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Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery is burning with love in February. This Saturday, February 1 finds rising star Julia Gfrörer signing the sensational new book Black Is the Color. Her story of a castaway sailor’s attraction to a nefarious mermaid examines the dubious value of maintaining dignity to the detriment of intimacy, and the erotic potential of the worst-case scenario. On Saturday, February 8 from 6:00 to 9:00 PM we open a colorful exhibition of art and artifacts by Virgil Partch, one of midcentury America’s most influential humorists. This event coincides with the festive Georgetown Art Attack featuring challenging visual and…

Insect Bath #1 by various artists; edited by Jason T. Milespublished by Profanity Hill; distributed by Fantagraphics 34-page black & white comic book • $3.99 Ships in: February 2014 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now   Out of the nihilist inkwell and printed in poison! Meet the finest in new cosmic horror! Face melters from: Max Clotfelter (Henry & Glenn Forever), Alex Delaney (Rapt in Fear), Eamon Espey (Wormdye and Songs of the Abyss), Noel Freibert (Weird Magazine), Sammy Harkham (The Simpsons' Tree House of Horror, Kramers Ergot and Everything Together), Juliacks (Swell and Rock That Never Sleeps), Jason T. Miles (Love Wins),…

Just arrived and shipping now from our mail-order department: Zero Hour and Other Stories (The EC Comics Library)Illustrated by Jack Kamen; written by Al Feldstein et al. 170-page black & white 7.25" x 10.25" hardcover • $28.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-704-8 See Previews / Order Now BARGAIN COMBO: Sucker Bait + Zero Hour Gift Set Price: $57.98 $46.38 Jack Kamen's deceptively wholesome approach to comics storytelling was never put to better use than in the science fiction shockers Al Feldstein wrote for him at EC Comics. Together, the two conspired to exploit Kamen's clean-yet-lush graphics with fantasies of the future that take a startlingly brutal…

Just arrived and shipping now from our mail-order department: Sucker Bait and Other Stories (The EC Comics Library)Illustrated by Graham Ingels; written by Al Feldstein et al. 216-page black & white 7.25" x 10.25" hardcover • $28.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-689-8 See Previews / Order Now BARGAIN COMBO: Sucker Bait + Zero Hour Gift Set Price: $57.98 $46.38 Before Halloween and Freddy Krueger and Night of the Living Dead, there were EC horror Comics. And before John Carpenter and Wes Craven and George Romero, there was Graham Ingels. "Ghastly" Ingels's fine-line depictions of the corruption of flesh and nature made him the premier artist for…

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.   Prince Valiant Vol. 8: 1951-1952 by Hal Foster 120-page full-color 10.25" x 14" hardcover • $35.00ISBN: 978-1-60699-699-0   "Medieval swordplay and adventure have never been as glorious as in Foster's Sunday-only comic strip…. Prince Valiant is one of the best-drawn comics ever, and this new edition does ample justice to its achievement." –…

Just arrived and shipping now from our mail-order department: Prince Valiant Vol. 8: 1951-1952 by Hal Foster 120-page full-color 10.25" x 14" hardcover • $35.00ISBN: 978-1-60699-699-0 See Previews / Order Now SPECIAL OFFER: Add Prince Valiant Vol. 9 (coming Spring 2014) or Vols. 9 & 10 (coming Fall 2014) to your order for just $27.99 each, a savings of 20% off the cover price! Use the option menu on the product details page to subscribe. This eighth sumptuous volume of Hal Foster's Prince Valiant concludes "The Missionaries," the epic adventure that follows Val and several of his fellow knights to Rome on…

  This Tuesday, editor and designer Jonathan Barli will give a talk on cartoonist Virgil Partch, aka VIP.  Barli recently edited and designed the recent collection The Mad World of Virgil Partch. The seventy-second meeting of the NY Comics & Picture-story Symposium will be held on January 28, 2014 at 7:00 PM at Parsons The New School, 2 West 13th Street, in the Bark Room (off the lobby). Free and open to the public, just make sure not to flask it publically. From the symposium website: Jonathan Barli on The Mad World of Virgil Partch. An in-depth look at the life and art of one…

Young Romance 2: The Early Simon & Kirby Romance Comicsby Joe Simon & Jack Kirby 200-page full-color 7.75" x 10" hardcover • $29.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-732-1 Ships in: March 2014 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now From tears to soda fountains, from mobsters to pretty ingénues in freshly pressed dresses, the stories of love and betrayal herein will prompt you to grab a tissue box or swoon in delight. Joe Simon and Jack Kirby's sensational romance comics continue in this sequel to 2012's acclaimed Young Romance. This volume covers 1947 through 1949 and includes stories about women from all walks of life —…

  As reported by the Oregonian, the 2014 Oregon Book Award short lists have been announced. Oil and Water, a graphic novel about the cleanup of Deepwater Horizon oil spill, by Steve Duin and Shannon Wheeler is up for the Pacific Northwest College of Art Graphic Literature Award.   Duin and Wheeler are in line with Barry Deutsch ("Hereville: How Mirka Met a Meteorite"), Natalie Nourigat of Portland ("Between Gears"), Joe Sacco of Portland ("Journalism") and Craig Thompson of Portland ("Habibi"). Good luck to all but mostly Duin and Wheeler!   For those wanting to attend the Oregon Book Awards ceremony is…

We're thrilled to share that the great Kevin Huizenga will be performing a reading on Thursday, February 27th at Bryn Mawr College! Join the acclaimed artist behind the Ignatz-Award-Winning series Ganges in the Quita Woodward Room in Thomas Hall from 4:00 to 6:00 PM.  After his reading, he'll be joined by Shiamin Kwa, the Assistant Professor of East Asian Studies, for a public discussion.  Light refreshments will be served. Thomas Great Hall is located at Bryn Mawr College, 101 N. Merion Avenue in Bryn Mawr, PA.