Born in South Korea, but immigrating to Canada at age six and a current resident of Toronto, Michael Cho is a widely respected illustrator who moonlights as a comics creator.  Shoplifter is his first graphic novel, and an impressive debut it is. In its pages, Cho manages the feat of creating an elegant synthesis of contemporary Canadian cartooning.  Combining the deftly dynamic page layouts of Darwyn Cooke, J.Bone & Jay Stephens, the reflective ennui of Seth, the urban introversion of Chester Brown and the urbane sophistication of Ethan Rilly into finely nuanced work of life in that part of North America that continues to swear allegiance to the Queen (which, of course, is not all that much different from life in that part which doesn't).  The story told in Shoplifter is that of one young woman's lonely struggle to find her place in world.  The tale is solidly constructed, well balanced, filled with strongly delineated characters and likely to please the readers it is intended for.  Comparisons with the work of Adrian Tomine are, perhaps, inevitable.  While there are certainly numerous points of contact between the two artists' work, Cho's protagonist, Corrina Park, is cut from a different cloth than Tomine's superficially similar young working women, demonstrating a greater vulnerability, naivete and sincerity, in contrast to Tomine's generally more jaded and sarcastic heroines, and Shoplifter ends on a more upbeat and hopeful note than the typical Tomine narrative. There is one important quality shared by Cho and Tomine:  they are both top notch cartoonists who produce excellent work.  Now being offered at a special "check it out" price, for a limited time.