FCBM Day 3

It's day three of the YACB Free Comic Book Month!

Today's selected entry comes from Kyle Sterup. The five comics that Kyle listed are:

1. Anything by Alan Moore
2. Sandman
3. Acme Novelty Library
4. Daredevil by Frank Miller
5. Generation X by Chris bachalo

Kyle, I think, could be a big Paul Pope fan. So I'll be sending him Heavy Liquid #1.

And like all the selected entries, Kyle will be receiving a copy of the 32-page Free Comic Book Day Preview Edition of Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards by Jim Ottaviani & Big Time Attic (Zander Cannon, Kevin Cannon and Shad Petosky).

Kyle's comics should be in the mail at the end of the week. Enjoy!

There's still time to send in your entry for the YACB Free Comic Book Month; details are here.

Current FCBM Statistics:
39 entries
8 free comics sent so far
28 days remaining

New This Week: May 4, 2005

Based on the NCRL list for this week's comics shipping from Diamond, here are a few things to look for at the local comic shop tomorrow:


The Pick of the Week is the first volume of Mike Grell's The Complete Jon Sable, Freelance from IDW, a classic series getting a deluxe trade collection.


In other comics:

Beckett have a new issue of Fade from Grace (#5), a nice little superhero/romance comic that you all should be reading.

Dark Horse have the final issue of the latest Jingle Belle mini (#4) and the penultimate issue of Concrete: Human Dilema (#5).

DC have the debut of the Englehart/Rogers/Austin mini Batman: Dark Detective; the final issue of Fallen Angel (#20) (though rumors have it returning in the near future from IDW...); the debut of Gail Simone's Infinite Crisis tie-in The Secret Society of Super-Villians Villains United (SSoSV is a perfectly good title--why are they shying away from it?); and new issues of Detective Comics (#806), Firestorm (#13), The Intimates (#7), Lex Luthor: Man of Steel (#3), Seven Soldiers: Shining Knight (#2), Swamp Thing (#15), and Y, the Last Man (#33).

Del Rey debut two new manga, Genshiken & Nodame Cantiabile (though I saw both last week at Barnes & Noble...)

Fantagraphics' third volume of The Complete Peanuts hits comic stores (though mine arrived from Amazon last week...)

Image debut a Rising Stars mini, Voices of the Dead (I'm waiting for the trade...) and have a colected edition of The Luna Bros.'s Ultra: Seven Days.

Marvel have the second issues of GLA and Power Pack.

Lots of manga from Viz this week, including volume 30(!) of Ranma 1/2.


Hope you find something you like!

Quick GN Reviews

House of Java
by Mark Murphy
This is a collection of short stories written and drawn by Murphy, most of which have some sort of overt or tenuous connection to coffee. It's all slice-of-life type stuff, which could be boring, but Murphy has a way of making the stories interesting. He uses dialogue and facial expressions to quickly delineate characters and give them depth, allowing us to actually care what happens to the characters even with just knowing them for just a short bit. His artistic style is very raounded and, while a bit clumsy in some places, gets the job done and is for the most part attractive.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)


Why Did Pete Duel Kill Himself?
by Mark Kalesniko
Pete Duel, in case you're wondering, was the star of the early 70s tv show Alias Smith and Jones. The opening scene of this graphic novel finds Alex, a teenaged dog-headed boy, wondering why a successful adult like Duel would possibly want to committ suicide. We then flashback to episodes in Alex's childhood, and see how Alex, a sensitive child, suffered any number of humiliations big and small and the hands of both kids and adults; those special kinds of humiliations reserved for those who don't quite fit in anywhere. Kalesniko hits the notes perfectly, showing Alex's trials of childhood in anecdotes of various lengths. Alex is the only character who appears with the head of a dog, an interesting metaphorical choice that serves not only to show Alex's alienation, but also affords Kalesniko an palate of expressions to drawn on. Though depressing, this is a strong piece of work.
Rating: 4 (of 5)


Fantastic Butterflies
by James Kochalka
Probably the thing by Kochalka that I've read that I like best so far. It starts out like a regular ol' boring indy comic, with a melancholy guy and his bitchy girlfriend visiting a friend with cancer, but soon takes a turn for the absurd with a talking dog, time travel, robots and kung-fu fighting. Like much of Kochalka's work it doesn't really have a through plot or make much sense, but it works as a series of incidents strung together. Despite the seriousness of some of the subject matter it has a genuine charm and occasional sense of fun.
Rating: 3 (of 5)