NEW STUFF ARCHIVES
New for March 2024
In 2017, after having lived in Amsterdam for coming up on a decade, the ex-pat native of Cleveland, OH, Chad Bilyeu wasn’t sure what to do next. After a meaningful encounter with Harvey Pekar’s original, self-published run of American Splendor, he decided: comics. And so he embarked on the journey that became the comic book series, Chad in Amsterdam, which has to date yielded six issues, all entirely written, edited, art-directed and self-published by Chad. These six issues have now all been collected in a spiffy hardcover volume from Scratch Books, along with a forward – well actually, a voorward – by EI-P of alt-hip-hop fame, and an all new introduction – here, a vlotte babbel (to slide you into the Dutch swing of things) – by Chad himself; plus an appendix composed of annotations, a Marvel Universe-style capsule bio and a smattering of documentary photographs. In these pages, Chad clearly demonstrates a good sense for comics talent as well as a good eye for art styles, and, crucially, the ability to recruit said talent to engage with his scripts. These abilities enable him to match artist to story in a way that is beneficial to both and so effectively curate each issue in a manner not too dissimilar to how a gallerist would curate a group show. Sharp observations pithily noted and converted to teachable moments are inextricably interwoven throughout these entertaining tales of Amsterdammer life and Dutch culture, forming their bone and sinew. Also included are glimpses of Chad’s pre-Amsterdam life in the USA. Chad in Amsterdam has been well appreciated in its titular hometown, where Chad has now been a resident for nearly a decade and a half. The comics herein offer an at times blunt, unusually honest mirror to the city and its inhabitants, offering them new perspectives and allowing them to glimpse aspects of their city and themselves that they may not otherwise have noticed. This has brought Chad increasing recognition, one of the results of which is this hardcover collection, published by one of Amsterdam’s foremost publishers of comics. American readers will, on the other hand, receive the added bonus of a comics guided tour through the city, its people, its nightlife, its history & culture its thoroughfares and architecture all the while gaining insights aplenty. As might be expected, given Amsterdam’s global reputation, readers will have more than one encounter with the red light district (where, in fact, Chad resided for a number of years), as well as witness copious partakings of the herb along with the downings of several jenevers. And, yes, in case you were wondering: this volume is almost entirely in English, have no fear. The majority of Amsterdammers can make their way through a modest English text such as this. That said, English readers will have yet another added bonus here in experiencing plenty of Dutch words in context and, for the most part – and certainly whenever required for comprehension of the story – also then translated into English, thus gaining the opportunity to learn a little Dutch along the way. More on Chad in Amsterdam can be found in Ryan Carey’s excellent write up of the first five issues of the series. And then, keep going with Andy Oliver’s review on Broken Frontier – which he then followed up a year later with a nice interview. Chad in Amsterdam is an engaging, enlightening, and unique work that can also lay claim to being a true heir to the legacy of Harvey Pekar’s American Splendor.Chad in Amsterdam
retail price - $32.99 copacetic price - $28.75
Freak Buck
edited by Alexi Zeren w/ Marti, Igor Hofbauer, Jasper Jubenvill, Corinne Halbert, Lar Hallgren, Josh Simmons, et al
Editor Alexi Zeren states “Freak Buck is a prison for the monsters we build everyday, and the book covers are the cell walls.” This 256 page, (mostly) full color and black & white , 6 1/2" x 9 1/2" hard cover volume is crammed with comics of all sorts fro North and South America and Europe. Starting with a wraparound cover by Alexis Rose (who also contributes a ten-pager), then front and back endpapers by Igor Hofbauer, (who also contributes several comics pieces), title page by Victor Cayro, and an intro page by Josh Bayer, the book then proceeds to present the work of several dozen creators, first and foremost, Marti (RIP)! English language readers who have been hankering for more ever since reading Cabbie, can finally get a chance to read some new work – and its great! Then we have up and coming indy creators like Jasper Jubenvill and Corinne Halbert, along with plenty of creators whose work was previously unfmiliar to us here at Copacetic. Several of these works, it should be stated, are closer to illustration and/or conceptual art than comics, and some are a mix; and, of course, some are staight up comics.. This collection is all over the place! There is also a fairly lengthy, illustrated interview with Longmont Potion Castle. And, yes, there is some graphic sexual imagery (not all that much, but enough to warrant mentioning), and some in-your-face imagery, along with plenty of farout, freaky and hallucinatory imagery. Recommended for Comics Explorers.
