Fantagraphics Blog Jen Vaughn

  This is your official warning to bring your heavy duty bags and library book carts because here are our San Diego Comic Con graphic novel and comic debuts. Need a workout? Well, you're gonna get it by grasping our beautiful tomes to your chest as you happily leave, arms full from a fun time at Fantagraphics, booth #1718!   How to Be Happy is Eleanor Davis's first collection of graphic/literary short stories collecting the best stories she's drawn for Mome, Nobrow, and Lucky Peach, as well in her own self-published comics. Davis achieves a rare, subtle poignancy in her narratives that are at once…

In honor of Joe Shuster's 100th birthday, which would have been today, Drew Friedman created this portrait of Siegel and Shuster working on their creation: Superman. Writer Jerry Siegel would have also been 100 this year in October! For more amazing portraits of comic book and newspaper strip greats, check out Friedman's new book Heroes of the Comics, available for pre-order AND debuting at San Diego Comic-Con (details of Drew's signing schedule at our booth #1718 soon!).  

The good news is here! Dash Shaw's next Cosplayers book continues with Annie and Verti attending a 3-day anime convention called "Tezukon." During the convention they face off against a Street Fighter 2 Cammy, encounter two otaku boys who are obsessed with their youtube videos, and meet a manga scholar named Ben Baxter, who sleeps in a dumpster outside of the hotel and receives visions of the ending of Tezuka's unfinished "Phoenix" saga. Cosplayers 2 is a sweet, funny, melancholic ode to the anime convention experience!   $3.99 for this 32 page comic from Dash Shaw can be yours!     "A former student of the…

 Awww, yeah, our digital library groweth. Twelve Gems by Lane Milburn is a sci-fi epic taking place somewhere in the outer cosmos, beyond reckoning or observation. The mysterious Dr. Z has enlisted three space heroes to search the galaxy for the fabled Twelve Gems of Power: the hulking alien-brawn Furz; the beautiful and deadly sabre-wielding Venus; and the soft-spoken canine technician, Dogstar. They meet many strange and storied characters on their journey, but none so strange or sinister as their dear benefactor himself. With a heavy dose of humor and wall-to-wall action, this is one of the most action-packed and funny books of…

The How to Be Happy tour is most likely a-comin' to you West Coast. This ain't no flim-flamy snake oil juice we're forcing you to swallow, cartoonist Eleanor Davis KNOWS the secret to happiness and more. Start out the fun in Portland, OR at Floating World Comics on Wednesday, July 9th from 6-8pm with a presentation at 7pm. Next stop? The Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery on Sunday, July 13th from 3-5pm with Esther Pearl Watson. Seattle's always got the best cartoonists visiting and this event coincides with the Georgetown Garden Walk (more details here). Head straight south to Mission Comics on Monday, July 14th from…

Paste a smile on your face, Portland. Fantagraphics Books and Floating World cordially invite you to Floating World Comics on Wednesday, July 9th, 2014, from 5:00 to 8:00 PM to meet THE Eleanor Davis. She'll be signing copies of her new comic collection from Fantagraphics entitled How To Be Happy. Her polished line work and alluring palette perfectly complement her compelling stories and she's done work for everyone from Lucky Peach to The New Yorker. Please note that her book will not actually instruct you on how to live a happier life but reading it will put you in the perfect mindset. Please join…

This week's comic shop shipment is slated to include the following new titles. Read on to see what comics-blog commentators and web-savvy comic shops are saying about them (more to be added as they appear), check out our previews at the links, and contact your local shop to confirm availability.    Twelve Gems by Lane Milburn 248-page monochrome 5.75" x 8.5" softcover • $19.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-751-2 "For fans of pulpy storytelling, fans of silly action, and fans of fans, this book is the gem you must seek." – Jake Austen, Chicago Tribune  "It's '80s-indie black-and-white space-opera action as you like it!"– Robot 6   …

Seattle photographer Lance Mercer has captured some truly gorgeous photos throughout the years of musicians from all walks of life. From the official photographer for Pearl Jam in the 90's to Beck, from The President of the Unites States to the chapter breaks in grunge-rock memoir by Danny Bland, In Case We Die, drama and action and life ooze from shots. Recently, our friend Lance was diagnosed with lymphoma. The doctors caught it early, he's been through chemo treatment but as with most freelancers, the medical bills are rather weighty. Lance's family created a GoFundMe account to help cover the bills, that are still totalling…

Cartoonist from Sammy the Mouse, Le Mano Press and one of the Autoptic Festival organizer, Zak Sally is currently running a Kickstarter to create an interdisplinary experiment in art education! With all the heavy-wallet-hitting schools like SCAD, SVA and CCS (which I love, don't get me wrong), seeing education programs like SAW, Frank Santoro's low-residency Comics Workbook program and now SchoolHaus are very encouraging for the highly-ambitious, hard-working people without a lot of extra dough. When the choice is eat dinner or new bristol? Sometimes that's a tough choice.   Along with Dan Ibarra of Aesthetic Apparatus, Zak Sally aims to create an educational…

  Barnaby, the comic strip that welled up from the infamous inkpot of Crockett Johnson, who also greated Harold and the Purple Crayon, is chock fulla World War 2 information and allusions. Being a newspaper strip intended for children though, it's not a barrier to reading the comic.  "You don't need to get all of Crockett Johnson's allusions to enjoy his classic strip, Barnaby. But I'm the sort of person who wants to know these things," writes Philip Nel, co-editor of the Barnaby series and Johnson's biographer. For those who like a little inside baseball, Nel has posted a few corrections that readers have sent in…