Fantagraphics Blog Jen Vaughn

The 30th anniversary Love and Rockets celebration continues with this third of three volumes. Perla La Loca collects the adventures of the spunky Maggie; her annoying, pixie-ish best friend and sometime lover Hopey; and their circle of friends. As usual, Jaime Hernandez spotlights a wide range of headstrong female characters found in previous volumes Maggie the Mechanic and The Girl from H.O.P.P.E.R.S. Perla begins with the "Wigwam Bam" story, arguably Jaime Hernandez's definitive statement on the post-punk culture (what a good song too!). As Maggie, Hopey, and the rest of the Locas prowl Los Angeles, the East Coast, and parts…

This month's issue of Booklist reviewed three recent releases by Fantagraphics creators, excerpted below:  Heads or Tails by Lilli Carré (Starred Review) "As a graphic artist, Carré carries forward the design tradition that stems from the gossamer surrealism of Cocteau; as a verbal artist, she may be the most successful prose poet going. . . Her Wanda Gág–meets–Gene Deitch drawing style and new-weirdness literary bent make her work acutely interesting to both read and scrutinize." —Ray Olson Blacklung by Chris Wright (Starred Review) "Wright shows he’s got a deep arsenal of storytelling weapons at his command. Unsettling, upsetting, and strangely…

Huzzah! The Complete Syndicated Pogo Vol. 2: "Bonafide Balderdash" by Walt Kelly has hit the NY Times "Graphic Novels Best Sellers list" (hardcover). George Gene Gustines highlighted Pogo and its many qualities and quirks about this funny strip set in Okefenokee Swamp. The rest of the list is here but you'll notice no other funny animals!

Cate McGehee attended the 30th Anniversary party for Love and Rockets held at the Fantagraphics Bookstore and wrote about it in The Stranger. Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez were in attendance in addition to hundreds of people ready to see the brothers during their auspicious celebration. Flanked by a gorgeous wall of original art, punk show posters (draw by the brothers) and alt-weekly covers, curated by Larry Reid and editor Kristy Valenti, the room held more wonder than of those in The Mask of the Red Death! Nearly thirty years of work is laid out on prismatic display (more not pictured)….

The last peanut of a day of Online Commentaries & Diversions aka the news you missed while present shopping, latke eating and flying: • Review: The Comics Journal and Rucker crack the two books focusing on Malcom McNeill and William S. Burrough's artistic collaboration, Observed While Falling (the memoir) and The Lost Art of Ah Pook is Here. (the art book) "The art is awesome, the memoir is engaging. . .Ah Pook is in a characteristic style of Burroughs’s middle period.  He mixes a true-adventure story with bitter anti-establishment scenarios, gay sexual fantasies, science-fictional visualizations of chimerical mutants, and apocalyptic…

Is this happy-go-lucky holiday season getting on your nerves? Are increasingly sentimental anthropomorphic animals for the flippin' birds? Johnny Ryan is here to serve you. This week comiXology and Fantagraphics released Angry Youth Comix issues #11-14 for you to enjoy in the midst of madness. In addition to the sex, violence and scatological filth on display, Angry Youth Comix delivers equal opportunity antagonism toward every race, gender, sexual orientation, political persuasion and religion, as well as jokes about international and humanitarian tragedies, in abundance. That being said, it is only available via the filthy filthy web so buy it and…

Following the releases of Heartbreak Soup and Human Diastrophism (Books 1 and 2 of the Palomar series from Love and Rockets) by Gilbert Hernandez, we're releasing the third book via comiXology called Beyond Palomar. Beyond Palomar collects two of Gilbert's groundbreaking works about the Central American hamlet of Palomar in one affordable book."Poison River" is a dizzying period piece often hailed as one of Hernandez's masterpieces. It traces the pre-Palomar childhood of Luba, her teenage marriage to gangster Peter Rio, the secrets behind her mysterious mother, all the way up to her subsequent escape and arrival in Palomar. Meanwhile, "Love…

The first* glass of spiked eggnog of Online Commentaries & Diversions:   • Review: Metroland's Simcoe reviews Walt Disney's Donald Duck: A Christmas for Shacktown by Carl Barks and The Complete Peanuts: 1985 to 1986 by Charles M. Schulz. Glenn Perrett states, "Reading Carl Bark's "Donald Duck" stories from 60 years ago was entertaining. The animation and colours are excellent and sections such as "Story Notes" [etc.] . . . complement the wonderful comics making this book a nice addition to any library." And "The Complete Peanuts: 1985 to 1986 are sure to make the holidays more entertaining and makes…

The comics world lost a great cartoonist this month as Spain Rodriguez drove his wild hog one last time. As an influential members of underground comics, his reach was large. The New York Times wrote an excellent obituary on Spain and Bruce Weber profiled him as "part of a wave of artists — including R. Crumb, S. Clay Wilson and Bill Griffith, who created the character Zippy the Pinhead — who established the irreverent, profane, highly sexed, antiwar, anti-capitalist spirit of underground comics (often, in this context, spelled comix)." Below is a sketch Spain made for Associate Publisher Eric Reynolds….

The cutest Carré animation of Online Commentaries & Diversions*: • Review: Chris Sims on Comics Alliance looks at the first story (and title story) of the latest Carl Barks collection: Walt Disney's Donald Duck "A Christmas for Shacktown." Sims says, "At 32 pages, it's a sprawling epic (By Barks' standards, anyway) that hits those beautiful Holiday themes of altruism and the spirit of giving. Although to be fair, it does get a little closer to cannibalism than most other Christmas comics. • Review: Speaking of Christmas comics, John Seven of the North Adams Transcript reads Charlie Brown's Christmas Stocking by…