first six issues of Uncle Scrooge that were originally published between 1952 and 1954. Not only are the classic Scrooge epics that form the bulk of each of the six issues collected here (for the record: "Only a Poor Old Man", "Back to the Klondike", "The Horse Radish Treasure", "The Menehune Mystery", "The Secret of Atlantis" and "Tralla La") but also the numerous short pieces and one-pagers that rounded out each issue, as well as the covers to each of the issues, which are included amidst the copious story notes section at the conclusion of the volume. These are some of the most enjoyable comics stories there are, the work of one of the all time greats. Should you like to delve deeper and/or need further encouragement, let us direct you to our lengthy pæan to the first volume issued in this series as well as this 18-page PDF excerpt from the present volume.
retail price - $28.99 copacetic price - $23.75

Creepy Presents Richard Corben
by Richard Corben
With the stories collected in this volume, Richard Corben forged a wholly original approach to modeling color in comics that influenced a generation of American and European comics artists – much of whose work went on to appear alongside Corben's in Heavy Metal – graphic designers and professional illustrators, while inspiring the side of many a stoner van. This volume collects these ground breaking works that were originally published by Jim Warren's Creepy and Eerie magazines in the 1970s and represent that publisher's greatest legacy. In addition to those adapted from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe, and those penned by Corben himself, the scripts for these works were written by some of the top story tellers of the time, including Gerry Conway, Don McGregor, Roger McKenzie, Doug Moench, Jim Stenstrum and Jan Strnad. Horror, science fiction, druggy humor and more. These stories map the porous border between the mainstream genre comics that preceded them, and the underground that gave rise to them. This 350 page oversize hardcover volume also collects many of Corben's classic covers for these mags. This is it: the definitive Corben collection! Recommended.
retail price - $29.99 copacetic price - $27.50

Four New from Koyama!

By This You Shall Know Him
by Jesse Jacobs
Cosmic comics are back with a vengeance (as posited by Robert Boyd [whom we trust will eventually grow into a more full appreciation of the work of Jack Kirby] in his piece, "The Return of the Cosmic Techo-Gods from Space") and exhibit A is By This You Shall Know Him, a trip into the mind's eye made via a geometrically oriented comics that travels through outer space to reach inner consciousness. Get a nice taste of what's in store at this preview/interview hosted by Squidface & The Meddler.
retail price - $15.00 copacetic price - $13.75 WZ4

Wowee Zonk 4
edited by Ginette Lapalm, Chris Kuzma & Patrick Kyle
The fourth installment of this Toronto-based comics anthology continues to break new ground. "Wowee Zonk has been a champion of unconventional comics work and Canadian content from its inception as a hand-printed zine in 2007."
retail price - $15.00 copacetic price - $13.75

Wax Cross
by Tin Can Forest
This oversize, full color comic book is the long awaited follow up to Tin Can Forest's Koyama Press debut, the highly lauded (and quickly sold out) Baba Yaga and the Wolf. This Slavic-Canadian team once again mines the riches of Eastern European folklore for this beautifully rendered tale. Get hep by checking out

this Tin Can Forest interview (also) with Squidface & The Meddler that comes complete with some choice preview images from Wax Cross.
retail price - $20.00 copacetic price - $17.50

The World of Gloria Badcock
by Maurice Vellekoop
Enjoy some madcap time traveling fun with Gloria Badcock & Co. and have yourself a gay old time.
retail price - $5.00 copacetic price - $4.75

Strange Attractors: Investigations in Non-Humanoid Extraterrestrial Sexualities
by Encyclopedia Destructica
Strange Attractors is an hefty slab of a book – 288 pages, full color – that comes packaged with a 120 minute DVD; together encompassing art, writing, comics and film. It includes the work of 70 artists, writers and filmmakers who have created "remarkable explorations of possible extraterrestrial life forms and their multifarious sexual desires... A joint publication of Encyclopedia Destructica and The Institute of Extraterrestrial Sexuality, Strange Attractors straddles the line between speculative scientific exploration and artistic imagination." Contributors include Peggy Ahwesh, Thomas Scioli, Jacob Ciocci, Christopher Kardambikis, Ed Steck, Lizzee Solomon, Juliacks, Michael Mallis & Michael McParlane, and Adam Atkinson, as well as Institute of Extraterrestrial Studies founder, Suzie Silver and many others.
retail price - $49.95 copacetic intro special price - $39.95

KQ7

The Kindlin' Quarterly 7
edited by M Young
A woppin' 64 pages of homegrown autobio comics from Pittsburgh and its geographical neighbors, this issue sports a swell squarebound cover on heavy glossy stock that is full color inside and out. This issue including new work by Ed Piskor, Dave Kiersh, Nate McDonough, Lizzee Solomon (who turns in one of her strongest narratives yet), Bill Volk, Jessica Heberle and many others. The issue concludes with an epic tale of self-revelation by editor M Young herself. The Kindlin' Quarterly is one the best kept secrets in anthology comics. Papercutter fans who are jonesing for the next issue would do well to consider checking this issue out.
retail price - $5.00 copacetic price - $5.00

