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.
The Lost Art of Ah Pook Is Here: Images from the Graphic Novel
by Malcolm McNeill
168-page full-color 10.25" x 13.25" hardcover • $39.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-445-0
Observed While Falling: Bill Burroughs, Ah Pook, and Me
by Malcolm McNeill
192-page full-color 6.75" x 10.25" hardcover • $29.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-561-7
"Might as well start off with The Lost Art of Ah Pook Is Here: Images From the Graphic Novel, a 168-page hardcover suite of materials composed by artist Malcolm McNeill for an aborted ’70s book collaboration with William S. Burroughs… The Burroughs stuff will not be included in that book, although interested parties may nonetheless want to check out Observed While Falling: Bill Burroughs, Ah Pook, and Me, a new 192-page memoir by McNeill detailing their creative relationship." – Joe McCulloch, The Comics Journal
"My splurge would be the one-two punch of The Lost Art of Ah Pook Is Here and Observed While Falling: Bill Burroughs, Ah Pook and Me by Malcolm McNeill. Ah Pook is a pseudo-comic that Burroughs and McNeill collaborated on but never finished back in the 1970s. The first book offers a look at McNeill’s elaborate paintings for the work, while in the second McNeill writes about his experiences working with the Naked Lunch author. I imagine both books would make for fascinating reading." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
Ralph Azham Vol. 1: Why Would You Lie to Someone You Love?
by Lewis Trondheim
96-page full-color 8.5" x 6.625" hardcover • $14.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-593-8
"…Ralph Azham, Volume 1: Why Would You Lie to Someone You Love [is] Lewis Trondheim’s new fantasy series about a town pariah that might have more going on than first glance would suggest. Trondheim has proved with his contributions to the ongoing Dungeon series that he’s quite comfy in the fantasy milieu, able to create intricate worlds and stories that blend free-spirited humor with emotional gravitas. I expect this will be more of the excellent same." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
"…I like Trondheim and a six-volume fantasy series by him is something I’m ready to begin." – Michael May, Robot 6
"…Lewis Trondheim sees a new (est. 2011) French series released for English delectation with Ralph Azham Vol. 1: Why Would You Lie to Someone You Love?" – Joe McCulloch, The Comics Journal
"Lewis Trondheim is a wonderful, prolific and very mainstream-oriented cartoonist — by the last I mean he has books in print that I can give to just about anybody on my Christmas shopping list, with everyone getting a different book. I liked this one quite a bit on the first read; the writing seemed way more measured than a lot of fantasies in comics form usually seem to me." – Tom Spurgeon, The Comics Reporter
You'll Never Know Book 3: Soldier's Heart
by C. Tyler
128-page full-color 12" x 10.25" hardcover • $29.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-548-8
"… [In] the third and final volume of Carol Tyler’s You’ll Never Know trilogy, …(I hope) we will finally discover what traumatized her father during World War II and haunted him for the rest of his life. Even if we don’t, Tyler’s superb storytelling makes this a book to read over and over again." – Brigid Alverson, Robot 6
"…I’d… grab the third volume of You’ll Never Know, Carol Tyler’s three part saga about her father and how his experiences during WWII shaped him and his family. Tyler is a great cartoonist and woefully under-appreciated, so here’s hoping this final volume gets her some of the recognition she so richly deserves." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
"…Carol Tyler wraps up her hugely admired familial biography series with You’ll Never Know Vol. 3 (of 3): Soldier’s Heart." – Joe McCulloch, The Comics Journal
And finally, The Comics Reporter's Tom Spurgeon on the Malcolm McNeill & C. Tyler books: "As much grief as my former employers sometimes get for things that it's perceived they don't do as well as publisher A, B or C, this week throws a spotlight on two of their great virtues through two top-of-post worthy works: providing a home for archival work of great interest, facilitating later-in-career work from masterful cartoonists of the underground and early-alternative generations. Good on them. Buy both books."