February 27, 2020 Johanna First Second Leave a comment

Kid Gloves: Nine Months of Careful Chaos

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Lucy Knisley with a baby carriage. Kid Gloves: Nine Months of Careful Chaos captures the graphic memoirist’s experiences with pregnancy and childbirth — which went about as not smoothly as you could fear, since she almost died during the process. From reading her previous autobiographical graphic novels, I knew she’d dreamed about having children for a long time. As she says in her illustrated introduction, the book covers two years of “what […]

February 27, 2020 Johanna Comic News Leave a comment

C2E2 Starts Tomorrow in Chicago

I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while, but … C2E2, the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo, starts tomorrow. I’m excited to be there and to catch up with friends. The guest announcements were… odd. There’s a list of Comic Guests, which does not include the majority of the graphic novel creators I’m excited to see. They — Faith Erin Hicks, Lucy Knisley, Noelle Stevenson — are listed under Literary Guests, which … well. This artificial distinction may […]

February 27, 2020 Johanna Other Prose Leave a comment

Let Your Heart Be Light

If you’re not ready yet to let go of lovely holiday feelings, let me recommend a charming Christmas romance collection. Let Your Heart Be Light by J.R. Lawrie (published by Carnation Books) is a set of three M/M holiday love stories about two couples. The first is a goofy blue-haired stand-up comic who finds the love of his life in an older civil servant. The second features two neighbors who finally get a chance to meet after one is treated […]

February 25, 2020 Johanna First Second Leave a comment

Pumpkinheads

Author Rainbow Rowell (Fangirl) and artist Faith Erin Hicks (The Nameless City, Friends With Boys) team up for a lovely seasonal story about friendship and crushes and moving on to a new stage of life in Pumpkinheads. Josiah and Deja are working their last night at the Pumpkin Patch (which is more like a minor amusement park, with food booths and attractions and a giant corn maze). It’s Halloween, after which the patch shuts down, and they’re getting ready to […]

February 21, 2020 Johanna Other Manga Publishers 2 comments

I Married My Best Friend to Shut My Parents Up

I was in the mood for some light manga that resembled a rom-com, so I was looking forward to trying I Married My Best Friend to Shut My Parents Up. The premise is in the title: Machi agrees to marry the bubbly and persistent Hana in order to get Machi’s parents to quit pushing her to date and marry. Hana wanted to move in because she’s losing her apartment, and in return, she takes care of the housework. Machi knows […]

February 21, 2020 Johanna Yen Press Manga Reviews Leave a comment

Whenever Our Eyes Meet: A Women’s Love Anthology

Whenever Our Eyes Meet: A Women’s Love Anthology is a wonderful read if you’re interested in yuri manga or simply sweet romance. The characters are working women, not schoolgirls, which makes this a pleasant addition to the types of stories that are being translated. Each short story is by a different creator. Most are about how a couple meets, including: a one-night stand turns up at work the next day as the new employee former co-workers meeting again by chance […]

February 20, 2020 Johanna Art Leave a comment

Ash & Thorn Shows Women of Any Age Can Save the World

In April, Ahoy Comic is debuting a new series from writer Mariah McCourt and artist Soo Lee. Ash & Thorn is kind of like “what if Buffy was a lot older?” Lottie Thorn is selected as a new mystical champion to save the world, trained by Lady Peruvia Ashlington-Voss. The first issue can be preordered now from your local comic shop with Diamond code FEB20 1416. I enjoyed seeing older women headine an adventure comic; it’s still rare to see […]

February 20, 2020 Johanna Art Leave a comment

Sherlock: A Scandal in Belgravia

Making note here that I’m glad that Titan Comics is continuing its translation of the manga adaptations of the Sherlock series. They’re currently in the middle of the first episode of season 2, “A Scandal in Belgravia”, with issue #4 (of 6) coming out at the beginning of March. This is the episode where we meet Irene Adler. (The three previous are now available in collected form as Sherlock: A Study in Pink, Sherlock: The Blind Banker, and Sherlock: The […]

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