NEW
STUFF
A SELECTION OF RECENT ARRIVALS
New for February 2021
Rohner
by Max Baitinger
“Hell is other people.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
What should North American readers expect when they crack the cover of Röhner, the first English language publication of German comics maker, Max Baitinger’s work? Well… maybe something along the lines of a mash-up of Chris Ware and Patrick Kyle (Michael DeForge and Jason)? The formal focus here is on the clear line, while the content is the involuted nature of interpersonal relations. And coffee plays a central role, always a plus (the title page image is an exploded view of an electric coffee percolator and the line of text that starts the book off is ”I get up and prepare coffee”). The story centers on the character of Röhner, a somewhat obtuse house guest whose mere presence disturbs the strictly ordered life of his host, the protagonist/narrator. The fact that the personality of this protagonist/narrator is expressed through the artwork conveying the story makes for a successful marriage of form and content and is this work’s particular mark of distinction (which is further strengthened by the nice package it arrives in courtesy it's American publisher, 2dcloud). Sound interesting? Here’s Max’s website, and here’s a brief preview of Röhner.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.75
Yearly 2020
by Andrew White
This year, instead of one 8 1/2” x 11” color magazine, Yearly takes the form of three separate pieces held together with a belly band, which is itself a modest work of comics: Drowned River is a 94 page, 6” x 9”, B & W, squarebound graphic novella that intermixes long stretches of purely visual comics, all arrayed in a gutterless, six-panel grid, to tell the story of a relationship struggling amidst a flood; a flood that is at once literal, figurative and symbolic, and that makes for an immersive reading experience. (You can actually read it online, in its entirety, HERE). Everything Is Always, is an 80-page, 4 1/2” x 6 1/2”, philosophical comics poem that, while reproduced in full color, is largely rendered entirely in black ink, white gouache and pencil on a series of brown surfaces – mostly corrugated cardboard, but also brown wrapping paper and uncorrugated board. It too can be read in its entirety, HERE. This Is an Empty Room is a 16-page, digest-seize, B & W pamphlet that imposes a six-panel grid filled with minimal drawings, text and symbols over a series of grey-screened, black & white photographs of a forest. This combination could be read in a number ways: as someone sitting at home thinking, while remembering and/or reflecting on a recent walk through the woods; as someone walking through the woods, but distracted by thoughts and memories, or… as interchangeable quantum states, both at once! Each copy of This Is an Empty Room also includes a small, one-of-a-kind original colored pencil drawing on the inside front cover! Yearly was prepared to be released, as usual, for SPX, even in SPX's absence this year, making the event a spectral presence hovering over our reading of it. So, for anyone still feeling the lack of SPX, Yearly 2020 might help to fill that particular void...
retail
price - $25.00 copacetic price - $21.75
Stages of Rot
by Linnea Sterte
Stages of Rot is a unique work of anthro-bio-zoological speculative fantasy, and, furthermore, is one that could really only succeed on its own terms in comics form. Here we have a French-flapped softcover containing page after page of lush, full (but muted) color comics, beautifully printed (in Poland) on flat, off-white paper stock, presenting comics inspired by a mix of (mostly) Moebius, Miyazaki and Ernst Haeckel that as often as not is reminiscent of biological, zoological and anthropological illustration. The central visual ploy here is that we are presented with a world in which a splendid array of aquatic animals – whales, dolphins, jellyfish, etc. – populate the skies, together with those, such as birds and insects, that are “normally” airborne. This world is different in other ways, but we are meant to recognize ourselves in its contours. The effect of reading Stages of Rot is of visiting a world that is a strange mirror of our own, reflecting our lives back at us in such a manner as, through the specific differences, we see how our world is arranged in a way that is only one of the many (infinite?) ways it could have been, and how it is that what we take as given in our lives has, in actuality, been “given” to us by… the universe, nature, evolution – god? – that, ultimately, we populate a world not of our own making. Stages of Rot jars us out of our complacency and pushes us to see the inherent strangeness of existence and recognize that the underlying patterns and connections that make the web of life have come to be as they are now through a complex web of circumstance, and that this web is dynamic, not static; that everything is always in a state of flux and change, and that, all in all, life is an endless mystery...
retail price - $23.00 copacetic price - $21.75
Desperate Pleasures
by M.S. Harkness
An epic journey of self discovery that takes readers along for the (roller coaster) ride, Desperate Pleasures is M.S. Harkness’s most accomplished work to date, as she shows herself moving away from her earlier short pieces which tended to function in a more humorous vein, exploiting pathos for laughs. In its 200+ pages of crisp black and white comics, Harkness probes her psyche and unpacks some trauma while sharing an affecting tale of making a go of making a life, and in the process provides ample evidence that her developing cartooning abilities are in the midst of a “growth spurt”. Relationships lie at the core of the work. The difficulties in understanding them, establishing them and maintaining them. Desperate Pleasures also provides insights into how memory structures experience. Readers could be forgiven if they came away with the impression that she spends the bulk of her life in gyms and bars, on a bike or in bed – always accompanied by her mobile phone, of course. Harkness presents her life as one driven by abreactive impulse, skirting the abyss ever in motion towards a goal that occasionally appears almost at hand yet continues to remain at the horizon. The “desperate pleasures” of the title are revealed, through the course of the work, as a cloak for the underlying quest for security and stability – not so much economic as emotional. Her quest is close to universal and one that her readers, while perhaps unlikely to share her methods will nevertheless share her goals and so be able to benefit from some of the hard won insights delineated in these pages.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.75
Doughnut Economics
by Kate Raworth
If you’re looking for a book to start off 2021 with, a book that will set your thinking on a fresh path and that by doing so will help extricate us, as a society, together, out of our present dark morass, and to provide a strong, sensible, workable basis on which to build a better tomorrow, then look no further – Doughnut Economics is that book. Kate Raworth is an educator, researcher and activist currently based at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute who is both smart enough and strong to recognize and identify the errors in the reigning economic theories that underpin the global capitalist systems and how they have led to the glaring inequities that are destabilizing the system and where they are the root cause of so much suffering. Raworth illustrates how these inequities and suffering are both unnecessary, the result of intellectual failures as well as moral ones. A key to her success – and to her appeal to us here at The Copacetic Comics Company – is that Raworth is a keen and perceptive visual thinker. She understands how pictures, in addition to being "worth a thousand words”, often form the basis for entire schools of thought. She employs these insights in dexterous deconstructions of some of the key diagrams and charts that underpin textbook economics and points out where they go wrong and/or what they’re missing. More to the point, she has created a series of incisive and inclusive diagrams of her own, none more important than – yes, you guessed it – The Doughnut, which lies at the center of this work, and, in fact preceded and inspired it. Even should you have no prior interest in economics or economics theory, this may be the book that changes your mind, for part of its remit is to show that, indeed, just as you suspected, much economic theory is simply ex post facto justification of the historical hierarchies of class, gender and race, and, not only that, but in addition, that too much of the theory that seeks to overturn "the establishment" partakes in many of the same fallacies as the traditional economic theory it is opposing, simply occupying the opposite side of the argument. Doughnut Economics seeks to forge an entirely new paradigm employing a new way of seeing and, crucially, a new way of organizing economics around the needs of people and the planet, rather than the needs of the holders of capital assets. >>> Highly Recommended! <<< If you’re interested enough to explore this a bit further to see whether or not this book’s going to be worth your while, then take a chance on spending a few minutes with this BBC video that features Raworth and The Doughnut. And, finally, Doughnut Economics is more than just a book, it’s now also an organization, The Doughnut Economics Action Lab.
