This is it: The ideal antidote to these trying times. Slim’s wit, style, charm, and grace will make the world vout oroonee in no time. As with all Proper Boxes, this one includes 4 CDs packed to the limit (102 tracks total!) for over 5 hours of music -- all remastered in the UK at the highest possible standards for music recorded during this period -- and a 44 page booklet containing a comprehensive history of Slim's career along with fab photos, old ads, record labels, and, best of all, complete track by track annotation -- where you’ll note the appearances of Slam Stewart, Ben Webster, Zutty Singleton, Dizzy Gillespie & Charlie...

Stroppy is here: it's ALL NEW; it's a self-contained whole; it's by Canadian cartoonist extraordinaire, Marc Bell; it's...a giant-size, full-colour, underground comix classic presented to an unsuspecting [well, not for long] public in the guise of a hardcover graphic novella. Stroppy channels the vigorous populist cartooning energy that can trace its roots back to the classic comics strips – especially the depression-era Popeye by E.C. Segar and Harold Grey's Little Orphan Annie. This vital populism was an integral part of American life and lore, but with the advent of the war economy in the late-1930s, it was sublimated into the national...

GIlbert Hernandez enthusiasts, aficionados, completists and collectors have reason to celebrate the release of Comics Dementia. Here, collected in a single volume, we have over 200 pages of GIlbert's wildest and wooliest comics, drawn together from hither and yon in the comics firmament. Not for the faint of heart or weak of mind, the work here is where Gilbert cuts loose and lets you have it, right in the eyes! So, hold onto your hats! 64 stories in all!

A long time coming, Collier's Popular Press is a hefty softcover volume just released by Conundrum Press. It starts off with an introduction by noted Canadian comics scholar, Jeet Heer, who situates Collier's work here squarely in the tradition of "observational cartooning," for which he provides a concise history before ushering in a whoppin' 200 pages of Collier comics, originally published over three decades in a variety of Canadian newspapers and magazines – few, if any, of which have previously reached the straining eyeballs of stateside comics readers. In addition, a series of Collier's essays and personal recollections are mixed...

The long awaited follow up toAbandoned Carshas arrived.The Lonesome Gois a giant oversize volume packed with more carefully placed ink lines than any book this side ofBlack Hole.Taking a hint from theLegend of Duluoz, St. Louis resident and Washington University lecturer, Tim Lane takes a turn down aLost Highway on aSavage Night, whereA Good Man Is Hard to Findand a sprawling chaos of comics ensues, recorded employing a visual lexicon that is partCharles Biroand partCharles Burnsand shines a light onthose parts of the American psyche that are usually left festering in the dark, allin the service of creating an acutely observed and fully...

It's time for comics connoisseurs to crank up their cogitation once again, as a new issue of Ganges is in stock and on sale here at The Copacetic Comics Company. And the verdict? Kevin Huizenga once again delivers the goods! This time around we have the inner workings of an agitated mind – that of Glenn Ganges, to answer your question – at the edge of sleep, visually embodied as its own cartoon being, distinct and separate from – if in many respects identical to – the body housing this mind. All readers who have ever had a rough time falling asleep and have had their mind wander to and fro seemingly of its "own" accord will have plenty to...

"The definitive course in comics narrative" continues, as Mastering Comics ventures deeper into the wilderness of formal comics instruction, widening and extending the trail blazed by Drawing Words & Writing Pictures. This horizontally formatted volume follows the same textbookish format as its precursor; this time around divided into eleven lessons, rather than 15, and at 318 pages is a tad heftier. This works out to lessons that are on average 50% longer and more in depth. In other words, Mastering Comics is a 200 level class to DW&WP's 100 level (although the authors clearly state that DW&WP is not a prerequisite for MC)....

It took us a minute to get this one in, due to screwball comedy hi-jinx. At long last, Saul Steinberg's first book, from way back in 1947 (?) is back in print in this luxe oversize hardcover edition fro NYRB, who have this to say about it:

"To escape fascist Europe, the artist Saul Steinberg drew his way to America. He made it to New York in 1942 already in contract with The New Yorker, but was soon called up to serve in the US Naval Reserve in World War II. This book, All In Line, is a memoir-via-drawing of this key time in Steinberg’s life, when he began to find his line and his way as an American.

In works for The New Yorker and...

Gilbert's long awaited return to the multi-generational saga form that he made his own in Palomar is here, and we are happy to report that it is a book that is as rewarding as it was long in coming. We are given a 20th century spanning tale of five generations of the Reyes clan that centers on the titular Julio and precisely matches the span of his life. Taking place in a nameless rural town that is presumably located somewhere in southern California,Julio's Daytakes its readers through five wars and generation defining events like the Great Depression and The Sixties as they are experienced at the fringes.Julio's Dayis most notable,...

The tale Blankets tells is in most respects a classic coming of age story, but the place -- emotional as well as geographical -- that it is coming from may not be familiar territory for many readers: an abnegating Christianity built on self-denial ensconced in the harsh northern environs of Wisconsin and Michigan. Yet there can be no doubt that the core questions and values dealt with in Blankets are certainly universal ones. Craig Thompson has clearly devoted himself to a serious study of Will Eisner's late work -- from A Contract With God to the present -- and this study has really paid off here. The pacing, the placement of blacks,...