retail price - $34.99 copacetic price - $32.75
The amazingly prolific, self-publishing comics maker (and former Comics Workbook Magazine editor), Andrew White presents comics biographes of three of the most important figures of modernism – Virginia Woolf, Gertrde Stein and Georgia O'Keefe. Containing close to 300 pages – with roughly 100 pages devoted to each of its subjects – Together & Apart works to synthesize a form of comics moderism out of its subjects' respective approaches to literature and art. There is much food for thought – and for the eyes – in White's understated black & white comics, which tailors its graphic approach to each of the subjects: straight black & white in pen & ink for Virginia Woolf; a variable mix of black & white and grey tones rendered in ink with both pen and brush and then also in pencil, which gradually comes to dominate, for Gertrude Stein; and, finally, the Georgia O'Keefe section is drawn almost entirely in pencil, with the exception of the lettering.
Together & Apart: Biographies of Virginia Woolf, Gertrude Stein, and Georia O'Keefe
retail price - $29.99 copacetic price - $25.75
Tender, Beth Hetland's debut grahic novel, is a well drawn, well paced tale of a darkness inhabiting the primal drives, lurking just beneath a thin veneer of superficial normalcy. The wordless dream/nightmare sequences are especially effective, immersing readers in an experience of that liminal space between conscious desires and unconscious drives lying at the core of this work.
Tender
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $16.75
Black Phoenix #3There's "Christmas in July" so why not "Halloween in March"? The third issue of Rich Tommaso's homage to all things comic book, Black Phoenix is 112 pages of non-stop old school comics action – with a special accent on horror and monsters – all in black & white and orange. The sterling production values of the first two issues continue here, with bold lines and vivid flat color on newsprint. Roll back the hands of time and enjoy comics as they used to be.
retail price - $14.99 copacetic price - $13.75
SunflowersSunflowers is 24-page comics book. It takes a hybrid form mixing confessional autobio with selfhelp information and resource guide, with the intent of providing an accessible, "hey, I've been there" approach to dealing with and defusing the issues surrounding bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. It's cogently written, well drawn, nicely printed and sensibly organized.
retail price - $7.99 copacetic price - $6.75
Masters of the Nefarious: Mollusk RampageThink Michael Kupperman and Eric Haven crossbred with the early works of Chester Brown and Olivier Schrauwen and you'll begin to get an idea of what's in store in the 162 full color pages of Mollusk Rampage. Taking up a psychic pick-axe, the Paris-based, pseudonymous comics-maker Pierre La Police forces open a crack in the barrier protecting the controlled consciousness of the super ego from the chaotic unconsciousness of the id, unleashing a torrent of absurdist humor verging on giddy silliness which permeates every page. Take a moment to peruse this excerpt on McSweeney's Internet Tendency, HERE.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
XinoXino is a 128 page, full color, softcover anthology of speculative fiction comics. Engaging themes largely centered around where technology might take us in the near to distant future, but also containing homages to classic SF comics, Xino features computers, robots, gaming, space travel, aliens and all sorts of technologies that the future may bring, particularly those involving a computuer-human/animal interface. In addition to the comics stories there are plenty of full page illustrations showcasing artistic talent galore.
