Fantagraphics Blog Mike Baehr

Black Friday Online Commentary & Diversions: • List: At NPR.org, Glen Weldon recommends "Tomes With Which to Tough Out Your Turkey Coma," including Linda Medley's Castle Waiting ("a wryly funny fairy tale narrative that's both women-centered and women-powered") and Gilbert Hernandez 's Palomar ("Dense, vividly realized and both literally and figuratively magical") • Interview: Robot 6's Chris Mautner talks to Dash Shaw about The Unclothed Man in the 34th Century A.D., BodyWorld and other topics: "There’s a meshing going on between film/animation and comics. The meshing is happening in my own interests, the subject matter of my stories, the way…

ActuaBD interviews Lorenzo Mattotti (translated) about his new art book collaboration with Lou Reed, Le Corbeau (The Raven), among other topics. Above, Mattotti & Reed sign the book at Galerie Martel in Paris, where the original art is on display until January. Holy smokes! (Via The Comics Reporter)

An early update for our weekly strips today? Sure why not: I think I can guess why this week's The House of No by Derek Van Gieson was rejected by The New Yorker… …hobo murder makes a happy Blecksgiving in this week's Blecky Yuckerella strip by Johnny Ryan…. …and Steven Weissman is taking the day off from the Obama strips but would like you to know that he's having a 20% off sale on his artwork and prints at Comic Art Collective. Take it from me, Weissman artwork really spruces up a home!

Online Commentary & Diversions observes the U.S. holiday tomorrow and returns on Friday: • Review: "Children of the early Cold War who grew up with a pre-Spider-Man Ditko will find plenty to love in these restorations… Contemporary fans will no doubt find a lot to like in this volume, as well, both as a piece of mid-century pop-art, and as a first-hand look at the singularly warped sensibilities of one of the artists that would go on to shape the modern superhero book as we know it. Ditko clearly revels in his pre-Code world, constructing giant man-eating worms, and serial…

Paul gives a reading at Chicago's venerable Quimby's on 11/11/09 on his book tour with Jay Ryan (YouTube link; Paul's blog commentary):

…in Denmark, under a different title (Alkymisterne), from our pals at Aben Maler (co-publishers of From Wonderland with Love — ooh, they've got previews). Jim Woodring shares his thoughts on the occasion on his blog, along with a link to this translated review from tegneseriesiden.dk ("To go into [Weathercraft] is like sticking your head deep in a witches' pot and letting your brain cook slowly. It is an attack that has the ability to flush from the visual into your other senses, it is like to smell and hear and above all feel with the eyes, synesthesia in cartoon form")….

On The A.V. Club's (controversial) Top 25 Comics of the '00s list: Eightball #23 by Daniel Clowes ("a straight-up masterpiece"), Tales Designed to Thrizzle by Michael Kupperman ("No one does giddy surrealism quite like Kupperman"), and Why Are You Doing This? by Jason ("builds to a gut-punch ending"); their separate list of the best archival books includes The Complete Peanuts ("has framed Charles Schulz’s enduring masterpiece about as well any lifelong fan could’ve hoped") and Krazy & Ignatz ("a godsend to comics fans… Each book is bizarre, sweetly amusing, and blissfully continuity-free").

As expected, a Huizenga-heavy Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Pim & Francie: The Golden Bear Days is a downright sadistic journey through the lives of its titular characters, playing out like fragments of a fairytale, had the rawer stories of yesteryear from the likes of the  Brothers Grimm been followed to their logical conclusions in the context of our hyper-graphic society, rather than having been hijacked by the likes of Walt Disney. … The book succeeds rather well as both an introduction to the artist’s work and as a standalone art book. It’s simultaneously lush and sparse and terrifying…

Just arrived in our warehouse and ready to ship, AND scheduled to arrive in comic shops this week: Ganges #3 By Kevin Huizenga In the third issue of Kevin Huizenga's Eisner Award nominated comic, Glenn Ganges still can't fall asleep. In "Mind and Body" Glenn tries lying still, but his mind — The Wanderer — keeps thwarting his plans! In "Getting Things Done" he gives up trying to get to sleep and tries to get some things done… until the cops show up! All executed in Huizenga's strikingly crisp, lovely two-color "clear line" style, and presented in our deluxe oversized…