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...

With Jack's Book, Gifford and Lee launched the oral biography as a valid form(there'd be no Please Kill Me without it), and arguably created what remains its gold standard. Here you have a portrait in the round of the central figure of "the beat generation" (who hated that label) provided by all the other players who were in his circle during the two decades of his writing career. William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Carolyn Cassady, Gregory Corso, Lawrence Felinghetti, Gary Snyder and many more herein provide thoughtful, forthright recollections of Kerouac, his scene and the times in which they mixed. Gifford and Lee weave them together...

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...

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...

edited by Ivan Brunetti It's too early to say for certain, but this follow-up to Brunetti's already classic 2006 anthology, also published by Yale University Press, might just be even better than its precursor. One thing's for certain: Brunetti has held onto -- and further refined -- his editorial vision of arranging the work contained in this volume in an organic sequence, deftly managing to map out the similarities between artists so that each piece flows smoothly into into the other, creating an amazing sense of an innate connectivity between all areas of comics here on display. This book is a powerful ally in the struggle to bring the...

Another impossibly good album from the one and only Joe Henry. Amazingly, you can listen to the entire LP online at his site, HERE (Just click on "Launch MP3 player to listen"). And while you're listening to it, you can take a moment to read the note he penned on the day of its release, HERE. And, please note that both the package and booklet covers feature photographs taken by Eugene Smith in Pittsburgh, PA during his epic Dream Street project of 1955-56.

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.

IT'SHERE! The sixth and (maybe? maybe not??) final issue of Kevin Huizenga's revelatory exploration of andmeditation on time and space:Ganges. This issue focuses on some of the effects of technology on our temporal experience. As always, Huizenga takes the opportunity to explore the unique properties of comics; searching for new, untried and/or under-appreciated approaches to what the medium has to offer by way of communicating concepts and states – of mind as well as of being.

While all of us employing the latest gadgetry, apps, platforms, etc. have no shortage of anecdotes pertaining to our experience, Huizenga isn't satisfied with...

Before cracking open The Hard Tomorrow, it might be a good idea to mentally buckle up – and maybe even put on an emotionally protectivehelmetfor good measure –as Eleanor Davis's new graphic novellives up to its title. It is indeed ahard hitting look at how the here andnow could play out in what'scoming – but certainly not one without hope, and that is, ultimately, the point. Beautifully drawn, dramatically paced, and overflowingwith empathy for its fully realized cast of characters, The Hard Tomorrow is vibrantly alive to being in the world in America in our time. Davis's choice to set the work a few years in the future (apparently2022)...

introduction par Chris Ware Le secret le mieux gardé des vingt dernières années de la bande dessinée est probablement Storeyville. Aucune autre bande dessinée ne capture avec autant de succès l'énergie propulsive américaine que nous associons dans la littérature aux œuvres de Walt Whitman et de Jack Kerouac. Storeyville était sui generis à l’époque de sa publication initiale en 1995, quand il a paru sous la forme d’un journal tabloïde de 40 pages. Poème épique en bande dessinée, il révèle des profondeurs jusque-là inexplorées dans la forme. Employant une audace artistique qui était à l’époque sans égal, Storeyville incorpore des éléments d...