Fantagraphics Blog FantaBlog

  Monte Schulz's book tour continues this week in Northern California after a weekend respite, kicking off tomorrow in San Francisco, Wednesday in Santa Rosa, Thursday in Corte Madera and Saturday in Monte's hometown of Grass Valley! Tuesday, Oct. 20, 7PM Modern Times Bookstore888 Valencia St.San Francisco, CA 94110-1739Tel: 415.282.9246 Wednesday, Oct. 21, 7PM Copperfield's Books2316 Montgomery DriveSanta Rosa, CA 95405Tel: 707.578.8938 Thursday, Oct. 22, 7PM Book Passage51 Tamal Vista Blvd. Corte Madera, CA 94925Tel: 415.927.0960 x239 Saturday, Oct. 24, 2PM The Bookseller107 Mill St. Grass Valley, CA 95945Tel: 530.272.2131

Thanks to everybody who came out to see us at the Alternative Press Expo in San Francisco this weekend! As always we loved meeting fans and hanging out with our pals and colleagues. This year's gold star goes to Frank Santoro, who provided us with our best photo ops and cheerfully helped us out packing up at the end of the show. We can't wait to read your Comics Comics post about the ninja comics you bought, Frank! Frank flexes the muscles he'd later use packing boxes, while Dash Shaw and Jon Vermilyea look on. Note the early, un-dustjacketed copies…

Hi from San Francisco! Janice puts the finishing touches on our table setup Looky all them books. Spot the debuts! Frank Santoro & Jon Vermilyea, ready to ROCK (and sign issues of Mome)! T. Edward Bak & Dash Shaw Lilli Carré took a break from signing her newest book at the Little Otsu table to visit with John Pham and check out Sublife Vol. 2

It might already be Saturday where you are, but we don't want you to miss your Friday webcomics update! I don't think the folks at Cryptomundo could ever have imagined the events of this week's Blecky Yuckerella strip by Johnny Ryan…. …it's something completely different (no Yikes!) in this week's strip from Steven Weissman ("Chapter 1 of my new Graphic Novel, ha ha" says Steven)… …and careers, jealousy and bad dancing are topics of our Monday-Friday Rocky strips by Martin Kellerman. Enjoy!

Cory Doctorow praises Monte Schulz's new novel, THIS SIDE OF JORDAN, on BoingBoing this morning. "Did I mention how good the writing is? The writing is excellent… The setting is so vivid I felt like I could fall into the book and lose myself there, landing on some dusty road in a tourist camp where the hicks waited to be fleeced or killed by Chester," he writes. Monte's tour takes a few days off and reconvenes next Tuesday in San Francisco: Tues., Oct. 20, 7PM • Modern Times Books, San Francisco, CAWed., Oct. 21, 7PM • Copperfield's Books, Santa Rosa, CAThurs., Oct. 22,…

Now available for preview and pre-order: Strange Suspense: The Steve Ditko Archives Vol. 1. Before Spider-Man, before Dr. Strange, before Mr. A, the legendary Steve Ditko was conjuring all manners of horrors at his drawing table. For the first time, all of Ditko's pre-Comics Code horror and suspense stories from the first two years of his career are collected in one beautifully designed hardcover, restored to their full, lurid, four-color glory. Edited and with an introduction by Blake Bell, author of the acclaimed biography Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko. We've put together an exclusive 15-page PDF excerpt…

  Fantagraphics is storming APE this weekend in San Francisco. Come check out a slew of new books and get 'em signed by some amazing cartoonists! FANTAGRAPHICS SIGNINGS AT APE: SATURDAY   11AM – 1PM: Jon Vermilyea (MOME) & Frank Santoro (MOME) 12PM-12:45PM: SPOTLIGHT ON DASH SHAW  1PM – 3PM: Dash Shaw & T. Edward Bak (MOME)  3PM – 5PM: John Pham 5PM – 7PM: Renée French & Andrice Arp (MOME)   SUNDAY   11AM – 1PM: Jon Vermilyea (MOME), Frank Santoro (MOME) & Dash Shaw 1PM – 3PM: T. Edward Bak (MOME) & John Pham 3PM – 5PM: Renée French (MOME) & Andrice Arp (MOME)   NEW…

Not sure if there will be an Online Commentary & Diversions update tomorrow or Monday, as your humble correspondent will be en route to and from San Francisco for APE. Say, we should have an APE announcement coming up any time now. • Review: "Femke Hiemstra, a Dutch artist, was 'raised on liquorice and buttermilk,' in her words. Fittingly enough, her work is an alluring mixture of sweet and sour. … Hiemstra… does a wonderful job of offsetting her cuteness with a measure of tears, skeletons, Venus fly-traps and demons. The palette, meanwhile, is unrepentantly pretty — can we call…

Tim Lane is working on a cut-out-n-assemble diorama of The Temptations for his next book Folktales — on his blog he shares some of the artwork in progress and a few Temptations tunes to boot.

Now available for preview and pre-order: Pim & Francie: The Golden Bear Days and Pim & Francie: The Golden Bear Days – Collectors Edition by Al Columbia. One of our most hotly-anticipated books of the year, this gorgeous grimoire is part alchemy, part art book, part storybook, part comic book, and part conceptual art, a broken jigsaw puzzle of a book starring two childlike imps whose irresponsible antics get them into horrific trouble. We've put together an exclusive 24-page PDF excerpt which you can download right here. This book is scheduled to be in stock and ready to ship as…