January 18, 2021 Johanna First Second Leave a comment

The Peter & Ernesto Series

The Peter & Ernesto series by Graham Annable features two sloths who are the best of friends although they’re very different in personality. Ernesto is adventurous, wanting to explore and see new things, while Peter appreciates their home and enjoys the familiar. The sloths have perhaps the most minimal character design ever, being basically tubes with faces and sticks for arms and legs, but Annable’s animation experience gives them a wonderful physicality and sense of motion. The result is a […]

January 17, 2021 Johanna Oni Press / Lion Forge Leave a comment

The Black Mage

St. Ivory Academy, a magical boarding school run by Mr. Lynch, has accepted its first Black student as a recipient of a minority scholarship. His name is Tom Token, his familiar is a crow named Jim, and you may have already gathered from the names that this is not a subtle story. But who says it should be? As written by Daniel Barnes and illustrated by D.J. Kirkland, the book opens with Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, and John Henry in […]

January 12, 2021 Johanna Boom! Studios / Archaia Leave a comment

Bolivar Eats New York: A Discovery Adventure

The followup to the impressive Bolivar, about a dinosaur living incognito in New York City, takes a different approach. Instead of a story, Bolivar Eats New York: A Discovery Adventure is a puzzle picture book. Sybil thinks Bolivar should eat something other than corned beef sandwiches, so she makes him come with her to visit representative New York food institutions, including a kosher deli, the Coney Island Boardwalk, a dim sum restaurant, an Italian bakery, and, of course, a pizza […]

January 1, 2021 Johanna Andrews McMeel Leave a comment

The Unicorn Whisperer

What can I say about more Phoebe and Her Unicorn books other than the strip is still funny?! (I last recommended Unicorn Bowling last summer, and I was behind in reading them then.) The idea is simple — Phoebe is an oddball kid who has a real, live, magical unicorn for a friend. Her parents and a couple of her classmates know about Marigold (the unicorn). Their different perspectives make for all kinds of humorous moments, whether it’s Phoebe reacting […]

December 25, 2020 Johanna Toon Books Leave a comment

A Trip to the Top of the Volcano With Mouse

Following up on A Trip to the Bottom of the World With Mouse, Frank Viva takes the chatty rodent to a different extreme area of the world in A Trip to the Top of the Volcano With Mouse. Mouse and the traveler climb a volcano in Italy, while Mouse spends most of the time asking when they can eat pizza. The landscape around the mountain contains a variety of crops, animals, and temperatures. The child-like mouse, by making lists and […]

November 22, 2020 Johanna Other Publishers Leave a comment

The Hardways #1

I liked Russell Lissau’s Old Wounds when I read it several years ago (unfortunately, it no longer seems to be available digitally), so he got in touch about his newest project, The Hardways, and sent over a copy of the first issue. Illustrated by Shawn Richison, it’s the beginning of a five-issue miniseries, a Las Vegas-set caper story, that also launches Double Down Comics. This first issue has the schlubby Maury getting kidnapped after a successful run at the craps […]

November 22, 2020 Johanna Other Publishers Leave a comment

Major Holmes & Captain Watson

These days, I’m excited by how many good Sherlock Holmes projects there are. (I’m even more excited if Mycroft’s in them.) Of course, it’s always a dice roll when ordering comics on Kickstarter if you don’t already know the creators or publisher, but I was pleasantly surprised by this comic series, which came out in reasonable time and of good quality. Major Holmes & Captain Watson is written by Jeff Rider and illustrated by Ismael Canales. It stars the blond […]

November 17, 2020 Johanna Other Publishers Leave a comment

Touch is Really Strange

Touch is Really Strange is the newest book in the therapeutic comic series. Written by Steve Haines and illustrated by Sophie Standing, it’s due out in April 2021. The book is almost a meditation on paper, wandering through poetic thoughts on the importance of touch, how damaging the lack of touch can be, how we use it to engage with the world, and how touch interacts with the rest of our senses. (There are footnotes, too, with sources and additional […]

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