G23

Grixly #23
by Nate McDonough
This 44 page mini comic is a jam-packed hip pocket full of fun, and the best issue yet in the series. Written and drawn – and lived! – right here in tha' 'burgh, Grixly in the definitive Pittsburgh comic book series: dense (by our count this issue has 42 pieces, ranging in length from one panel to eight pages in length), busy, all over the place, and cheap! Grixly gives you more bang for your comics buck than any other comic we can think of. We've been carrying this title since its 2009 inception, and we know that quite a few of you reading this are aware of its existence, but, perhaps, with 23 issues out so far and no end in sight, knowing where to start and what sort of commitment reading this series involves may make it seem like a daunting task to choose – but it's not! We're here to tell you that each issue of Grixly is a stand alone, so you won't be starting in the middle of anything – although we can't promise you that you won't be momentarily disoriented upon your first encounter with the Grixly Way. Not sure where to start? Start here!
retail price - $2.00 copacetic price - $2.00

Scorched Earth
by Josh Kramer
A 24 page journalistic exploration of the history of Parcel 45-123 in White River Junction, VT and how it came to be a piece of "scorched earth" – in comics form!
retail price - $2.00 copacetic price - $2.00

Ed Choy Draws James Joyce
by Ed Choy
This risograph printed – in "purple and Riso-Federal Blue" – self published comic book features a batch of short, fun comics surrounding a full-length comics adaptation of Joyce's short story, "Araby" from Dubliners.
retail price - $5.00 copacetic price - $5.00

Sock, Vol. II
edited by Conor Stechschulte
See what happens when youthful hormones rage across 112 8 1/2" x 11" pages: desires twist and turn backwards and inside out; repressions are released; obsessions unleashed. Features work by Chris Adams, Carrie Bren, Andy Burkholder, Anya Davidson, Chris Day, Edie Fake, Mr. Freibert, Jesse McManus, Lane Milburn, Jason T. Miles, Molly Colleen O'Connell, Jose Luis Olivares, Ryan Cecil Smith, Conor Stechschulte, Ben Stiegler, Matthew Thurber, Leslie Weibeler and Kristie Winther.
retail price - $10.00 copacetic price - $8.88

Soaked Moist
edited by PB Kain
Here's another comics walk on the wild side that loudly proclaims that it wants to "keep comics nasty." Its 52 8 1/2" x 11" pages also feature plenty of work by Pittsburgh area talent such as Andy Scott, Daniel McCloskey, Lizzee Solomon (whose "Opium Denny's" is this issue's centerpiece), Stephanie Neary, and the indefatigable Nate McDonough.
retail price - $7.00 copacetic price - $5.95

Only Skin
by Sean Ford
This hefty volume from Secret Acres collects the entirety of the self-published series in a full-size softcover volume featuring a wraparound cover.
retail price - $21.95 copacetic price - $18.88

The Score
by Darwyn Cooke
The third volume of the toughest tough guy in pulp fiction, written and drawn by the toughest tough guy in comics. We are saving it for a cool fall evening, but Dan Allen has read it, and says it's the best one yet!
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.75

Monsieur Jean: The Singles Theory
by Dupuy & Berberian
Then, anyone needing an antidote to the hypermasculinity embodied by Parker can find it here, with Dupuy & Berberian's signature creation, Monsiur Jean, who occupies the opposite end of the masculine spectrum of Parker. In The Singles Theory, Monsieur Jean returns in this collection of short tales of Parisian singles going steady.
retail price - $24.95 copacetic price - $18.88

Q
by Aidan Koch’s
In Q, Aidan Koch appears to approach comics in a manner that may be informed by Frank Santoro's efforts to span the centuries and connect comics with the west's most enduring archetypes, most notably in his 2005 newspaper comics, Chimera and his dreamscape, Incanto (perhaps with an implicit nod to Thomas Pynchon's V?). Q can profitably be viewed as an experimental comics translation of the mythic symbols of classical antiquity. By employing what is by the standards of comics a massive "canvas" – 15" x 22", which yields a 30" x 22" centerspread – Koch is able to open up the space of the visual field in a way that few comics have. This allows for an unusual degree of majesty to inhere in the images presented, which are arrayed in a fashion that both suggests the decaying architecture of antiquity and posits the comics page as a potential heir. Q calls imagination and memory to the fore and allows/demands the reader (re)construct a mythic presence of their own.
Limited to 1000 copies, 8 pages, 15" x 22" , full color
retail price - $4.00 copacetic price - $4.00

Items from our July 2012 listings may now be purchased online at our eComerce site, HERE.