retail price - $17.95 copacetic price - $15.00
New for December 2020
Mini-Kus #90: Banal Complications
by Marc Bell
Marc Bell pulls back the curtain and reveals the (less than) glamourous life of today's jet-setting international cartoonist! Readers will be privy to rarely seen behind the scene goings on that are the underpinnings of comics creation. Here you will vicariously encounter collectors, gallerists, accountants, visas, leases and taxes! All squeezed into 24 pages of Marc Bell TextToons™. These shenanigans will all be especially appreciated by other working cartoonists and artists. (Slightly stressful) fun!
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $6.00
New for November 2020
New for October 2020
Michigan: On the Trail of a War Bride
by Lucas Varela & Julien Frey
Michigan is a highly engaging and thoroughly enjoyable graphic novel recounting of the story of how a Parisian woman came to live in Michigan in the aftermath of the Second World War. It is also, simultaneously, a look at contemporary America from a French perspective. This is accomplished by Michigan's narrative having two interwoven threads. One is the story of the travel of a grand niece of Odette – the war bride in the title – along with her husband, Julien – presumably the author – and their child, from Paris to Michigan to meet Odette and her daughters. The second is the story of how Odette came to America. The weaving together of these two strands is part of the pleasure of the text, the other is Varela's art, which fits the story to a T. His choice of employing the limited, and notably French, tri-color palette of pastel blue, pastel red and white throughout serves to preserve the French perspective in readers' minds while the story moves back and forth between France an the USA. Translated by Matt Madden!
retail price - $24.95 copacetic price - $21.75
Moms
by Yeong-Shin Ma
Inspired by the life of his own mother – and roughly based on written accounts and anecdotes that she provided about her life and that of her peers – Yeong-Shin Ma's Moms – translated into English from the Korean original by Janet Hong – is a strikingly empathic and highly engaging account of the lives of a group of 50-something Korean working women. In its 368 pages readers will experience the ups and downs of their loves, marriages and affairs (of which there are plenty) – including various intimate details – on the one hand, and their unrelenting working lives on the other. Scattered in between are child-rearing – with a focus on the stay-at-home son that is the stand-in for the author – and other family matters, like funerals. Through it all, there is the bond that the moms share with each other. It is this, perhaps more than anything else, that keeps them all going. And while the particulars of these women's lives will provide readers with insights into Korean life and culture – which is, if anything, even more patriarchal and paternalistic than that of the USA – there is a clear universality at the core of the stories and of the work as a whole. These moms are characters that live and breath on the page.
retail price - $29.95 copacetic price - $25.75
Ghostwriter
by Rayco Pulido
Rayco Pulido's Ghostwriter is a tale of derangement that doubles as an engaging mystery. Set in Spain during its fascist era, its narrative serves as a biting critique of that eras hypocrisies We don't want to give too much away here, as that is one of this text's primary pleasures. The other is its art. Any Love and Rockets fans jonesing for some of those crisp lines combined with solid black placement working together in well balanced compositions that are the Jaime Hernandez trademark will find the next best thing here. Pulido obviously studied Jaime quite closely and has clearly spent some time honing his chops, as he really delivers in the 96 magazine size pages of this value-priced, hardcover edition Ghostwriter. Fantagraphics has provided a nice preview here (scroll down to the bottom of the page for the preview), so you can get an idea of what we're talking about.
retail price - $19.95 copacetic price - $16.75
One Story
by Gipi
Italian comics auteur, Gipi's latest delivers a time-hopping tale that centers on the First World War. The somewhat ironically titled One Story is a graphic novel that "demonstrates how the choices our ancestors made dramatically affect generations to come" (sez US publisher, Fantagraphics). The US edition is an attractively printed – in both black & white pen & ink, , and full color watercolor – oversize hardcover volume, translated from the original Italian by Jaime Richards. Fantagraphics describes the narrative and it's representation thusly: "Silvano Landi is a successful writer who, at the age of 50, sees his family leave him and his life fall apart. Landi's great-grandfather, Mauro, is an anxious soldier being fed to the maw of carnage in the First World War. Alternating between past and present, a psych ward and the bloody trenches, and told through complex clues — a lone gas station, an apathetic baroness, found love letters, and shifting from scratchy black-and-white to lush watercolors (sometimes on the same page), A Story documents the origins of pain that serve as the roots of a twisted family tree, and allows the reader to trace the branches." John Sweven has penned a review on The Beat that will bring you up to speed, HERE. And, there's a nice preview that is well worth checking out, hosted by the new online literary magazine for comics, Solrad, HERE!
retail
price - $22.99 copacetic price - $20.00
Ginseng Roots #6
by Craig Thompson
Yes, it's another great issue of Ginseng Roots from Craig Thompson! In this issue, the timeline crosses over into Craig's teen years, a threshold marked by his being baptised in the river in classic old school fashion. Long time readers will recognize that this issue overlaps with that time in Thompson's life that was thinly fictionalized in Blankets. As always, the art is thrilling, and his use of red & black duotone continues to amaze. Don't miss it!
