This week's figgy pudding of Online Commentaries and Diversions:
Review: Arsène Schrauwen by Olivier Schrauwen
"Olivier Schrauwen's Arsène Schrauwen is one of the most complex, and simply best, comics released this year. " – Hillary Brown, Paste Magazine
"In this crackpot graphic novel from the historically minded and utterly original Schrauwen, the Belgian cartoonist imagines a fanciful history that slips the bonds of reality almost immediately." – Publisher's Weekly
"Cockeyed, adventurous, and truly bizarre, the first full graphic novel from the Belgian cartoonist sets out to dramatize the heartsick youthful folly of the artist’s dim but determined grandfather." – Sean Rogers, The Globe and Mail
Review: Bumf Vol. 1: I Buggered the Kaiser by Joe Sacco
"BUMF is a delirious exercise in mashup, working in references to 9/11, the Kaiser, 'Bunga Bunga,' drone strikes, Nixon's enemies list, the street execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém in Vietnam, Abu Ghraib, black sites, the Checkers speech, 'Mission Accomplished,' the NSA, and whatever other outrage happened to cross Sacco’s field of vision." – Martin Schneider, Dangerous Minds
"Its imagery is what you might have imagined listening to a Firesign album through headphones in a darkened room…It's an odyssey through an inner space where you can open a door and find yourself at the Battle of Verdun." – R. Fiore, The Comics Journal
Review: The Late Child and Other Animals by Marguerite Van Cook and James Romberger
"The Late Child is a rich and intelligent work, one of the lushest and most giving graphic novels in recent memory." – Jason Sacks, Comics Bulletin
Review: Massive: Gay Erotic Manga and the Men Who Make It edited by Anne Ishii and Graham Kolbeins
"The content of the stories in "Massive" is completely unlike the feathery romanticism of yaoi manga and anime. Rough, even sadistic sex takes the place of wistful longing." – Charles Solomon, IndieWire
Review: Cochlea & Eustachia by Hans Rickheit
"Originally a webcomic, this new graphic novel from Fantagraphics follows two identical women, Cochlea and Eustachia…who wear domino masks and only the top half of their lingerie while wandering curiously, but without any real intentions, through a dream-like environment that mixes French nouveau, steampunk, Joel-Peter Witkin, Sigmund Freud, MC Escher, and lots of weird creatures." – Rich Barrett, Mental Floss