retail price - $17.99 copacetic price - $15.75
And here's a Certified Copacetic Classic™
We've been selling Starstruck in one form or another since 1980, but were so used to hand-selling it that it didn't occur to us to put it onto our site... until now! A long-time Copacetic favorite (that was, before that, a BEM favorite), Starstruck is the comics space opera par excellence! Lee and Kaluta's wacky, hi-jinx, freewheeling approach to story and relative unconcern with narrative cohesion (riffing, to some degree, on Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon), along with its non-linear approach to time – it has been printed in multiple arrangements and different orders without deleterious effect – allowed a truly epic scope for imaginative possibilities that resulted, in turn, in providing a muti-point perspective on the intertwinings of business and politics and sex and romance and war along the long arc of life from childhood to adolescence through adulthood to senescence – plus cloning – and more! FAR ahead of its time (for comics), not least in its dominating women and female-driven storylines, Starstruck began life in 1979/80 as an off-off-Broadway play by Lee, for which Kaluta designed characters, costumes (and sets?) which ran briefly on the stage and also resulted in the 1980 publication of Kaluta's Starstruck Portfolio which was largely sold into the comic cook direct market. After the run's conclusion, Lee and Kaluta decided to continue it... in comics! It's comics life began in 1982, by being serialized in Heavy Metal magazine, going on to be collected as one of the first Marvel Graphic Novels in 1984, and then continuing as one of the first creator-owned Epic series, which ran six issues through 1985. There were then some Galactic Girl Guides (part of the Starstruck multiverse) short stories that were published as back-ups in Dave Stevens's Rocketeer in the late '80s. A few years passed, and then in the early '90s Lee and Kaluta expanded what had been done before, but instead of simply writing new stories and tacking them on what had come before, they took the unusual decision to weave the new work thorugh the old work! This was enabled by the freewheeling modus operandi. Then followed a long hiatus... before it was finally (mostly) collected, in 2010, into the volume we have before us here, with all new lush coloring by Lee Moyer. Along with yet another configuarion of the comics, we get all the Galactic Girl Guides story, and addenda galore! An appendix/glossary/encyclopedia of the Starstruck multiverse, "Ordering Anarchera" along with activities, ship designs, a history of the project (which goes over in more detail what we are covering here), photographs (that we believe are) from the origial stage production, all sorts of miscellanea and plenty of great Kaluta art! Starstruck is a rich, multi-layered work that rewards – and, yes, demands – multiple readings. It is filled with unexpected observations and insights all vividly rendered by Kaluta in what has to be considered his best work. A member of the legendary late-seventies group of comics artists that also included Barry Windsor-Smitih, Jeffrey (later Catherine) Jones, and Berni Wrightson, known as The Studio, who together worked to raise the artistry of comics to new levels, bringing styles and techniques derived from fin de siecle European painting, illustration and print-making, along with elements taken from American classic children's book and magazine illustration. Heady days! Starstruck is, in the Copacetic view – the most substantial and successful single comics work to come out of that ferment. And, just FYI, it doesn't end here. In 2017, the remaining, uncollected earlier work was, once again, expanded through an interweaving of all new material in Starstruck: Old Proldiers Never Die (which we will list shortly). HIGHLY RECOMMEDED!Starstruck
retail price - $34.99 copacetic price - $29.75
These items and more may also be found at our eCommerce site, HERE.
New for February 2024
The N*Word of God
The long (as in a decade) out of print, first D & Q collection of comics maestro, Kevin Huizenga's work, Curses is now at last back in print in this very nice French-flappped softcover edition – that includes 40 additional pages, including an appreciation by noted comics authority, Douglas Wolk. Revisiting this thematically and formally interlinked collection of short to mid-length comics after close to twenty years, the first thought it how current, even prescient they seem. The social, political and personal observations feel as fresh and pertinent now as they did then. Huizenga's long running concerns with temporality, scale and variability are all here, flowing along atop an undercurrent that is an idiosyncratic and unique – and intellectually bracing – mix of Midwestern sincerity and European absurdist humor. "Not Sleeping Together" has improved with age, showing itself to be a stronger and more amply significant tale this second time around. While perhaps hampered by the not altogether successful grafting of an overly familiar horror comics trope, the story is formally inventive in a number of ways – structurally as well as graphically – which build upon each other, yielding compound insights that reward multiple readings. Suffice it to say, this is a must for all Huizenga fans who do not already have the original, and is recommended to all 21st century comics readers. And here's our original 2006 write-up of the hardcover edition.
