Alice in Sunderland


Bryan Talbot - 2007
    In the time of Lewis Carroll it was the greatest shipbuilding port in the world. To this city that gave the world the electric light bulb, the stars and stripes, the millennium, the Liberty Ships and the greatest British dragon legend came Carroll in the years preceding his most famous book, Alice in Wonderland, and here are buried the roots of his surreal masterpiece. Enter the famous Edwardian palace of varieties, The Sunderland Empire, for a unique experience: an entertaining and epic meditation on myth, history and storytelling and decide for yourself - does Sunderland really exist?

My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies


Ed Brubaker - 2018
    But when Ellie lands in an upscale rehab clinic where nothing is what it appears to be... she'll find another more dangerous romance, and find out how easily drugs and murder go hand-in-hand.MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN JUNKIES is a seductive coming-of-age story, a pop and drug culture-fueled tale of a young girl seeking darkness — and what she finds there. This gorgeous, must-have hardback is the first original graphic novel from ED BRUBAKER and SEAN PHILLIPS, the bestselling creators of CRIMINAL, KILL OR BE KILLED, THE FADE OUT, FATALE, and INCOGNITO.

Hellboy, Vol. 1: Seed of Destruction


Mike Mignola - 1994
    Hellboy is one of the most celebrated comics series in recent years. The ultimate artists' artist and a great storyteller whose work is in turns haunting, hilarious, and spellbinding. Mike Mignola has won numerous awards in the comics industry and beyond. When strangeness threatens to engulf the world, a strange man will come to save it. Sent to investigate a mystery with supernatural overtones, Hellboy discovers the secrets of his own origins, and his link to the Nazi occultists who promised Hitler a final solution in the form of a demonic avatar." ... Hellboy is a brilliant example of how to elevate the comic of the future to a higher literary level while achieving a higher pitch of excitement." --Robert Bloch, from his introduction

The Gigantic Beard That Was Evil


Stephen Collins - 2013
    By which we mean: orderly, neat, contained and, moreover, beardless.Or at least it is until one famous day, when Dave, bald but for a single hair, finds himself assailed by a terrifying, unstoppable... monster*!Where did it come from? How should the islanders deal with it? And what, most importantly, are they going to do with Dave?The first book from a new leading light of UK comics, The Gigantic Beard That Was Evil is an off-beat fable worthy of Roald Dahl. It is about life, death and the meaning of beards.(*We mean a gigantic beard, basically.)

Honor Girl: A Graphic Memoir


Maggie Thrash - 2015
    First love. First heartbreak. At once romantic and devastating, brutally honest and full of humor, this graphic-novel memoir is a debut of the rarest sort.Maggie Thrash has spent basically every summer of her fifteen-year-old life at the one-hundred-year-old Camp Bellflower for Girls, set deep in the heart of Appalachia. She’s from Atlanta, she’s never kissed a guy, she’s into Backstreet Boys in a really deep way, and her long summer days are full of a pleasant, peaceful nothing . . . until one confounding moment. A split-second of innocent physical contact pulls Maggie into a gut-twisting love for an older, wiser, and most surprising of all (at least to Maggie), female counselor named Erin. But Camp Bellflower is an impossible place for a girl to fall in love with another girl, and Maggie’s savant-like proficiency at the camp’s rifle range is the only thing keeping her heart from exploding. When it seems as if Erin maybe feels the same way about Maggie, it’s too much for both Maggie and Camp Bellflower to handle, let alone to understand.

Little Fish: A Memoir from a Different Kind of Year


Ramsey Beyer - 2013
    Written in an autobiographical style with beautiful artwork, Little Fish shows the challenges of being a young person facing the world on her own for the very first time and the unease—as well as excitement—that comes along with that challenge.

Emotions Explained with Buff Dudes: Owlturd Comix


Andrew Tsyaston - 2018
    — Shen"You know how, since the dawn of humanity, great philosophers and poets have dedicated their entire lives to exploring concepts like love, life itself, logic, and sorrow? Well, those great philosophers and poets are dead now, so I win." — Shen Emotions Explained With Buff Dudes is your fully illustrated guide to the hyper-conflicted, tragicomic feelings of our age. Featuring the resilient, shaggy-haired Shen, this debut collection of Owlturd Comix is a tale of triumph and survival — of getting your ass kicked by sleep deprivation and student loans, but never losing hope. Most of all, it's an amusing, instructive journey through a vast array of emotions, including those best explained with dudes who are buff.

