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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. Esperanza: A Love and Rockets Book(Love and Rockets Library: "Locas" Book 5) by Jaime Hernandez 248-page black & white 7.5" x 9.25" softcover • $18.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-449-8 "Yes, I hear people say, Jaime Hernandez, I keep hearing about how great he is and everything, but there are like a million books,…

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "…[T]he stories [in Maggie the Mechanic], of course, suck you in, because they're absurd and funny and warm, and even though they're the kind of stories where it's not a question of whether the good guys will win, only when they will, they're well told and well plotted, and I was sad when they ended. Apparently they're meant to be the sci-fi version of magical realism, which is neat, but the dinosaurs and aliens and rocket ships were far less interesting than seeing the girls get drunk and run around, or even just…

Jason 2009 Exhibition Print – Signeddesigned by Jacob Covey 16" x 22"  3-color silkscreen printsigned by the artist; ships rolled The signed, limited-edition print for Jason's 2009 exhibit at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery features Athos, The Last Musketeer, on a lonely park bench, in artwork originally featured on the cover of The Comics Journal #294. Formerly available only at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery, we are pleased to now offer limited quantities of this exquisite print via mail order! Screenprinted in black, teal and metallic silver on heavyweight white paper.

Nuts by Gahan Wilson 144-page black & white 8" x 8" hardcover • $19.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-454-2 Ships in: September 2011 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now In this thematically and narratively linked series of one-page stories originally published in the National Lampoon’s “Funny Pages” section throughout the 1970s, the master of the macabre eschewed his usual ghouls, vampires, and end-of-the-world scenarios for a wry, pointed look at growing up normal in the real, yet endlessly weird world. Watch as our stoic, hunting-cap-wearing protagonist (known only as “The Kid”) copes with illness, disappointment, strange old relatives, the disappointment of Christmas, life-threatening escapades,…

Today' Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Whether you want to take a stroll down mammary lane with grandpa or are searching for new pomo tattoo ideas, this omnibus look at the various gagsters that brought their pens and inks to the pages of Humorama's various digests from 1938 until the sexual revolution will give you a window into your sexual soul that you didn't know existed and will finally gives rest to the lie that sex was invented in the 60s…. Whether gag panels or slice of life renderings, this is a loving look back at all the dead…

Prince Valiant chronicler (and fine cartoonist in his own right) Brian Kane presented Usagi Yojimbo creator Stan Sakai with this fantastic fan-art mashup of Val and Usagi at the Baltimore Comic Con this past weekend and forwarded it along to us, and now he's given us permission to share it with you! (Click the image for a slightly larger version.) Inspired by this artwork, we had the idea to offer free standard domestic shipping on orders that include at least one Usagi book and at least one Prince Valiant book for the rest of the week! This offer is not…

PREVIEWSworld is offering up yet another 5-page preview of one of our books due in comic shops this week — this time it's Drawing Power: A Compendium of Cartoon Advertising 1870s-1940s. In addition to Dr. Seuss (above) you'll see Buster Brown, Amos 'n' Andy, Winsor McCay and more.

Our good friend Mark Evanier, who's been providing invaluable editorial assistance on our forthcoming Walt Kelly Pogo collections, has posted a very informative must-read update on his blog. Long story short: Volume 1 has gone to the printer and is going to be awesome. But read Mark's entire post for many more details and a much more eloquent description of the book! (And since we know you'll ask: no, these books will not be released in slipcased pairs à la The Complete Peanuts. They're big enough on their own!)

We're all a-buzz over the 2011 Small Press Expo, which is just around the corner on September 10th & 11th in Bethesda, Maryland!  And here are our Fantagraphics panel highlights — plot your weekend accordingly: Saturday, September 10th Excruciating Detail: Drawing the Grotesque1:00 pm | White Flint Amphitheater Historical comics ranging from Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy to the horror comics of the 1950s have specialized in images of the grotesque. Sean T. Collins will speak with cartoonists Lisa Hanawalt (I Want You), Benjamin Marra (Night Business), Tom Neely (The Wolf), and Johnny Ryan (Prison Pit) about the act of drawing horrific, visceral, visual detail in…

Mark Twain's Autobiography 1910-2010 by Michael Kupperman 160-page two-color 6" x 8.25" hardcover • $19.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-491-7 Ships in: September 2011 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now "Here Mister Kupperman," he said, thrusting a manuscript into my hands. "Publish this, and let the world read of my adventures." My name is Mark Twain, and I write these words to you in the good old days of August 2010. "What's that," you say? "Didn't you die a hundred years ago, you old coot?"… The truth is I never died, but the same old rumors got exaggerated and then a bunch of other…