Curses - softcover edition
retail price - $25.95 copacetic price - $21.75
Hypericum is the latest graphic novel from the amazing Manuele Fior. This 144-page, oversize (9" x 12"), full color hardcover is a wonder to behold. Two tales run on parallel tracks, grounded in 1990s Berlin where Italian insomniac, Teresa Guerrero finds herself after being selected as a "scientific assistant to prepare an upcoming exhibit on Tutankhamen's Treasure" being held there. The story connects to – and is bracketed by – the 1922 discovery of Tutankhamen's ("King Tut") tomb by the British archaeologist and Egyptologist, Howard Carter – one of the most momentous and substantial archeological finds of modern times – via the device of the protagonist's reading of the recounting of the discovery in the massive tome, The Tomb of Tutankhamen by Carter with A.C. Mace. Page after page of beautifully rendered gouaches of Egypt's The Valley of the Kings intermix with cityscapes of Berlin as we follow Teresa's progression through the city, often in the tow of her fellow expat compatriot, Ruben, with whom romance – and conflict – quickly blossom. In the structuring of the narrative of Hypericum, the fleeting pleasures of the present are situated within the timelessness of ancient Egypt, creating a work that is at once a rollicking romance and a meditation on (im)permanence. It is a story that conflates individual and civilizational chronicities, bringing the reader up close and personal with the eternal, and told through some of the most effective – and affecting – art of Fior's career.Hypericum
retail price - $29.99 copacetic price - $24.25
Here's a massive volume (presumably only the first, given the "Vol. 1" in the title) presenting a nice chunk of the over 2300 pages of comics continuity by a guy (almost) none of us ever heard of before who drew comics in his spare time... for fifty years! (1928-1978) Frank Johnson's work first emerged out of total obscurity in the pages of The Ganzfeld, over twenty years ago, but has been languishing in relative obscurity since then... until now! This volume collects 600 pages of Johnson's work, organized in complete blocks of continuity, all scanned directly from the originals, which were primarily drawn in pencil and in sketchbooks, making for a nice, up close and personal reading experience. Fantagraphics has this to say: "When Frank Johnson, an itinerant musician and shipping clerk, died in 1979, he left behind a startling discovery: more than 2,300 notebook pages of comics and 131 unbound drawings, among them a massive, continuous story line beginning in the earliest surviving notebook dated 1928 — before the existence of comic books! — and following the exploits of his own cast of characters across 50 years until Johnson passed away. In the course of this lifelong project, Johnson invented in private many of the conventions and tropes that define comics storytelling, effectively enacting an alternative secret history of the comics medium."
Frank Johnson, Secret Pioneer of American Comics Vol. 1: Wally's Gang Early Years (1928-1949) and The Bowser Boys (1946-1950)
retail price - $49.99 copacetic price - $42.25
Surprise! It's a new Aya adventure, the first in over a decade. Readers once again will have the opportunity to enjoy Marguerite Abouet's fully realized characterizations and pitch-perfect dialogue (exhuberently translated from the French by Edwige Dro) bought to life by Clément Oubrerie's expressive lines and truly amazing color sense as together they bring to life the hustle and bustle of 1980s Abidjan, the mega-city at the heart of the Côte d'Ivoire. Get more details on what's in store along with some preview pages at Claws Come Out's official D & Q page, HERE and/or head over to The Guardian to read Rachel Cooke's review, HERE. Anyone yet to experience Aya is hereby directed to the two omnibus editions, Life in Yop City and Love in Yop City – each collecting a trio of amazing Aya tales.
Aya: Claws Come Out
retail price - $24.95 copacetic price - $21.75
Aint It Fun: Peter Laughner & Proto-Punk in the Secret City Wow! Heavily researched and packed with information that has been carefully woven into an intricate narrative tapestry, Aaron Lange’s Aint It Fun: Peter Laughner & Proto-Punk in the Secret City is a heaping hunk of history. While Peter Laughner is a special focus of the book, his presence is perhaps best described as the most pronounced thread in this magnificent tapestry of the power and the glory of the 1970s Ohio Scene that centered on Cleveland. A visually oriented concatenation of text and illustration forge a quasi-comics presentation of key moments and crucial information that has not been widely disseminated and is largely unknown in the rest of America (or even in most of Ohio, for that matter!). Ain't It Fun takes readers from the roots through to the branches of the 1970s Ohio counter culture – particularly its vastly underrated music scene that gave birth to Devo, Rocket from the Tombs, Pere Ubu, The Deadboys, The Pagans, The Waitresses, The Bush Tetras, and so many more – along with being the home state of Chrissie Hynde and Lux Interior – but that also gives space to a wide spectrum of culture, including Harvey Pekar and Robert Crumb (who, yes, has a Cleveland connection). Given Ohio’s association with conservatism and “the right”, the history revealed in Ain’t It Fun shows these qualities can inadvertently provide a fertile ground for cultural revolt by demanding – or provoking – an intelligent response. That the Kent State shootings of 1970 were the pivotal event that likely was a prime catalyst for the rebellious and at times even nihilistic stance of the Ohio Scene is shown here by the way it is incorporated into the the narrative thread. Ain’t It Fun provides a mountain of information, of the best kind, in an engaging and accessible manner and a easily absorbable form. Readers of Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's epic, From Hell, may feel some similar vibes and/or echoes of that work here, in the at times mystical focus on the physical landscape and overlapping contiguities of action and history. Aaron has, with Ain't It Fun, created a unique and vital document. The real right stuff is here. This is a great place to start for anyone looking to learn more about the history of punk, 70s music and the Cleveland/Akron scene, and, really, the essence of America itself. | softcover w/French flaps | 444 pages | black & white |
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $35.75
Here are the two latest issues of Grixly, hot off the press and here at Copacetic! Featuring a clever cover image by guest artist Jon Minerich that spreads across both issues (and so works perfectly with our listing photo format), these two Grixlys are, literally, cover-to-cover Longboxes™. As Nate relocated to Colorado during the period covered by this issue, readers will get the chance to experience a wider cross-section of North American comics shops than ever before. But, as readers will discover, the comic shop experience doesn't vary all that much by geographic location; once you enter the shop you're in the ComicsZone®. Nate has really hit his stride here and these issues contain some of his best stories yet; yielding some fantastic gems of insight into the world of comics readers and collectors, yes – but also capitalism, America in the 21st Century, and the human condition. RECOMMENDED!
