This week's comic shop shipment is slated to include the following new titles. See more about each book at the links, and contact your local shop to confirm availability.
32-page full-color comic book • $4.95
"It really has been almost exactly a year since #8! Fancy that. Previous Hate Annuals have been a catchall for whatever Peter Bagge's been drawing lately, plus a short check-in with Buddy Bradley as he ages in real time; this time, the Buddy-and-Lisa story is longer than usual. There's something I really admire about Bagge's sticktoitiveness." – Douglas Wolk, Comics Alliance
"…I’m most looking forward to reading the Hate Annual, if only cause we get new Buddy Bradley adventures so infrequently these days." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
"Pete Bagge’s Hate Annual is on fairly regular scheduling now, by which I mean I think it’s roughly a year since we saw the last one. Top marks, Mr Bagge. Hate Annual #9 includes the first full-length Buddy story in a decade…" – Gosh! Comics
"Each Hate annual is like a weekend visit from a best friend you haven't seen in years. This issue is the first full-length Buddy Bradley story in a decade. Buddy goes along with Lisa as she reunites with her family for the first time in twenty years, and it quickly becomes apparent why she's been avoiding them." – Benn Ray (Atomic Books), Largehearted Boy
"I like how loopy and ridiculous the Buddy Bradley narrative has become in the Hate Annuals." – Tom Spurgeon, The Comics Reporter
Love from the Shadows
by Gilbert Hernandez
120-page black & white 5.75" x 8.5" hardcover • $19.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-406-1
"The newest installment of Gilbert Hernandez's series of standalone "adaptations" of nonexistent exploitation movies, and the most screwed-up by far. (That's a good thing.) There are lots of comics that try for a "cinematic" tone, but Gilbert H. is the only cartoonist I can think of who's tried to approximate the weird narrative power of the kinds of flaws you only really find in movies–dodgy special effects and awkward editing become deliberate, controlled dramatic devices here." – Douglas Wolk, Comics Alliance
"Gilbert Hernandez’s latest graphic novel is yet another delightfully loopy and hauntingly surreal entry in his ongoing, loosely-related 'Fritz' series and would be my pick of the week, certainly for any self-respecting Love and Rockets fan." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
"Love from the Shadows is Gilbert Hernandez’s third original hardcover graphic novel (after Chance in Hell and The Troublemakers) about Love & Rockets’ Fritz as a Z-movie actress. 'Erotic, harrowing, graphically violent, and astonishingly grim, Love from the Shadows sees Hernandez plunging ever further into his own heart of darkness,' writes one reviewer over at TCJ, adding 'Christ, what a f*cking book.'" – Gosh! Comics
"B-movie actress Fritz, from Love & Rockets, stars in this thriller of odd sexual obsession, suicide and more." – Benn Ray (Atomic Books), Largehearted Boy
"Can’t resist splashing some Los Bros art on here for all to enjoy because, well, because it is Gilbert Hernandez and because we can never get enough of Los Bros, they just make our days better…" – Forbidden Planet International
And at TCJ.com it's Joe McCulloch's… "CONFLICT OF INTEREST RESERVOIR: Some shops seem to have gotten it in last Wednesday — I’ve personally seen it sitting around — but Diamond has designated this week as the official release of Hate Annual #9, in which Peter Bagge again visits with Buddy Bradley and family, this time for most of the 32-page issue’s space; $4.95. Also, Gilbert Hernandez brings Love from the Shadows, the latest in his Fritz 'movie' series (this time the character plays various male and female roles), which has already inspired diverse reactions on this very site; $19.99."