Barely Functional Adult: It’ll All Make Sense Eventually


Meichi Ng - 2020
    Prepare to excitedly shove this book in your friend’s face with little decorum as you shout, “THIS IS SO US!”In this beautiful, four-color collection compiled completely of never-before-seen content, Meichi perfectly captures the best and worst of us in every short story, allowing us to weep with pleasure at our own fallibility. Hilarious, relatable, and heart-wrenchingly honest, Barely Functional Adult will have you laughing and crying in the same breath, and taking solace in the fact that we’re anything but alone in this world

The Customer is Always Wrong


Mimi Pond - 2017
    Oakland in the late seventies is a cheap and quirky haven for eccentrics, and Mimi Pond folds the tales of the fascinating sleazeball characters that surround young Madge into her workaday waitressing life. Outrageous and loving tributes and takedowns of her co-workers and satellites of the Imperial Cafe create a snapshot of a time in Madge's life where she encounters who she is, and who she is not.Employing the same brash yet earnest style as her previous memoir Over Easy, Pond's storytelling gifts have never been stronger than in this epic, comedic, standalone graphic novel. Madge is right back at the Imperial with its great coffee and depraved cast, where things only get worse for her adopted greasy-spoon family while her career as a cartoonist starts to take off.

Feynman


Jim Ottaviani - 2011
    . . Nobel winner . . . bestselling author . . . safe-cracker. In this substantial graphic novel biography, First Second presents the larger-than-life exploits of Nobel-winning quantum physicist, adventurer, musician, world-class raconteur, and one of the greatest minds of the twentieth century: Richard Feynman. Written by nonfiction comics mainstay Jim Ottaviani and brilliantly illustrated by First Second author Leland Myrick, Feynman tells the story of the great man's life from his childhood in Long Island to his work on the Manhattan Project and the Challenger disaster. Ottaviani tackles the bad with the good, leaving the reader delighted by Feynman's exuberant life and staggered at the loss humanity suffered with his death. Anyone who ever wanted to know more about Richard P. Feynman, quantum electrodynamics, the fine art of the bongo drums, the outrageously obscure nation of Tuva, or the development and popularization of the field of physics in the United States need look no further than this rich and joyful work.• One of School Library Journal's Best Adult Books 4 Teens titles of 2011 • One of Horn Book's Best Nonfiction Books of 2011

The Thud


Mikaël Ross - 2018
    The author spent two years living 3 or 4 days a week there, researching and getting to know its townsfolk, and the result is an empathetic depiction. This graphic novel is told entirely from a developmentally impaired boy's perspective. Noel had always lived with his mother in Berlin, until one day tragedy strikes and he finds himself alone for the first time. A man with a beard tells him he can’t stay in the apartment anymore and takes him to a place with so many strangers — Who can he trust? Who does he like? Who loves him?

Just Peachy: Comics About Depression, Anxiety, Love, and Finding the Humor in Being Sad


Holly Chisholm - 2019
    The all-too-real cartoon protagonist gives readers a character to empathize with, and helps explain some of the not often talked about consequences and symptoms of having depression. The comics also explore the themes of heartbreak, finding love, dealing with stress, and capturing the magical moments in life that keep us going.Through dark humor and cute illustrations, the subject matter becomes a bit more bearable, allowing for honest discussion about things like treatment and getting through anxiety attacks, and providing some comfort in times of struggle.For anyone affected by mental illness, Just Peachy shows that you are not alone. Simply put, this is an encouraging collection of comics about being just okay sometimes."So brave of Holly Chisholm to share her struggles with mental health issues through this creative medium. Just Peachy will inspire others to connect to, navigate through, and recover from their own day-to-day trials and tribulations of living with a mental illness. Well done!"—Dr. Carlin Barnes and Dr. Marketa Wills, authors of Understanding Mental Illness and founders of Healthy Mind MDs

Heart and Brain: An Awkward Yeti Collection


Nick Seluk - 2015
    From paying taxes and getting up for work to dancing with kittens and starting a band, readers everywhere will relate to the ongoing struggle between Heart and Brain.Heart and Brain: An Awkward Yeti Collection illustrates the relationship between the sensible Brain and its emotionally driven counterpart, the Heart.Boasting more than one million pageviews per month, TheAwkwardYeti.com has become a webcomic staple since its creation in 2012.

Spinning


Tillie Walden - 2017
    Wake up, grab the ice skates, and head to the rink while the world was still dark.Weekends were spent in glitter and tights at competitions. Perform. Smile. And do it again.She was good. She won. And she hated it.For ten years, figure skating was Tillie Walden's life. She woke before dawn for morning lessons, went straight to group practice after school, and spent weekends competing at ice rinks across the state. It was a central piece of her identity, her safe haven from the stress of school, bullies, and family. But over time, as she switched schools, got into art, and fell in love with her first girlfriend, she began to question how the close-minded world of figure skating fit in with the rest of her life, and whether all the work was worth it given the reality: that she, and her friends on the figure skating team, were nowhere close to Olympic hopefuls. It all led to one question: What was the point? The more Tillie thought about it, the more Tillie realized she'd outgrown her passion--and she finally needed to find her own voice.

Oblivion Song, Vol. 1


Robert Kirkman - 2018
    The government made every attempt to recover them but after many years they gave up. Nathan Cole… won’t. He makes daily trips, risking his life to try and rescue those lost, alone and afraid, living in the apocalyptic hellscape of Oblivion. But maybe… Nathan is looking for something else? Why can’t he resist the siren call of the Oblivion Song?Collects OBLIVION SONG #1-6.