Grixly #63 + 64 (two-pack)
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.00
And, in the interests of promoting personal creativity on the part of Copacetic customers, here's a pair of budget-priced notebook/sketchbook offerings we dug up.
Here's a handy – and unique – hardcover sketchbook/notebook/journal, with front and back inside pockets and elastic band. It contains 200, 4 1/4" x 7" smooth, flat, off white pages, with bevelled edges and discreetly numbered at the bottom left. The (very) minimal textual elements are set in Helvetica, in a small, light grey font. While this notebook was designed with photographers in mind, we feel that its design has the potential to serve comics makers as well. It opens up with 4 ruled pages that are intended (and designed) to be used, ex post facto, as a table of contents. This is followed by a universal (no days are included, so it will work for any year) annual calendar. Then, the next 141 pages are devoted to the "Assignment and project log". This is a series of two spreads (four pages), each of which starts with a ruled page for notes on the verso (left) of the first spread, followed by three blank pages (except for a light grey horizontal line along the top of each page above which – in a truly tiny, light grey font – is printed "Notes, observations and captions". There are 35 of these units in all (with the final log containing four blank pages). Then there is a lengthy section of 36 consecutive pages each with three, lightly ruled 1 3/4" x 2 1/2" horizontal panels with a 1 1/4" open vertical space running along the right edge. This section is ideal for jotting down sequential ideas and/or thumbnails and so could be especially suited for comics makers. Then it closes off with nine completely blank pages. And, yes, that blue horizontal band is simply part of the packaging; it comes right off. And, as a result of a special purchase, we're able to offer it at a substantially discounted price.Field Notebook
retail price - $19.95 copacetic price - $8.75
Sketchbook 3-Pack And, here's a set of three 5 7/8" x 8 1/4", 48 page, bevelled-edge, saddle-sewn, softcover sketchbooks: one blank, one dot grid, one graph grid. The paper is flat, off-white/cream, with just a little bit of tooth. They have a nice feel. And, as a result of a special purchase, we're also able to offer this set at a great price!
retail price - $14.95 copacetic price - $5.75
These items and more may also be found at our eCommerce site, HERE.
