Fantagraphics Blog Mike Baehr

Gravitatus horizontus! Don Rosa Disney ducks for Free Comic Book Day!

At last, the long-awaited next Gilbert Hernandez volume in the comprehensive Love and Rockets Library paperback series is nearly here! Luba and Her Family is at the printer now for release in July. This is the first book in this format to collect Gilbert's work past the original 50-issue L&R series. (We'll reveal the full Table of Contents and provide more previews in the not-too-distant future.) This book is also the debut of the new addition to our Art Department, Keeli McCarthy, who designed the cover based on the look established by Jacob Covey, with her own fresh twist. Welcome,…

Google welcomes Spring today with a lovely and charming animated logo by the one and only Eleanor Davis! Go look (if you miss it, it'll be archived here), then come back here to pre-order Eleanor's book How to Be Happy. Update: The Washington Post has the inside behind-the-scenes scoop!

Another gorgeous volume of Hal Foster's magnum opus is off to the printer! Prince Valiant Vol. 9: 1953-1954 collects two more years of quests, danger, sorcery, family milestones, treachery, and comic relief from one of the greatest illustrators to ever grace the comics page. It almost goes without saying, but a reminder can't hurt: these volumes are scanned from original engraver's proofs, meaning that the strip has never looked better and making this the ultimate Prince Valiant series. This volume is expected to be available in early July; look for more sneak peeks between now and then, and pre-orders are…

Unlovable Vol. 3by Esther Pearl Watson 412-page two-color 5.75" x 5.75" hardcover • $29.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-737-6 Ships in: May 2014 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now BARGAIN COMBO: Unlovable Vols. 1-3 Gift Set Price: $68.98 $55.18 Summer vacation is here and Tammy Pierce is back with more sometimes ordinary, often humiliating, occasionally poignant, and usually hilarious exploits! Her hopes, dreams, agonies, and defeats are brought to vivid, comedic life by Watson's lovingly grotesque drawings, filled with all the eighties essentials — too much mascara, leg warmers with heels, and huge hair, etc. — as well as timeless teen concerns like acne,…

"…Barks’s Disney comics were and are enormously well crafted and equally enormously entertaining, timeless comedy adventures that Fanta presents in such handsomely designed volumes that they make the perfect gift for just about any reader of comics, regardless of age, background, or experience with the art form." – School Library Journal "One of comics revered masters gets a fresh new reprinting worthy of his work and accessible to kids…. A wonderful project that should put Barks’s name in front of new generations of admirers." – Publishers Weekly "Even the silliest premise, when executed by an artist in perfect control of…

Just arrived and shipping now from our mail-order department: Batter Up, Charlie Brown! by Charles M. Schulz 64-page black & white (with spot color) 5.75" x 5.75" hardcover • $9.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-725-3 See Previews / Order Now Good ol' Charlie Brown is up at bat in this delightful collection of three complete Peanuts baseball stories. Charlie Brown, along with his teammates Lucy, Linus, Schroeder, and Snoopy, gives it his all in these funny, touching testaments to his indefatigable spirit. "Schulz was truly one of the game's great ambassadors." – Former National Baseball Hall of Fame President Dale Petroskey PEANUTS ® & ©…

The man. His work. They coexist on the cover and in the pages of Pirates in the Heartland: The Mythology of S. Clay Wilson Vol. 1, compiling Wilson's seminal underground comix work along with the first part of Patrick Rosenkranz's authoritative biography. Wilson unleashed a cannon barrage on the boundaries of the comics art form and rushed through, flintlocks blazing, cutlass in teeth, and fly open, taking no prisoners with his outrageous output. This book, combined with its two forthcoming sequels, will be the last word and the ultimate collection of a comics legend. Look for more previews between now and its…

Hey Charlie Brown: you had one job! For the new softcover editions, we redesigned The Complete Peanuts inside and out, as you can see in these snapshots of a just-arrived advance copy of the kick-off volume, The Complete Peanuts 1950-1952. Looks pretty snappy, huh? Even if you've been collecting the hardcover volumes, you'll want to have these affordable paperbacks around for the kids and for loaning out or giving as gifts to friends and relatives, and of course the brilliance of Charles M. Schulz's beloved strip endures no matter what the format. Pre-order your copy (it'll be available a couple…

"Just as Usagi has learned that swordsmanship is more than fighting, Stan Sakai has obviously learned that art is more than drawing. The entire field would be richer if more artists embraced this lesson." – Robert Asprin, from the introduction "If you haven't seen this ultra-cool series, you must! It involves a rabbit samurai — yes, a rabbit samurai — that young readers will love for the action and sophisticated art. I adore it for those reasons too, but there's more substance to it than you might expect. A good Zen comic is hard to find, and this one is…