[The Umpteen Millionaire Club, our series which puts forth book club discussion questions for Fantagraphics titles, turns its attention to The Heart of Thomas by Moto Hagio. The Comics Journal interns Tom Graham, Nomi Kane and Jack McKean put together this set of questions. – Ed.] Summary: The Heart of Thomas is a manga by Moto Hagio about students in a German boarding school for boys. The boys deal with tragic death, romantic love amongst each other and have more lighthearted concerns about popularity, rumors and cliques. Questions: How does the story address gender conventions or stereotypes? How do the characters deal with complex emotions that…
Peanuts Every Sunday: full color comics by Schulz
When Dorothy first finds herself in Oz, the whole world refocuses and shifts from black and white to full color. The time has come for Peanuts to turn a page into the same spectrum! Coming in the Fall of 2013, Fantagraphics will be releasing Peanuts Every Sunday: 1952-1955 in resplendent remastered colors. Each volume will contain four years of Sunday comics just the way Charles M. Schulz intended, in crisp full color. You don't have to be a white witch to see the beauty in these comics. Publisher Gary Groth stated, "We always felt that the best format for The Complete Peanuts was a…
Be our Valentine! Sexytime at Fantagraphics Bookstore on February 9
Be our Valentine! Sexytime at Fantagraphics Bookstore on February 9. January 31, 2013 – Seattle, WA. The 1960s ushered in era of sexual liberation that profoundly influenced American pop culture. The social stigma was removed from adult films, which were openly advertised in major publications and attracted throngs of curious patrons. Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery examines the aesthetics of erotic movie posters in Sexytime: The Post-Porn Rise of the Pornoisseur opening Saturday, February 9 from 6:00 to 9:00 PM. Grindhouse movie aficionado Jacques Boyreau assembled an amazing collection of porn movie posters with lurid titles like Teddy Bare, Hot Lunch,…
Fantagraphics Books to Publish In Case We Die, a Novel by Danny Bland
FANTAGRAPHICS BOOKS TO PUBLISH IN CASE WE DIE, A NOVEL BY DANNY BLAND (not final cover) SEATTLE, WA 1/23/13 — Fantagraphics Books is proud to announce the forthcoming summer 2013 publication of In Case We Die, the first novel by longtime Seattle music figure Danny Bland, which follows a pair of addict outsiders who find themselves locked in the palpable, dizzy grunge-rock drug scene of '90s Seattle. The book will also be supported by a unique audiobook project from Seattle's Local638Records. It wasn't the pounding headache or the all-too familiar taste of blood in my mouth that woke me that…
Fantagraphics presents Michael Jordan: Bull on Parade by Wilfred Santiago in March 2014
(not final cover) 15 seasons. 1,072 games. 41,011 minutes of basketball. Every kid, fan and often other players wished they could “Be Like Mike.” The man who inspired a generation of children to lace up their high-tops will be depicted in a kinetic graphic novel fit for the greatest basketball player of all time. Wilfred Santiago, the creator of the acclaimed and best-selling 21: The Story of Roberto Clemente, depicts Jordan's public successes, private struggles and all the noise in between in his dynamic full-color graphic novel called Michael Jordan: Bull on Parade. Eric Reynolds, Associate Publisher and known ball-hog, had this to say…
Fantagraphics Uncovers Your Nightmares with New Works from Julia Gfrörer and Ben Catmull
(not final cover) The living will forever be obsessed with death and those who have started on that grand adventure before them. This Fall, Fantagraphics presents two books to capture the imagination and haunt each and every night by the young and talented Julia Gfrörer and Ben Catmull. Black Is the Colorby Julia Gfrörer September 2013 $9.99 Paperback • 72 pagesBlack-and-white • 6" x 9"ISBN: 978-1-60699-717-8 The push and pull, ebb and flow of the water calls out to all men. In this harrowing new graphic novella, Black Is the Color, Julia Gfrörer delicately hatches away this sailor-at-sea story until…
Nijigahara Holograph is coming
Nijigahara Holograph by Inio Asano; translated by Matt Thorn February 2014 $26.99 Hardcover • 200 pages Black-and-white • 7" x 9.25" ISBN: 978-1-60699-583-9 Fantagraphics continues its line of acclaimed literary manga with new classic Nijigahara Holograph by Inio Asano. As society slowly spirals into darkness an unexplained explosion in the butterfly population is just the first of many curiosities in the town where rumors of a creature in a tunnel under the school spread like wildfire. A curse haunts the town as the story follows the scapegoat, Arié, who is plunged into the tunnel's horrors and offered up to the creature. Many…
Jim Woodring gets Problematic at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery
January 3, 2013 – Seattle, WA. Visionary artist and cartoonist Jim Woodring presents Problematic, an enlightening look inside his creative process, at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery opening Saturday, January 12 from 6:00 to 9:00 PM. Woodring is rarely without a pocket-sized Moleskine sketchbook, in which he captures character studies, sight gags, emblems, dream motifs, and other fugitive impressions. He has filled at least one a month for the past 8 years. Problematic collects random images from these sketchbooks from 2004 – 2012. The resulting book is, in Woodring’s words, "an idea battery loaded with shorthand references to long game insights." The exhibition includes…
Eat More Bikes with Nathan Bulmer at Fantagraphics Bookstore!
End the year in style with a trip to Georgetown on Sunday, December 30 from 2:00 to 4:00 PM as Fantagraphics Bookstore welcomes Brooklyn, NY cartoonist Nathan Bulmer back to his home town of Seattle. Bulmer will sign copies of his new comix collection, Eat More Bikes, from Canada's adventurous Koyama Press. A recent graduate of New York's storied School of Visual Art, Bulmer made an immediate impact with his daily Eat More Bikes comix art blog. He returns to Seattle with a new anthology of these strips, as well as a handful of hilarious self-published minicomics. The festivities include…
The Unexpurgated “Swamp Talk” Annotations from Pogo Vol. 2
The edited version of these annotations by R.C. Harvey appears in Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips Vol. 2 – Bona Fide Balderdash by Walt Kelly. – Ed. Swamp TalkAnnotations and Historical DataBy R.C. Harvey lthough celebrated for his political allegory and satire, Walt Kelly laced Pogo with allusions to other aspects of contemporary life in America, plus literary references and snatches of poetry. In our less than literate society of 140-character communiques, many of Kelly’s nods at literature are obscure to the point of irrelevance, and the targets of much of his political sniping are no longer visible: sixty…