New for January 2024
Anyone who ever wondered what pornographic comics produced by Chris Ware would be like to read probably won’t ever get an answer closer to Italian cartoonist, Miguel Vila’s North American debut, Milky Way, seamlessly translated by Jaime Richards and delivered to readers in a solid, well-designed, 176 page, 7" x 10", full color hardcover. As would be expected in such a case, Milky Way is not, of course, a work of straight-up pornography, but rather it is – as it would be if penned by Ware – a complex work of meta-porn, a look at the context, function and effects of pornography at the same time as it is also pornography; it examines the motivations behind pornography consumption as well as those behind its production, and in the process links the two via "the male gaze", while situating them within a framework of class consciousness – all in consummately Wareian fashion. All this talk of Chris Ware is not, however, in any way intended to downplay Vila’s own phenomenal talent as a comics creator; quite the contrary. His startlingly self-assured drawing, in which the flickering of fleeting emotions are captured in spot-on pen and ink renderings, in panel after panel of amazing comics characterizations, draw readers into his characters’ states of mind. These are then assembled in intricate constructions and sophisticated layouts – that lead from static establishing shots to detailed temporal breakdowns, and that employ parallel montage of multiple, simultaneous narrative visual streams that work together to construct a solid, if sordid, satire of contemporary sexual mores that contains within it a psychological exploration of the wider cultural context that supports them, and that will knock your socks off… But you may soon want to put them back on as there are many disturbing and uncomfortable scenes and situations which Vila's expert presentation bring very up close and personal. This entire work will, for some, likely fall under the classification of TMI; for those of a more voyeuristic bent, on the other hand, Milky Way could well be “the mother lode” (bringing a new assocation to this well worn term, as it has more notably done with the title); most readers will fall somewhere in between. The plot centers on a very young couple, Marco and Stella, in which it soon develops that Marco has some issues that are interfering with its progress. These issues are hidden, even from himself, but nonetheless lead him on a journey that is not so much one of self-discovery as it is of self-destruction. Milky Way boldly goes where no comics have gone before in exploring the psychological underpinnings of (at least this particular) sexual desire, demonstrating in the process how life decisions can be – and are – unwittingly led by unconscious desires. Mommy-issues and, to a lesser extent, daddy-issues are confronted and explored (again, in more detail than some – perhaps most – readers will be comfortable with; but that’s really the idea here). One of the themes of this multilayered work, complete with its own motif, could be stated, “if you think you’re in the driver’s seat, think again." None of the characters are spared from the piercing gaze of Vila’s critical eye, and though glimmers of sympathy leak through, to varying degrees, for each of the characters, the work’s conclusions demonstrate that Vila, despite sharing a level of artistic ability with Chris Ware, is ultimately lacking the generous humanism that is an essential characteristic of Ware’s work (although Vila may prefer see it more as a case of his refusal to embrace the American naiveté regarding the incorrigibility of the human animal that can be seen as implicit in Ware's work, viewing it as being at odds with his own embrace of the more fatalistic, old world view grounded in the Roman tradition; cf. Portrait of a Lady). But, of course, Vila is nearly thirty years younger than Ware, and so has plenty of time to mature as his career progresses, which we certainly hope it does, as he is possessed of an enormous artistic talent.Milky Way
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
Meditations of First PhilosophyRiffing on the foundational René Descartes work from 1641, the goal of which was to prove that it is possible to logically demonstrate "the existence of god and the immortality of the soul" through the mind of man (roughly speaking), Goda Trakumaite’s Meditations of First Philosophy uses comics to demonstrate the same in 24 hypnotic and hallucinatory magazine-size pages. This is work that delves deep into the consciousness, simultaneously from the outside in, via the route of sense perceptions, and then from the inside out via the mind’s eye, employing the language of comics to create a complex visualization of a neural feedback loop to demonstrate – à la Descartes – how much the nature of reality is dependent on our own consciousness of it (roughly speaking). Her comics, heavily rendered in bold black and white with plenty of patterning, reside in a district of comics that is quite visually stimulating and intellectually engaging, but that nevertheless remains relatively obscure; Willy Mendes, Mark Beyer and Julieacks are among her few close neighbors. This amazing work by Goda Trakumaite will amply reward those who undertake to make the trek. Taking a bus seems like the best way to get there...
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.75
Portrait of a BodyPortrait of a Body is Julie Delporte's intimate account of her own belated coming to identify as a woman who loves women, and then coming out as such. Taking the form of a lushly illustrated journal – but one possessing a clearly structured narrative – it interweaves autobiographical details with cultural referents – primarily films, and especially those of Chantal Akerman – to create a meditative journey through identity. You can learn more and read an excerpt HERE.
retail price - $29.95 copacetic price - $22.75
Summer SpiritSummer Spirit is a thoroughly enjoyable, young adult graphic novel from France. We'd been selling it in the shop since it's release, but just realized that we hadn't got around to posting here on the site, where it certainly deserves to be! Originally published in France in 2018, Elizabeth Holleville's charming and engaging coming of age tale – well translated here by Amy Evans-Hill, who has a good ear for the inflections of teen speech – spends a summer at the seaside in France wherein the protagonist, Louise, a girl on the edge of adolescence, hanging out with some slightly older teenage relatives and friends, copes with all the ensuing drama with the aid of... a ghost! And therein lies the tale. Lush, pastel colors complement equally lush, thick brushed ink lines, and, running 254 pages on heavy, flat white stock, it's an entertainment bargain, to boot. Recommended for fans of This One Summer, teen tales and ghost stories.
retail price - $16.99 copacetic price - $14.25
And now for a double dose by the comics creator whose name is Rugg, James Rugg...
