After a long delay – the result of a highly mobile, and doubtless stressful, period in Craig Thompson's life (see note at issue's end for details) – the ninth issue of Ginseng Roots has at long last arrived! This time around we are given a detailed look at the business of Wisconsin ginseng at its strong links to mainland China and Taiwan. Another amazing, highly informative, educational and entertaining issue of this epochal series. Don't miss it!

Boundless is a 248 assemblage composed of ninetales: World Class City;Body Pods;The Clairfree System;1. Jenny;Half Life;Darla!;bedbug;Sexcoven;Boundless. Each is possessed of itsown individual artistic personality, chosen to best visually convey the character of the story:rough and ready;smooth and silky;precise;loose;colorful;stark. Here, the real story is the way in which the taleis told. Decision embodied in line and composition.

Each of the pieces, while being a unique organic whole in and of itself, is part of a greater whole as well; part ofa tapestric unity. These stories deal with individuals alone, together and in groups. They...

This startlingly well produced Big Book, the latest from the greatest full grown adult comics whiz kid, that literary minded artistic genius and graphic technician extraordinaire who possesses what could possibly be the most divided consciousness in a fully-functioning adult in the known world -- yes, that's right, Mr. Chris Ware -- collects material previously presented in the comics periodical Acme Novelty Library #7 & #15 (AKA Acme Novelty Big Book of Jokes #1 & #2 ) published by Fantagraphics, along with plenty of finely crafted, bruising new work with which it has been seamlessly integrated, all bundled together in an...

Yes, it has finally come to pass: Ed the Happy Clown is back in print in book form for the first time in decades, in what is likely to be the definitive edition. This is the ground breaking work that both put Chester Brown on the map and broadened the horizons of comics in the 1980s, causing a seismic shift in its landscape and charting a new direction away from heroic fantasy through a methodology that, in hindsight, can be seen to be – at least in some respects – a deconstruction of the psychological as well as epistemological underpinnings of that genre, which has since become dominated by corporate entertainment behemoths. Ed the Happy...

Brecht Evens, creator of The Wrong Place, The Making Of and Panther (all of which except forPanther, which was, thankfully, just reprtinted arecurrently – and shockingly –out of print here in North America)has,in TheCity of Belgium,likely produced hismasterpiece.There might not be any other work that compares in the effectiveness ofits conveyance of the feeling of being immersed in the overflowing of city life, of the sense of being aware of everything, of being surrounded byso much – too much – that ishappening all aroundat every moment. Ariotous explosion of color and details communicate the overwhelming feelings that accompany this...

Sacha Mardou is a natural born comics storyteller. Her pen & ink characters live and breath on the page. The situations they find themselves in, their reactions to them, and the way it all plays out in the pages of her comics works have a verisimilitude that few other comics creators can match. The Sky in Stereois her first foray into long form comics (i.e., a graphic novel). She's been at work on it for a number of years (she and her husband, fellow comics maker, Ted May are also raising a child, who was an infant at the start of Sky in Stereo) and has released two of it's chapters as successful stand-alone comics. Here in this...

I Am Young reads likea series oflushly renderedpostcards sent through time from eras past, eachaccompanied by an illustrated "soundtrack" consisting of classic LPs. Running throughout, as the main theme, is an ill-starred love story set to the music, lives and times of The Beatles. Other LPs incorporated into the narratives of love and heartbreak are Eddy Arnold's Anytime, The Beach Boys Pet Sounds, theTom Jones debut, Along Came Jones (ironic or not ironic? / that is the question), along withChuck Berry's greatest hits collection, The Great Twenty-Eight –and it all gets started with a Brunswick 78 rpm 10" of Cab Calloway's "St. James...

No one has ever created better Christmas comics than Carl Barks. "Christmas on Bear Mountain" is more than just another Barks Christmas Classic, however: it has the added historical significance of being the story for which Barks created his most famous character: Scrooge McDuck – Uncle Scrooge to Donald and his nephews. Scrooge – obviously patterned after the character of the same name form Charles Dickens'sA Christmas Carol– was originally created simply as the dramatic foil for Donald and his nephews in this particular story that was originally released for Christmas in 1947, and that was supposed to be that... but Barks quickly...

Principles derived in classical antiquity and then revived during the renaissance are given a new lease on life in comics (Renaissance II: Comics?) through the work of Frank Santoro.The Golden Section,Dynamic Symmetry, andplenty moreare all incorporated into the underlying structure of his work, and nowhere more so than here. The completePompeiigraphic novel premiered at the 2013 SPX, a year after its first chapter had appeared as a limited edition risograph at the 2012 SPX (and which went on to sell out in the blink of an eye).

The book's look and feel transmits an æsthetic charge even before it is opened to reveal a 144 page work,...

Those few unfortunate souls among you who strayed and so failed to get a hold of this singular, epic and amazing comics masterwork now have now been given a second -- and less expensive -- chance. Make sure you take it. To learn more, click on the cover image at left to read our in depth review.