Here it is: the final (>sob!<) Peanuts strips by Charles M. Schulz, the last of which, the final Sunday page, originally appeared on the same day as Schulz's obituary, as he passed on from this world (and doubtless onto the Sphere of True Comics) the day before its publication. The editors cleverly filled out what would have otherwise been a slim volume by bookending the conclusion of Peanuts with the complete collection of Schulz's precursor strip to Peanuts, L'il Folks. And, to top it all off, this volume is introduced by none other than the President of the United States of America, Barack Obama! A fitting finale.

And here's another reason to get up in the morning: a new release by Kevin H. This one is fairly convoluted in its conception and execution, but therein lies part of its appeal. Wild Kingdom had its humble beginnings in Super Monster 12 that was first published way back at the dawn of the millennium. This material was then bolstered and slightly reconfigured for the February 2006 release of the fourth issue of Or Else, his since discontinued Drawn & Quarterly series. And, now with Wild Kingdom, the material at last receives its apotheosis. The core meaning of Wild Kingdom is surrounded by a dense underbrush of irony that must be...

The greatness continues! 1950 was the year of Carl Barks. Along with the title track this volume includes the mega-classics, "In Ancient Persia," "The Magic Hour Glass," "Big-Top Bedlam," the lesser know but nonetheless classic Christmas tale, "You Can't Guess," and perhaps the greatest summer vaction comic book story ever penned, "Vacation Time." Also on hand are a lone ten-pager from WDC&S #117 and three low-profile tales that accompanied "Vacation Time" in the pages of Vacation Parade #1: a one-page written but not drawn by Barks, and two tales that are drawn but, unusually,not written by Barks; one featuring Grandma Duck, and one...

For twenty years and counting, Scott McCloud's explication of the mechanics of comics remains essential.



Testamonials:

<>"If you've ever felt bad about wasting your life reading comics, then check out Scott McCloud's classic book immediately. You might still feel you've wasted your life, but you'll know why, and you'll be proud."
-Matt Groening, creator ofThe Simpsons

<>"In one lucid, well-designed chapter after another, [McCloud] guides us through the elements of comics style, and... how words combine with pictures to work their singular magic. When the 215-page journey is finally over, most readers will find it...

Typex'sAndy: The Life and Times of Andy Warholis a tour de force of comics biography. It's 562 (silver-edged!) pages delve deeply into the life and times of its subject. The work's central organizingprinciple is that each of its 10 chapters is conceived and designed as an individual issue of a comic book series, titledAndy, complete with it's own front and back covers (and, as an added bonus, each also comes with its ownuncut sheet of collector trading cards!). The chapters arechronologically arranged, with each tackling a particular arc of Warhol’s life and work. Each of the“issues" in thisserieshas been conceived and executed by Typex as...

Picking up where the first issue left off, Cold Heat #2 revs it up a few notches and takes us on a whirlwind ride through the dis-united states of the disturbed American psyche. Series artist, Frank Santoro once again refuses to play it safe. This time around he pulls out all the stops and takes the chances that most other artists wouldn't take even if they could. Leaping into the artistic no man's land between the well established borders of pre-existent genres, Santoro combines the propulsive narratives of mainstream American heroic adventure comics, the exaggerated expressiveness of Japanese manga, and the naivete of self-published...

<<•>> WAREHOUSE FIND <<•>> Much to our amazement, a heretofore unknown secret stash of the original 1995 newspaper edition of Storeyville has been unearthed! Each copy had been sealed in a polypropylene bag and the entire box had been taped up and stored away in a corner where it was eventually forgotten... until now! We haven't seen a copy of this for sale anywhere for years (except for one that was on sale on Amazon for $1000!) so, if this is something you've been thinking about, don't debate about it too long, as there's only this one box, and when it's empty, that's it! A perfect match of form and content, ...

WOW!!! It's here and it's a dream come true. Founding editor of Comic Artmagazine, Todd Hignite has given us an elegant, oversize, beautifully produced, 320 page hardcover book that takes you into the studio and collections of today's top independent cartoonists. Featuring tons (499, to be exact) of reproductions of the highest quality, depicting the original art, personal collections and physical environs of R. Crumb, Art Spiegelman, Gary Panter, Charles Burns, Jaime Hernandez, Dan Clowes, Seth, Chris Ware and Ivan Brunetti side by side with extensive interviews with the creators themselves, this is a book to savor. Todd Hignite is a...

One could say thatJoseph Smith and the Mormons, a 464-page, hardcover, full color, historical-epic/biography in comics form of the life of Joseph Smith and the founding of the Church of the Latter Day Saints – aka the Mormons – is the work of a lifetime. It is the fruition of years of self-reflection and research followed by even more years of writing and drawing (and then editing). Noah Van Sciver was brought up in the the Church of the Latter Day Saints, but then fell away from it – along with his mother, and some (but not all) of his siblings – after his parents divorced. His father stayed in the church. These biographical facts shed...