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.50
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $34.75
Funky Town
by Mathilde Van Gheluwe
Funky Town is a modern fairy tale, of sorts. Mixing old and new, Mathilde Van Gheluwe's 132 page graphic novel presents the stresses and traumas of a pre-adolescent girl as she confronts and navigates the world of appetites and emotions – with Baba Yaga for a mother! Beautiful pencil art throughout. You can get a peek at a few pages which accompany Philippe Leblanc's review at The Beat, HERE (but beware of spoilers in the text of the review itself).
retail price - $18.00 copacetic price - $18.00
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $29.75
retail price - $100.00 copacetic price - $79.75
Ditko Is... Strange!
by Steve Ditko & Stan Lee
Yowza! Here we have the COMPLETE Ditko run on Dr. Strange, from Strange Tales #110, 111 and 114-146, reproduced truly GIANT size, as in 14" x 22" (and weighing over 13 pounds)! All in full color. Perfect for the aging comics reader whose eyes aren't what they used to be – and who could use the workout provided by hoisting and holding this hefty tome. We've placed an original issue of Strange Tales in the photos at left for scale. 'Nuff said, indeed.
retail
price -
$100.00 copacetic price - $85.75
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $16.75
Rohnerby Max Baitinger
“Hell is other people.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
What should North American readers expect when they crack the cover of Röhner, the first English language publication of German comics maker, Max Baitinger’s work? Well… maybe something along the lines of a mash-up of Chris Ware and Patrick Kyle (Michael DeForge and Jason)? The formal focus here is on the clear line, while the content is the involuted nature of interpersonal relations. And coffee plays a central role, always a plus (the title page image is an exploded view of an electric coffee percolator and the line of text that starts the book off is ”I get up and prepare coffee”). The story centers on the character of Röhner, a somewhat obtuse house guest whose mere presence disturbs the strictly ordered life of his host, the protagonist/narrator. The fact that the personality of this protagonist/narrator is expressed through the artwork conveying the story makes for a successful marriage of form and content and is this work’s particular mark of distinction (which is further strengthened by the nice package it arrives in courtesy it's American publisher, 2dcloud). Sound interesting? Here’s Max’s website, and here’s a brief preview of Röhner.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.75
King-Cat
Comics and Stories #80
by John Porcellino
Start 2021 by catching up with the one and only John Porcellino, who here, in the 40 pages of this, 80th issue of King-Cat Comics and Stories shares his experiences of 2020 and more. In addition to the fine John P. comics on offer, this issue includes: fresh installments of "Catcalls" and "Top o' the Forty"; "List of Birds Spotted in Our Yard (in Taxonomic Order)"; and three pages of dreams! Enjoy!
retail price - $5.00 copacetic price - $4.75
Ginseng Roots #8
by Craig Thompson
It's here, hot off the press and right on schedule, the new issue of Ginseng Roots, wherein Craig Thompson continues to unearth more details as he digs deeper into the fascinating nexus of biology, history, politics and culture that is embodied by this humble plant. The focus of this issue is the intercontinental biography of Hmong ginseng farmers who left their native Laos for a new life in Wisconsin... growing ginseng.
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.50
P.E.O.W. : Painfully
Embarrassing Otaku Weekend
by Jane Mai
P.E.O.W. : Painfully Embarrassing Otaku Weekend is a playful if masochistic romp through the life of a comics-making fangirl / manga-making otaku, Jane Mai (the title is also a pun on / homage to the book's publisher, PEOW). This book is actually two books in one. The first, making up slightly more than half the page count, is a tour diary made up of a series of short strips “drawn on Staples paper with whatever pen was close by.” Randomness, absurdity and chaos mix it up in these rough and ready comics made on the fly as Ms. Mai traveled with PEOW to various comics expos and the like. The second is a polished work of autobio comics/manga – that also features “great demon lord Tante”, a fantastic ideation embodying “fear, anxiety and terrible unease” that accompanies Jane on her “painfully embarrassing otaku weekend” in Toronto. The entire 116 page, 5” x 7” dust-jacketed, softcover book is printed in black and white with pink tones throughout. Taken together these two approaches to work to convey the differences between how events are experienced in the present, and the how they are organized and evaluated in memory. They also make for a really fun read! And, finally, we couldn’t help but notice that the cover sports a “Book 1” on it, but not the copyright page. So, it may just be an in-joke about the serial nature of the form, but… it may not! Suffice it to say, if there ever is a Book 2, we’ll get it in here at Copacetic.
retail price - $15.00 copacetic price - $13.75
New for January 2021
by John Porcellino
Start 2021 by catching up with the one and only John Porcellino, who here, in the 40 pages of this, 80th issue of King-Cat Comics and Stories shares his experiences of 2020 and more. In addition to the fine John P. comics on offer, this issue includes: fresh installments of "Catcalls" and "Top o' the Forty"; "List of Birds Spotted in Our Yard (in Taxonomic Order)"; and three pages of dreams! Enjoy!
retail price - $5.00 copacetic price - $4.75
Ginseng Roots #8
by Craig Thompson
It's here, hot off the press and right on schedule, the new issue of Ginseng Roots, wherein Craig Thompson continues to unearth more details as he digs deeper into the fascinating nexus of biology, history, politics and culture that is embodied by this humble plant. The focus of this issue is the intercontinental biography of Hmong ginseng farmers who left their native Laos for a new life in Wisconsin... growing ginseng.
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.50
The Grande Odalisque
by Florent Ruppert, Jerome Mulot & Bastien Vives; translated from the original French by Montana Kane
Here in the 124 full color, full size pages of this hardcover, English Language edition of The Grande Odalisque just released in North America by Fantagraphics, Ruppert and Mulot team up with Bastien Vives for a rock ‘em, sock ‘em (art) heist caper in which partners in crime, Alex and Carole team up with Clarence, the arms dealer, and then Sam, the stunt motorcyclist and boxer, and then… well, anyone familiar with the work Ruppert, Mulot and Vives should have a pretty good idea by now of what’s in store, but anyone wanting to learn more can head over to The Comics Beat and check out John Seven’s review that includes a few choice pages, HERE.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.50
Hypnotwist
/ Scarlet by Starlight
by Gilbert Hernandez
Hot off the press, it's the latest addition to the canon of Gilbert Hernandez's series of hardcover "movies" that have been "shot" within the Love and Rockets universe, and "starring" characters – most notably, Fritz – who live there. This time around we have... a double feature! Packaged like the Ace Doubles of yore – with two front covers and no back covers, as soon as you've finished one, you can flip it over and read the other – or savor the moment and save it for another day, the choice is yours. If either of these stories looks or sounds familiar to long time Love and Rockets readers, that is because they each appeared around ten years back: Hypnotwist – a surreal, dreamlike (and entirely wordless!) tale – in Love and Rockets: New Stories (V3) #2 (in, however, a significantly shorter version; roughly 2/3 the length of what is here); and Scarlet by Starlight – a science fiction tale set on an alien world, that, we should warn you, uses this alien world as a stage set and pulls back the curtain on some of the darker primal drives lurking below the surface of human civilization – in Love and Rockets: New Stories (V3) #3. Now, at last, each of these worthy tales have been given a permanent home. (And, yes, those round yellow stickers do peel off, just take your time and peel slowly...)
