Dance Class Volumes 1 and 2

I got a quick taste of the Dance Class comics by Beka and Crip as part of the Papercutz Free Comic Book Day comic. Since then, I’ve had a chance to read the two slim volumes released so far, and I’ve enjoyed them. So, You Think You Can Hip-Hop? The books, translated from the French (where it’s called Studio Danse), consist of single-page strips that each provide a gag. Yet reading a bunch of them together, a picture of these […]

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Resident Alien #0

Resident Alien provides a sci-fi twist on a retirement tale. You’ve seen the story before, of a smart detective pulled back into work by the right case. Only this time, the investigator is particularly different. An alien just wants a peaceful life until he can be rescued from Earth and return home. The only time he uses his powers is to hide his appearance from his neighbors. However, when the town doctor gets murdered, he’s the only medical man left […]

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Between Gears

Natalie Nourigat captured her senior year at the University of Oregon in daily diary comics on the web, and now they’ve been collected in this thick volume. Opening Between Gears served as an immediate time capsule for me. It’s been longer than I like to think since I went away to school, but even though I didn’t (for example) watch Twilight my first night back, I could identify with so many of the events — moving back into dorms, catching […]

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Unterzakhn

Thought-provoking and disturbing, Unterzakhn shows us the lives and options available to young Jewish girls in an early 1900s New York slum. Although the twins look identical, Fanya is considered the smart one, and so she begins helping a “lady doctor”. This bitter woman helps others deal with unwanted pregnancies during an era when birth control was illegal and a homemade abortion risked killing you. The doctor also teaches Fanya to read, a skill she’s not otherwise thought to need. […]

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The Shark King

R. Kikuo Johnson (Night Fisher) returns to comics with this Hawaiian folktale for kids from Toon Books. Although the art takes full advantage of the island setting, the story is one familiar to any fan of legends. The Shark King, who can take human form, encounters a beautiful woman. They fall in love, marry, and have a child. The father leaves to return to the sea, but the child has his unusual abilities. So long as they live apart, the […]

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Baby’s in Black

Baby’s in Black tells, as the subtitle says, the story of Astrid Kirchherr, Stuart Sutcliffe, and the Beatles. Stu was known as the “fifth Beatle”, playing bass for the band until he took up with Astrid, a German photographer, during the Beatles’ time in Hamburg. He passed away just a few years later. Arne Bellstorf‘s version of this classic rock-and-roll story was published last year in Europe by SelfMadeHero. It’s told from Astrid’s perspective, and Bellstorf interviewed her as background. […]

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Usagi Yojimbo #144

Concluding the two-part story about feuding soy sauce makers by Stan Sakai, this issue provides a simple look at justice. SPOILERS follow. The rabbit samurai’s biggest challenge this issue isn’t the greedy rival merchant who’s escalated a business struggle into sabotage of the traditionalist’s warehouse sauce vats. Instead, it’s the fraidy-cat local lawman who refuses to get involved. After a slow opening, which recaps the premise if you missed the previous issue, we pick up with Usagi determined to force […]

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Silent Partner

Silent Partner is based on a novel originally published in 1989, the fourth in the Alex Delaware series by Jonathan Kellerman. Delaware is a child psychologist who solves murder mysteries, and the newest book in that series, Victims, comes out the same day as this graphic novel adaptation, for cross-promotion purposes. I haven’t read the novels, but I’ve been a fan of Ande Parks’ crime writing since Capote in Kansas. He does an excellent job making this feel like a […]

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