Diamond Comics Distributors has confirmed with us that the following 4 books are shipping this week, though only one is included on their official weekly shipping list. Therefore, most of these will likely be reappearing with additional comics-blogger blurbs in next week's New Comics Day post. Be extra-sure to contact your local shop to confirm availability. Previews and more info about each book, as always, at the links below:
The Arctic Marauder
by Jacques Tardi
64-page black & white 9" x 11.75" hardcover • $16.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-435-1
"If The Arctic Marauder is indeed out this week – ComicList lists it, but Diamond doesn’t – I’m totally getting that too, budget be damned…" – Michael May, Robot 6
Dungeon Quest, Book 2
by Joe Daly
136-page black & white 6" x 8.25" softcover • $12.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-436-8
"Joe Daly's D&D/stoner/sword-and-sorcery semi-parody epic continues. Opening caption: 'In their ongoing mystical quest to find the missing parts of the Atlantean resonator guitar our heroes find themselves wandering through the primeval gloom of Fireburg Forest in an attempt to find the prophet and poet, Bromedes, and return his borrowed penis sheath…' That about sums up the aesthetic here." – Douglas Wolk, Comics Alliance
Krazy & Ignatz 1919-1921: A Kind, Belevolent and Amiable Brick
by George Herriman
176-page black & white 9" x 12" softcover • $24.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-364-4
"The next-to-last volume of Fantagraphics' reprint of all of George Herriman's miraculous 'Krazy Kat' Sunday strips. I could go on about this stuff all day, so I won't start, except to say: not for fast quaffing, for slow sipping." – Douglas Wolk, Comics Alliance
"Hey, it's a book featuring page after page of the best comic ever. Krazy Kat is so good that if you don't get it, it's better for you in the long run that you do whatever is necessary to change yourself until you do get it." – Tom Spurgeon, The Comics Reporter
"Fantagraphics are still enthusiastically plowing on with their plan to collect every Krazy Kat Sunday page ever, which is about as ambitious a plan as they come. A Kind, Benevolent and Amiable Brick is the penultimate volume of the series, collecting over 150 pieces published between 1919 and 1921. As usual, they’re housed in a handsome package designed by the esteemed Mr. Chris Ware so they’ll match the others on your shelf, or near enough, providing he isn’t pulling a wacky Acme Novelty Library design on us." – Gosh! Comics
"CONFLICT OF INTEREST RESERVOIR: And speaking of commonalities with Spawn and Youngblood, Krazy & Ignatz 1919-1921: A Kind, Benevolent and Amiable Brick offers 176 pages of blood-drenched chrome and muscle carnage as you like it…" – Joe McCulloch, The Comics Journal
Mome Vol. 21 – Winter 2011
by various artists; edited by Eric Reynolds
112-page full-color 7" x 9" softcover • $14.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-394-1
"From Fantagraphics you can get the latest instalment in their acclaimed comics anthology Mome, now in its sixth (!) year. There’s stuff from Sara Edward-Corbett, Steven Weissman (Chewing Gum in Church), Sergio Ponchione (Grotesque), Nate Neal, Dash Shaw (Bottomless Belly Button), Jon Adams, Tom Kaczynski, T. Edward Bak, Derek Van Gieson, Kurt Wolfgang, Lilli Carré (The Lagoon), Nicolas Mahler (Van Helsing’s Night Off) and Josh Simmons, whose biography goes 'Simmons draws comics about happy bunnies, cirkus folks, and violent sex. He is a nice young man.'" – Gosh! Comics
On all of them:
"If I had $15: It’s a toss-up between the latest volume of Mome [and] the second volume of Joe Daly’s great stoners-meet-D&D fantasy Dungeon Quest… Splurge: Two big books out this week from Fantagraphics, both must-buys, at least for me. The first is Krazy & Ignatz 1919-1921 which collects more wonderful Herriman goodness. The second is The Arctic Maurader, the latest release in Fanta’s ongoing Jacques Tardi library. This one is particularly interesting as it’s a) a parody/homage of sorts to the classic Jules Verne/H.G. Wells/19th-century pulp stories; and b) done in a scratchboard-style motif designed to emulate woodcuts that apparently all but drove the artist around the bend. Since I’m splurging, I’ll get them both." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6