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $29.75
by Florent Ruppert, Jerome Mulot & Bastien Vives; translated from the original French by Montana Kane
Here in the 124 full color, full size pages of this hardcover, English Language edition of The Grande Odalisque just released in North America by Fantagraphics, Ruppert and Mulot team up with Bastien Vives for a rock ‘em, sock ‘em (art) heist caper in which partners in crime, Alex and Carole team up with Clarence, the arms dealer, and then Sam, the stunt motorcyclist and boxer, and then… well, anyone familiar with the work Ruppert, Mulot and Vives should have a pretty good idea by now of what’s in store, but anyone wanting to learn more can head over to The Comics Beat and check out John Seven’s review that includes a few choice pages, HERE.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $22.50
Hypnotwist
/ Scarlet by Starlightby Gilbert Hernandez
Hot off the press, it's the latest addition to the canon of Gilbert Hernandez's series of hardcover "movies" that have been "shot" within the Love and Rockets universe, and "starring" characters – most notably, Fritz – who live there. This time around we have... a double feature! Packaged like the Ace Doubles of yore – with two front covers and no back covers, as soon as you've finished one, you can flip it over and read the other – or savor the moment and save it for another day, the choice is yours. If either of these stories looks or sounds familiar to long time Love and Rockets readers, that is because they each appeared around ten years back: Hypnotwist – a surreal, dreamlike (and entirely wordless!) tale – in Love and Rockets: New Stories (V3) #2 (in, however, a significantly shorter version; roughly 2/3 the length of what is here); and Scarlet by Starlight – a science fiction tale set on an alien world, that, we should warn you, uses this alien world as a stage set and pulls back the curtain on some of the darker primal drives lurking below the surface of human civilization – in Love and Rockets: New Stories (V3) #3. Now, at last, each of these worthy tales have been given a permanent home. (And, yes, those round yellow stickers do peel off, just take your time and peel slowly...)
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $29.75
P.E.O.W. : Painfully
Embarrassing Otaku Weekendby Jane Mai
P.E.O.W. : Painfully Embarrassing Otaku Weekend is a playful if masochistic romp through the life of a comics-making fangirl / manga-making otaku, Jane Mai (the title is also a pun on / homage to the book's publisher, PEOW). This book is actually two books in one. The first, making up slightly more than half the page count, is a tour diary made up of a series of short strips “drawn on Staples paper with whatever pen was close by.” Randomness, absurdity and chaos mix it up in these rough and ready comics made on the fly as Ms. Mai traveled with PEOW to various comics expos and the like. The second is a polished work of autobio comics/manga – that also features “great demon lord Tante”, a fantastic ideation embodying “fear, anxiety and terrible unease” that accompanies Jane on her “painfully embarrassing otaku weekend” in Toronto. The entire 116 page, 5” x 7” dust-jacketed, softcover book is printed in black and white with pink tones throughout. Taken together these two approaches to work to convey the differences between how events are experienced in the present, and the how they are organized and evaluated in memory. They also make for a really fun read! And, finally, we couldn’t help but notice that the cover sports a “Book 1” on it, but not the copyright page. So, it may just be an in-joke about the serial nature of the form, but… it may not! Suffice it to say, if there ever is a Book 2, we’ll get it in here at Copacetic.
retail price - $15.00 copacetic price - $13.75
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items and more may
also be found at our
eCommerce site, HERE.
New for January 2021
Yearly 2020by Andrew White
This year, instead of one 8 1/2” x 11” color magazine, Yearly takes the form of three separate pieces held together with a belly band, which is itself a modest work of comics: Drowned River is a 94 page, 6” x 9”, B & W, squarebound graphic novella that intermixes long stretches of purely visual comics, all arrayed in a gutterless, six-panel grid, to tell the story of a relationship struggling amidst a flood; a flood that is at once literal, figurative and symbolic, and that makes for an immersive reading experience. (You can actually read it online, in its entirety, HERE). Everything Is Always, is an 80-page, 4 1/2” x 6 1/2”, philosophical comics poem that, while reproduced in full color, is largely rendered entirely in black ink, white gouache and pencil on a series of brown surfaces – mostly corrugated cardboard, but also brown wrapping paper and uncorrugated board. It too can be read in its entirety, HERE. This Is an Empty Room is a 16-page, digest-seize, B & W pamphlet that imposes a six-panel grid filled with minimal drawings, text and symbols over a series of grey-screened, black & white photographs of a forest. This combination could be read in a number ways: as someone sitting at home thinking, while remembering and/or reflecting on a recent walk through the woods; as someone walking through the woods, but distracted by thoughts and memories, or… as interchangeable quantum states, both at once! Each copy of This Is an Empty Room also includes a small, one-of-a-kind original colored pencil drawing on the inside front cover! Yearly was prepared to be released, as usual, for SPX, even in SPX's absence this year, making the event a spectral presence hovering over our reading of it. So, for anyone still feeling the lack of SPX, Yearly 2020 might help to fill that particular void...
Stages of Rotby Linnea Sterte
Stages of Rot is a unique work of anthro-bio-zoological speculative fantasy, and, furthermore, is one that could really only succeed on its own terms in comics form. Here we have a French-flapped softcover containing page after page of lush, full (but muted) color comics, beautifully printed (in Poland) on flat, off-white paper stock, presenting comics inspired by a mix of (mostly) Moebius, Miyazaki and Ernst Haeckel that as often as not is reminiscent of biological, zoological and anthropological illustration. The central visual ploy here is that we are presented with a world in which a splendid array of aquatic animals – whales, dolphins, jellyfish, etc. – populate the skies, together with those, such as birds and insects, that are “normally” airborne. This world is different in other ways, but we are meant to recognize ourselves in its contours. The effect of reading Stages of Rot is of visiting a world that is a strange mirror of our own, reflecting our lives back at us in such a manner as, through the specific differences, we see how our world is arranged in a way that is only one of the many (infinite?) ways it could have been, and how it is that what we take as given in our lives has, in actuality, been “given” to us by… the universe, nature, evolution – god? – that, ultimately, we populate a world not of our own making. Stages of Rot jars us out of our complacency and pushes us to see the inherent strangeness of existence and recognize that the underlying patterns and connections that make the web of life have come to be as they are now through a complex web of circumstance, and that this web is dynamic, not static; that everything is always in a state of flux and change, and that, all in all, life is an endless mystery...