In the pages of True Crime Funnies, Jim Rugg turns in page after page (24 in all; full color and B & W) of pulse pounding pencils (& inks & colors & lettering &, oh yeah, scripts) in the first issue of an all new single-creator anthology title that provides readers with ringside seats to a series of action-packed short comics stories in the pulp fiction tradition, in the process demonstrating that when seeing is believing, truth and fiction are interchangeable; two sides of the same coin. A carefully balanced construction of actual events, hearsay, mistakes, misdirection, misrepresentations, oversights, lies and outright fabrications are all deliberately presented as one and the same, conflated in the service of forging a strong and persuasive central point of view, thus revealing – in a hidden twist that can only be intellectually grasped once by the reader once they've been released from the grasping hold of the narrative – that it is in the “Funnies” themselves that the “True" Crime has been perpetrated. Rugg leaves various clues throughout to assist those readers – who know how to look – in solving this crime, and in the process created a meta-fable for our times of disinformation, “fake news” and “deep fakes", where the border wall between fact and fantasy has collapsed. That's Entertainment! The irony here is so all-pervasive here that casual comics readers – those unschooled in decoding – are at risk of missing it, and so taking the comics at face value. That would be a mistake. True Crime Funnies is dangerous fun; the kind that only comics can provide. BONUS: All our copies are signed on the front cover!True Crime Comics #1
retail price - $10.00 copacetic price - $9.50
Jim Rugg was spot on in selecting 1986 as THE year in which comics underwent a seismic shift. 1986 is an 80-Page Giant-Size black & white magazine that provides a broad and thorough – if at time idiosyncratic, iconoclastic and/or eccentric – cross-section of this year in the form of, mostly, paratextual selections and excerpts from the print comics universe, such as comics advertisements, reviews and articles largely sourced from fan and news magazines such as The Comics Journal, Comics Interview, Amazing Heroes and others, as well as odds and ends from some of the more obscure corners of the comics spectrum. This magazine can make for some fun reading for comics collectors, fans, historians and obsessives – but the subset of obsessive collectors should BEWARE, as too much time spent with this fine publication could lead to a compulsive desire to track down and procure the original sources of everything herein on display. You have been warned.
1986
retail price - $20.00 copacetic price - $17.75
Pure EvilWeighing in at 40 black and white 8 1/2" x 11" pages, largely – and smartly – employing a 12-panel grid, Pure Evil is the most substantial work by Matt Seneca that we've come across, and makes for a very meaty read. Taking a hardboiled look at the nitty gritty, capitalistic flipside of the funny book business, where financial necessity intersects with – or leads to – the sublimation of sexual drives into the creation of pen & ink realities – ultimately in place of the real thing. Out of the past comes an old comicstrip looking to hitch a ride with a new lease on life, but what starts out looking like a promising venture goes on a late night drive with a femme fatale that takes a detour to failure... that shows that the sun also rises on a world without men where women can lead the way.
retail price - $8.00 copacetic price - $7.50
Croyden's GrailHere's a new mini by C.F.! A dark fable for our times in which the dangers of self-righteousness are made apparent and innocence is not what it seems. This is a numbered edition of 500 copies. (Ours are all in the low 200s, in case anyone was wondering...) 24 pages | mini-comic size (4" x 5 1/2 ") | B & W on orange paper w/ white cardstock cover
retail price - $10.00 copacetic price - $9.50
It's here! Years – decades, really – in the making: Had To Be There: A Visual History of the Explosive Pittsburgh Underground (1979 - 1994) is the first volume of photos from Erik Bauer’s extensive, (mostly) photographic (w/ some fliers & posters) archive documenting Pittsburgh Punk and Underground music from 1979-1994. Introduction by Sam Matthews | Text and extensive band bios by Jason Pettigrew | Published by Mind Cure Records here in Pittsburgh. 192 pages | Hardbound
Had To Be There
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