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 […]

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 […]

As many readers know, I’m a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes in many of his incarnations. That includes one of the recent comic reworkings, which I reread this weekend. Watson and Holmes was a modernization that revamped the characters as Black men in modern-day New York. That makes a lot of sense for Watson’s Army background, as a war vet returned from Afghanistan. He’s meant to be the main character, working with a Holmes who refuses to be called Sherlock. […]

Virtually Yours is what I want more of in comics — a romantic comedy with a unique premise. Eva is living at home looking for a journalism job. To get her parents off her back, at her sister’s suggestion, she gets a fake boyfriend from Virtually Yours. The company exists to provide proof of relationships for people in similar situations; it’s an anti-dating app. This way, she can focus on her career without her parents worrying. Max is a former […]