retail price - $23.00 copacetic price - $21.75
Desperate Pleasuresby M.S. Harkness
An epic journey of self discovery that takes readers along for the (roller coaster) ride, Desperate Pleasures is M.S. Harkness’s most accomplished work to date, as she shows herself moving away from her earlier short pieces which tended to function in a more humorous vein, exploiting pathos for laughs. In its 200+ pages of crisp black and white comics, Harkness probes her psyche and unpacks some trauma while sharing an affecting tale of making a go of making a life, and in the process provides ample evidence that her developing cartooning abilities are in the midst of a “growth spurt”. Relationships lie at the core of the work. The difficulties in understanding them, establishing them and maintaining them. Desperate Pleasures also provides insights into how memory structures experience. Readers could be forgiven if they came away with the impression that she spends the bulk of her life in gyms and bars, on a bike or in bed – always accompanied by her mobile phone, of course. Harkness presents her life as one driven by abreactive impulse, skirting the abyss ever in motion towards a goal that occasionally appears almost at hand yet continues to remain at the horizon. The “desperate pleasures” of the title are revealed, through the course of the work, as a cloak for the underlying quest for security and stability – not so much economic as emotional. Her quest is close to universal and one that her readers, while perhaps unlikely to share her methods will nevertheless share her goals and so be able to benefit from some of the hard won insights delineated in these pages.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $17.75
Maids
by Katie Skelly
We sold out of this in the shop in the blink of an eye when it was initially released, and so didn't get the chance to list it here. Now that the second print has arrived, we can! Katie Skelly's take on the Papin sisters case twins the themes of oppression and repression in this understated, slow boil graphic novel that finally gets to the climax that was bound to come. If you have a few minutes to spare, spend them giving Etelka Lehoczky's excellent review on NPR the once over.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $16.75
retail
price - $30.00 copacetic price - $26.75
by Katie Skelly
We sold out of this in the shop in the blink of an eye when it was initially released, and so didn't get the chance to list it here. Now that the second print has arrived, we can! Katie Skelly's take on the Papin sisters case twins the themes of oppression and repression in this understated, slow boil graphic novel that finally gets to the climax that was bound to come. If you have a few minutes to spare, spend them giving Etelka Lehoczky's excellent review on NPR the once over.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $16.75
Doughnut Economicsby Kate Raworth
If you’re looking for a book to start off 2021 with, a book that will set your thinking on a fresh path and that by doing so will help extricate us, as a society, together, out of our present dark morass, and to provide a strong, sensible, workable basis on which to build a better tomorrow, then look no further – Doughnut Economics is that book. Kate Raworth is an educator, researcher and activist currently based at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute who is both smart enough and strong to recognize and identify the errors in the reigning economic theories that underpin the global capitalist systems and how they have led to the glaring inequities that are destabilizing the system and where they are the root cause of so much suffering. Raworth illustrates how these inequities and suffering are both unnecessary, the result of intellectual failures as well as moral ones. A key to her success – and to her appeal to us here at The Copacetic Comics Company – is that Raworth is a keen and perceptive visual thinker. She understands how pictures, in addition to being "worth a thousand words”, often form the basis for entire schools of thought. She employs these insights in dexterous deconstructions of some of the key diagrams and charts that underpin textbook economics and points out where they go wrong and/or what they’re missing. More to the point, she has created a series of incisive and inclusive diagrams of her own, none more important than – yes, you guessed it – The Doughnut, which lies at the center of this work, and, in fact preceded and inspired it. Even should you have no prior interest in economics or economics theory, this may be the book that changes your mind, for part of its remit is to show that, indeed, just as you suspected, much economic theory is simply ex post facto justification of the historical hierarchies of class, gender and race, and, not only that, but in addition, that too much of the theory that seeks to overturn "the establishment" partakes in many of the same fallacies as the traditional economic theory it is opposing, simply occupying the opposite side of the argument. Doughnut Economics seeks to forge an entirely new paradigm employing a new way of seeing and, crucially, a new way of organizing economics around the needs of people and the planet, rather than the needs of the holders of capital assets. >>> Highly Recommended! <<< If you’re interested enough to explore this a bit further to see whether or not this book’s going to be worth your while, then take a chance on spending a few minutes with this BBC video that features Raworth and The Doughnut. And, finally, Doughnut Economics is more than just a book, it’s now also an organization, The Doughnut Economics Action Lab.
retail price - $17.95 copacetic price - $15.00
These items
and more may also be found
at our eCommerce site, HERE.
New for December 2020
Mini-Kus #90: Banal Complicationsby Marc Bell
Marc Bell pulls back the curtain and reveals the (less than) glamourous life of today's jet-setting international cartoonist! Readers will be privy to rarely seen behind the scene goings on that are the underpinnings of comics creation. Here you will vicariously encounter collectors, gallerists, accountants, visas, leases and taxes! All squeezed into 24 pages of Marc Bell TextToons™. These shenanigans will all be especially appreciated by other working cartoonists and artists. (Slightly stressful) fun!
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $6.00
Mini-Kus #83: Chapter Two
by Keren Katz
Get ready for 24 pint-size pages filled with Keren Katz's beautiful and inimitably enigmatic drawings that when combined with her fairly straightforward text work together to tell one story – and show another.
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $6.00
Remina
by Junji Ito
What better way to spend the holiday season than curled up with an up close and intimate look at impending doom, in the form of an unknown planet on a collision course with Earth. Here you will find 200 pages of "universal scale" terror – that may not be what it seems. Is the threat from without – or from within? Is it a harsh inhuman fate, or an inborn evil? Only Junji Ito knows for sure. The answer lies with Remina...
retail
price - $22.99 copacetic price - $20.00
The Eternaut 1969
All Time Comics Zerosis Deathscape
by Josh Bayer, Josh Simmons & Trevor Von Eeden, w/ Gabrielle Bell, Julia Gfrörer, Benjamin Marra, Ken Landgraf, Tom Toye, Dan Lee
Here it is, the complete collection of the brain bending All Time Comics epic, Zerosis Deathscape! Josh Bayer and Josh Simmons team up with Bronze Age Comics legend Trevor Von Eeden to deliver a throwback urban/cosmic tale that delivers old school cosmic comics from a gritty, new-school indy-alt perspective. This 224 page, full color trade paperback collects the entire seven-issue series (#0 + #1 - 6) along with all covers, and features contributions from Gabrielle Bell, Ken Landgraf, Julia Gfrorer, Benjamin Marra and Thomas Toye, and brain-scalding colors by Dan Lee. Get ready for some invigorating entertainment!
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
by Keren Katz
Get ready for 24 pint-size pages filled with Keren Katz's beautiful and inimitably enigmatic drawings that when combined with her fairly straightforward text work together to tell one story – and show another.
