Pocket Full of Rain – Exclusive Preview

{product_snapshot:id=1484,true,false,true,left} An Anthology of Materful Shorts from the Creator of I Killed Adolf Hitler This multifaceted anthology collects over 25 stories from the first decade of Jason’s career, including his remarkable calling card, the novella-length thriller “Pocket Full of Rain,” which has never before been published in English. Like a number of his initial stories, “Pocket” is actually drawn with realistic human beings instead of blank-faced animal characters — a true revelation for Jason fans. In fact, this book showcases three distinct styles: his earliest “realistic” drawing style (used to unsettling effect in some particularly creepy stories), an intermediate “bighead”…

Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko – Exclusive Preview

{product_snapshot:id=1474,true,false,true,left} The First Critical Retrospective of the Work of the Reclusive Spider-Man Co-Creator Steve Ditko is best known as the co-creator, with Stan Lee, of Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, and other classic Marvel and DC characters. But, in the context of Steve Ditko’s 50-year career in comics, his creative involvement with Spider-Man is merely the tip of the iceberg. Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko is a coffee table art book tracing Ditko’s life and career, his unparalleled stylistic innovations, and his strict adherence to his philosophical principles, with lush displays of obscure and popular art from the thousands…

Strange and Stranger – Introduction by Blake Bell

{product_snapshot:id=1474,true,false,true,left}By the 1950s, the superhero genre had been reduced to a minor piece of the comic-book mosaic. Patriots like Captain America — designed to boost the country’s morale and soothe wartime angst — ran aground of purpose with the end of World War II. The majority of heroes had been retired by the late ’40s, including the entire Timely Comics line, featuring Captain America, Sub-Mariner, and the Human Torch. The industry’s postwar output splintered into several distinct themes — crime, teen, funny animals, Western, war, and romance. Yet in the popular imagination the defining 1950s comics genre was horror. It…