Owly

Using animals to comment on the human condition is a tradition with a long history in comics. Andy Runton is the latest to use it to its full potential, creating this generation’s Winnie the Pooh in his stories of Owly and his worm friend. The first book, The Way Home & The Bittersweet Summer, contains two mostly wordless pieces. The first story shows how Owly rescues a worm from drowning during a rainstorm. After recovery, and although the two species […]

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Retail Strip Debuts

The New York Times reports that the new comic strip Retail will launch tomorrow. His aim for the comic strip … is to do for the mall what Dilbert did for the office, revealing the dysfunctional world of bickering employees, spineless managers, and cruel shoppers that lurks behind the cheery sales slogans. It’s a good topic, with lots of possibilities, and one most people can relate to. Everyone’s been shopping, even if they haven’t had the life-changing opportunity of working […]

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Last Exit Before Toll

Charles is driving south for a business trip but finds himself killing time at a small-town coffee shop when his car overheats. That summation of the premise of Last Exit Before Toll is too simple and almost irrelevant. This thought-provoking little book isn’t about what happens; it’s about the search for authenticity and a simpler way of life in an overly busy world. To fully enjoy it, you have to be willing to accept and experience a different pace, just […]

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The Annotated Northwest Passage

Scott Chantler’s historical adventure series is collected into a handsome hardcover volume. It’s only missing a ribbon book marker to take its place in a family library, next to the Jack London books. Charles Lord, a former hero living out his days managing a frontier fort, takes on a last adventure when a French rogue mercenary captures the incoming supply ship. He’s seeking revenge and some of the immense profit to be made by controlling the fur trade, while Lord’s […]

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Scandalous

It’s Hollywood in the early 1950s. Paige Turner is queen of the gossip heap, using her column to push her grudges. She’s aware of her power and wields it whenever possible, demanding the trappings of respect and declaring how people may and may not speak to her. She’s convinced beyond doubt of her own righteousness and takes people kowtowing to her as her due. She claims her bigoted pronouncements are all for her audience, who wish to know about indecency […]

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Egg Story

How’s this for a high concept? In Egg Story, an egg, determined to be more than breakfast, becomes a ninja. Feather and his sister Five-Spots learn early how short and harsh life can be. Mere minutes after they’re born, the farmer gathering them up throws their misshapen brother to the dog. At the supermarket, they discuss their fears. “What kind of a world are we living in?! Filled with murderers, kidnappers, thieves…” It’s easy to sympathize with the plucky young […]

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Carnet de Voyage

While on a three-month research and promotional tour of France and Morocco, Craig Thompson made sketches and kept notes of his adventures, now published as this travel diary. In Carnet de Voyage, his art is as lushly detailed as ever. Firm black lines with crayon or brush make up both full-page illustrations and more entertainingly cluttered pages, with thoughts and text and bits of pictures scattered over them. Always, though, the page works as a whole. Figure studies are sprinkled […]

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