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $6.00
Remina
by Junji Ito
What better way to spend the holiday season than curled up with an up close and intimate look at impending doom, in the form of an unknown planet on a collision course with Earth. Here you will find 200 pages of "universal scale" terror – that may not be what it seems. Is the threat from without – or from within? Is it a harsh inhuman fate, or an inborn evil? Only Junji Ito knows for sure. The answer lies with Remina...
The Eternaut 1969
All Time Comics Zerosis Deathscape
by Josh Bayer, Josh Simmons & Trevor Von Eeden, w/ Gabrielle Bell, Julia Gfrörer, Benjamin Marra, Ken Landgraf, Tom Toye, Dan Lee
Here it is, the complete collection of the brain bending All Time Comics epic, Zerosis Deathscape! Josh Bayer and Josh Simmons team up with Bronze Age Comics legend Trevor Von Eeden to deliver a throwback urban/cosmic tale that delivers old school cosmic comics from a gritty, new-school indy-alt perspective. This 224 page, full color trade paperback collects the entire seven-issue series (#0 + #1 - 6) along with all covers, and features contributions from Gabrielle Bell, Ken Landgraf, Julia Gfrorer, Benjamin Marra and Thomas Toye, and brain-scalding colors by Dan Lee. Get ready for some invigorating entertainment!
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
Object
Compendium
by Kilian Eng
Anyone who was frustrated by missing out on Eng's delicately delineated and lushly colored (and, we must add, Moebius-inflected) artwork in its original release, here's an opportunity to put that frustration behind you. the all-in-one, definitive edition of Kilian Eng’s otherworldly landscapes and retro-futuristic illustrations. The Object Compendium is a massive, oversize (9.5" x 12.5") hardcover volume running 280 full color pages that collects all of Eng’s first three sold out monographs, Object 5, Object 10, Object 15 as well as unpublished work from that time period, including 30 pages of previously unpublished works, and opens with a foreword by Chris Jalufka.
retail price - $49.99 copacetic price - $44.75
retail price - $14.99 copacetic price - $13.75
by Kilian Eng
Anyone who was frustrated by missing out on Eng's delicately delineated and lushly colored (and, we must add, Moebius-inflected) artwork in its original release, here's an opportunity to put that frustration behind you. the all-in-one, definitive edition of Kilian Eng’s otherworldly landscapes and retro-futuristic illustrations. The Object Compendium is a massive, oversize (9.5" x 12.5") hardcover volume running 280 full color pages that collects all of Eng’s first three sold out monographs, Object 5, Object 10, Object 15 as well as unpublished work from that time period, including 30 pages of previously unpublished works, and opens with a foreword by Chris Jalufka.
retail price - $49.99 copacetic price - $44.75
retail price - $14.99 copacetic price - $13.75
These items and
more may also be found at
our eCommerce site, HERE.
New for November 2020
Vision
by Julia Gfrörer
Julia Gfrörer has honed the blade of her gothic comics to a fine, sharp edge, and in the pages of Vision she grips its haft firmly and plunges it deep within, mingling sex and death in 90 pages of comics arrayed in a relentless 9-panel grid. Gfrörer's pen is, here, the sword, and she employs it to first delineate then cut through the borders between light and dark, night and day, flesh and spirit, and, ultimately, life and death, as they existed in the world of the privileged class, before Freud...
retail price - $16.99 copacetic price - $15.00
by Julia Gfrörer
Julia Gfrörer has honed the blade of her gothic comics to a fine, sharp edge, and in the pages of Vision she grips its haft firmly and plunges it deep within, mingling sex and death in 90 pages of comics arrayed in a relentless 9-panel grid. Gfrörer's pen is, here, the sword, and she employs it to first delineate then cut through the borders between light and dark, night and day, flesh and spirit, and, ultimately, life and death, as they existed in the world of the privileged class, before Freud...
retail price - $16.99 copacetic price - $15.00
Be
Gay, Do Comics! – Queer History, Memoir, and Satire
from The Nib
edited by Matt Bors & Matt Lubchansky
Be Gay, Do Comics! collects roughly 250 pages of full color comics from The Nib, that, taken together, run the LGBTQ+ gamut, in the process fleshing out quite a diverse spectrum of experiences. The 40 contributors to this volume, assembled here by (we believe) Matt Bors and Matt Lubchansky, including Kendra Wells, Hazel Newlevant, Maia Kobabe, Matt Lubchansky, Breena Nuñez, Sasha Velour, Shing Yin Khor, Levi Hastings, Mady G, Josh Trujillo, Bianca Xunise, Kazimir Lee, and many more, employ a wide variety of modes. Starting out with an important history lesson (and there are plenty more along the way) and moving on through personal accounts, jouralistic accounts and the unpacking of terms and definitions, all interspersed with wry one-pager reflections by Joey Alison Sayers, this collection is packed with positive energy and joyful vibes. Diverse as they are, all contributors, are united in their celebration of all things gay. Check this out for more.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
edited by Matt Bors & Matt Lubchansky
Be Gay, Do Comics! collects roughly 250 pages of full color comics from The Nib, that, taken together, run the LGBTQ+ gamut, in the process fleshing out quite a diverse spectrum of experiences. The 40 contributors to this volume, assembled here by (we believe) Matt Bors and Matt Lubchansky, including Kendra Wells, Hazel Newlevant, Maia Kobabe, Matt Lubchansky, Breena Nuñez, Sasha Velour, Shing Yin Khor, Levi Hastings, Mady G, Josh Trujillo, Bianca Xunise, Kazimir Lee, and many more, employ a wide variety of modes. Starting out with an important history lesson (and there are plenty more along the way) and moving on through personal accounts, jouralistic accounts and the unpacking of terms and definitions, all interspersed with wry one-pager reflections by Joey Alison Sayers, this collection is packed with positive energy and joyful vibes. Diverse as they are, all contributors, are united in their celebration of all things gay. Check this out for more.
retail price - $24.99 copacetic price - $21.75
Old
Growth
by Niv Bavarsky & Michael Olivo
This 200+ page, full color, hardcover (featuring metallic ink!) has been released by Fantagraphics under its "FU" (Fantagraphics Underground, in case you were wondering) imprint, which usually indicates a print run of 1000, or less. Old Growth is a trippy, dreamy mythological/philosophical in comics form. Includes an semi-explicative interview with the creators by Jesse Balmer at the conclusion. Not really sure what to expect from that admittedly vague description? Get a nice taste of what's in store HERE (just keep scrolling down – and up, as the link seems to take you to the middle of the preview? – but take your time as the graphics may take a second to load).
retail price - $35.00 copacetic price - $29.75
by Niv Bavarsky & Michael Olivo
This 200+ page, full color, hardcover (featuring metallic ink!) has been released by Fantagraphics under its "FU" (Fantagraphics Underground, in case you were wondering) imprint, which usually indicates a print run of 1000, or less. Old Growth is a trippy, dreamy mythological/philosophical in comics form. Includes an semi-explicative interview with the creators by Jesse Balmer at the conclusion. Not really sure what to expect from that admittedly vague description? Get a nice taste of what's in store HERE (just keep scrolling down – and up, as the link seems to take you to the middle of the preview? – but take your time as the graphics may take a second to load).
retail price - $35.00 copacetic price - $29.75
Hokusai
Manga
by Katsushika Hokusai
Now at last available in the USA, here is a look at where it all started – manga that is! This pint-sized box set is truly power-packed! While it’s pages measure a mere 4 1/4" x 5 3/4”, its three volumes contain well over 1000 pages total, over 900 of which are fully devoted to reproducing the most extensive selection of Hokusai’s ten-volume handbook of drawings – which he dubbed manga – that he originally published between 1814 and 1820 (although an additional five volumes were published long after his death, bringing the total to 15 – we think; read the notes accompanying these volumes for the full details) currently available in a popular edition – and nowhere even remotely close to this bargain price! Make sure to check this one out next time you’re in the shop. Online customers can get a sneak peek HERE. There is also a review (of the identical UK edition) accompanied by plenty of sample pages HERE.
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $29.75
by Katsushika Hokusai
Now at last available in the USA, here is a look at where it all started – manga that is! This pint-sized box set is truly power-packed! While it’s pages measure a mere 4 1/4" x 5 3/4”, its three volumes contain well over 1000 pages total, over 900 of which are fully devoted to reproducing the most extensive selection of Hokusai’s ten-volume handbook of drawings – which he dubbed manga – that he originally published between 1814 and 1820 (although an additional five volumes were published long after his death, bringing the total to 15 – we think; read the notes accompanying these volumes for the full details) currently available in a popular edition – and nowhere even remotely close to this bargain price! Make sure to check this one out next time you’re in the shop. Online customers can get a sneak peek HERE. There is also a review (of the identical UK edition) accompanied by plenty of sample pages HERE.
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $29.75
Los Angeles Times
edited by Sammy Harkham, w/ Jordan Crane, Julie Doucet, Max , Lale Westvind, Archer Prewitt, Connor Willumsen, Matthew Thurber, John Pham, Ron Rege, Simon Hanselmann and more!
Happy Thanksgiving, indeed! Arriving just the day before, this 72-page tabloid newspaper edited by Sammy Harkham is packed cover to cover with comics – in (mostly) full color, duotone and black and white – and is an amazing amalgamation of artistry. Wow! And, oh yeah, it's FREE (In the shop, just ask for a copy. Here on the site it's not possible to make it's price zero, so it's a penny. Also, PLEASE NOTE: there is a LIMIT of ONE COPY per customer.)
copacetic price - FREE!
Gross Exaggerations
by Milt Gross
The latest gigantic (13" x 16") deluxe Sunday Press hardcovers, has arrived! Gross Exagerations: The Meshuga Comic Strips of Milt Gross 1926-1934. A selection of Sunday strips and illustrations from the king of screwball comics, Milt Gross! This work was grew out of the Yiddish humor in vaudeville and went on to lampoon all the foibles and quirks of everyday life. Here is a curated collection of the major comic strips of Milt Gross— Nize Baby, Count Screwloose, and Dave’s Delicatessen —along with other comics, books and illustrations from his prolific career. Most of these lost gems have never been reprinted before! Ivan Brunetti sez: "Genius can manifest itself in two ways: the unfathomably complex, and the unfathomably simple. Milt Gross belongs to the latter category. He is one of the all-time great cartoonists because he makes the craft integral to the entire endeavor look so easy, even enjoyable. When I envision the word “cartooning” in the dictionary, the accompanying illustration is always a drawing by Gross: Nize Baby, Iggy, Count Screwloose, or any number of walk-on characters from his strips. These spirited drawings embody cartooning both as noun and verb. Gross is an elemental force, and his command of line and form convincingly argues for cartooning as the purest, the most natural, instinctive, and expressive—it’s tempting to say the only—way to draw. Mark Newgarden sez: "Gross was first and foremost a product of American popular culture and operated with the understanding that his latest gag had already begun disintegration on contact with oxygen (as all popular culture must). And while his generation’s bag of tricks has been long absorbed into the hardpacked humus of cartooning convention, this restless artist’s best work remains a revelation, compulsively energetic and still uncompromisingly funny. His mature line work in particular maintains a markedly fresh vigor and offhanded edginess that offers up as much a whiff of the avant-garde as of a Bronx-bound IRT." And check out this interview/conversation between screwball comics scholar, Paul Tumey and Sunday Press publisher, Peter Maresca.
retail price - $85.00 copacetic price - $78.75
edited by Sammy Harkham, w/ Jordan Crane, Julie Doucet, Max , Lale Westvind, Archer Prewitt, Connor Willumsen, Matthew Thurber, John Pham, Ron Rege, Simon Hanselmann and more!
Happy Thanksgiving, indeed! Arriving just the day before, this 72-page tabloid newspaper edited by Sammy Harkham is packed cover to cover with comics – in (mostly) full color, duotone and black and white – and is an amazing amalgamation of artistry. Wow! And, oh yeah, it's FREE (In the shop, just ask for a copy. Here on the site it's not possible to make it's price zero, so it's a penny. Also, PLEASE NOTE: there is a LIMIT of ONE COPY per customer.)
copacetic price - FREE!
Gross Exaggerations by Milt Gross
The latest gigantic (13" x 16") deluxe Sunday Press hardcovers, has arrived! Gross Exagerations: The Meshuga Comic Strips of Milt Gross 1926-1934. A selection of Sunday strips and illustrations from the king of screwball comics, Milt Gross! This work was grew out of the Yiddish humor in vaudeville and went on to lampoon all the foibles and quirks of everyday life. Here is a curated collection of the major comic strips of Milt Gross— Nize Baby, Count Screwloose, and Dave’s Delicatessen —along with other comics, books and illustrations from his prolific career. Most of these lost gems have never been reprinted before! Ivan Brunetti sez: "Genius can manifest itself in two ways: the unfathomably complex, and the unfathomably simple. Milt Gross belongs to the latter category. He is one of the all-time great cartoonists because he makes the craft integral to the entire endeavor look so easy, even enjoyable. When I envision the word “cartooning” in the dictionary, the accompanying illustration is always a drawing by Gross: Nize Baby, Iggy, Count Screwloose, or any number of walk-on characters from his strips. These spirited drawings embody cartooning both as noun and verb. Gross is an elemental force, and his command of line and form convincingly argues for cartooning as the purest, the most natural, instinctive, and expressive—it’s tempting to say the only—way to draw. Mark Newgarden sez: "Gross was first and foremost a product of American popular culture and operated with the understanding that his latest gag had already begun disintegration on contact with oxygen (as all popular culture must). And while his generation’s bag of tricks has been long absorbed into the hardpacked humus of cartooning convention, this restless artist’s best work remains a revelation, compulsively energetic and still uncompromisingly funny. His mature line work in particular maintains a markedly fresh vigor and offhanded edginess that offers up as much a whiff of the avant-garde as of a Bronx-bound IRT." And check out this interview/conversation between screwball comics scholar, Paul Tumey and Sunday Press publisher, Peter Maresca.
retail price - $85.00 copacetic price - $78.75
These
items and more may also
be found at our
eCommerce site,
HERE.
New for October 2020
Michigan: On the Trail of a War Bride
by Lucas Varela & Julien Frey
Michigan is a highly engaging and thoroughly enjoyable graphic novel recounting of the story of how a Parisian woman came to live in Michigan in the aftermath of the Second World War. It is also, simultaneously, a look at contemporary America from a French perspective. This is accomplished by Michigan's narrative having two interwoven threads. One is the story of the travel of a grand niece of Odette – the war bride in the title – along with her husband, Julien – presumably the author – and their child, from Paris to Michigan to meet Odette and her daughters. The second is the story of how Odette came to America. The weaving together of these two strands is part of the pleasure of the text, the other is Varela's art, which fits the story to a T. His choice of employing the limited, and notably French, tri-color palette of pastel blue, pastel red and white throughout serves to preserve the French perspective in readers' minds while the story moves back and forth between France an the USA. Translated by Matt Madden!
retail price - $24.95 copacetic price - $21.75
Momsby Yeong-Shin Ma
Inspired by the life of his own mother – and roughly based on written accounts and anecdotes that she provided about her life and that of her peers – Yeong-Shin Ma's Moms – translated into English from the Korean original by Janet Hong – is a strikingly empathic and highly engaging account of the lives of a group of 50-something Korean working women. In its 368 pages readers will experience the ups and downs of their loves, marriages and affairs (of which there are plenty) – including various intimate details – on the one hand, and their unrelenting working lives on the other. Scattered in between are child-rearing – with a focus on the stay-at-home son that is the stand-in for the author – and other family matters, like funerals. Through it all, there is the bond that the moms share with each other. It is this, perhaps more than anything else, that keeps them all going. And while the particulars of these women's lives will provide readers with insights into Korean life and culture – which is, if anything, even more patriarchal and paternalistic than that of the USA – there is a clear universality at the core of the stories and of the work as a whole. These moms are characters that live and breath on the page.
retail price - $29.95 copacetic price - $25.75
Ghostwriter
by Rayco Pulido
Rayco Pulido's Ghostwriter is a tale of derangement that doubles as an engaging mystery. Set in Spain during its fascist era, its narrative serves as a biting critique of that eras hypocrisies We don't want to give too much away here, as that is one of this text's primary pleasures. The other is its art. Any Love and Rockets fans jonesing for some of those crisp lines combined with solid black placement working together in well balanced compositions that are the Jaime Hernandez trademark will find the next best thing here. Pulido obviously studied Jaime quite closely and has clearly spent some time honing his chops, as he really delivers in the 96 magazine size pages of this value-priced, hardcover edition Ghostwriter. Fantagraphics has provided a nice preview here (scroll down to the bottom of the page for the preview), so you can get an idea of what we're talking about.
retail price - $19.95 copacetic price - $16.75
One Storyby Gipi
Italian comics auteur, Gipi's latest delivers a time-hopping tale that centers on the First World War. The somewhat ironically titled One Story is a graphic novel that "demonstrates how the choices our ancestors made dramatically affect generations to come" (sez US publisher, Fantagraphics). The US edition is an attractively printed – in both black & white pen & ink, , and full color watercolor – oversize hardcover volume, translated from the original Italian by Jaime Richards. Fantagraphics describes the narrative and it's representation thusly: "Silvano Landi is a successful writer who, at the age of 50, sees his family leave him and his life fall apart. Landi's great-grandfather, Mauro, is an anxious soldier being fed to the maw of carnage in the First World War. Alternating between past and present, a psych ward and the bloody trenches, and told through complex clues — a lone gas station, an apathetic baroness, found love letters, and shifting from scratchy black-and-white to lush watercolors (sometimes on the same page), A Story documents the origins of pain that serve as the roots of a twisted family tree, and allows the reader to trace the branches." John Sweven has penned a review on The Beat that will bring you up to speed, HERE. And, there's a nice preview that is well worth checking out, hosted by the new online literary magazine for comics, Solrad, HERE!
Ginseng Roots #6
by Craig Thompson
Yes, it's another great issue of Ginseng Roots from Craig Thompson! In this issue, the timeline crosses over into Craig's teen years, a threshold marked by his being baptised in the river in classic old school fashion. Long time readers will recognize that this issue overlaps with that time in Thompson's life that was thinly fictionalized in Blankets. As always, the art is thrilling, and his use of red & black duotone continues to amaze. Don't miss it!
retail price - $6.00 copacetic price - $5.50
retail price - $39.99 copacetic price - $34.75
Funky Town
by Mathilde Van Gheluwe
Funky Town is a modern fairy tale, of sorts. Mixing old and new, Mathilde Van Gheluwe's 132 page graphic novel presents the stresses and traumas of a pre-adolescent girl as she confronts and navigates the world of appetites and emotions – with Baba Yaga for a mother! Beautiful pencil art throughout. You can get a peek at a few pages which accompany Philippe Leblanc's review at The Beat, HERE (but beware of spoilers in the text of the review itself).
retail price - $18.00 copacetic price - $18.00
retail price - $34.95 copacetic price - $29.75
retail price - $100.00 copacetic price - $79.75
Ditko Is... Strange!by Steve Ditko & Stan Lee
Yowza! Here we have the COMPLETE Ditko run on Dr. Strange, from Strange Tales #110, 111 and 114-146, reproduced truly GIANT size, as in 14" x 22" (and weighing over 13 pounds)! All in full color. Perfect for the aging comics reader whose eyes aren't what they used to be – and who could use the workout provided by hoisting and holding this hefty tome. We've placed an original issue of Strange Tales in the photos at left for scale. 'Nuff said, indeed.
retail price - $19.99 copacetic price - $16.75
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more may also be found at
our eCommerce site, HERE.
