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A Drifting Life


Yoshihiro Tatsumi - 2008
    A Drifting Life is his monumental memoir eleven years in the making, beginning with his experiences as a child in Osaka, growing up as part of a country burdened by the shadows of World War II.Spanning fifteen years from August 1945 to June 1960, Tatsumi’s stand-in protagonist, Hiroshi, faces his father’s financial burdens and his parents’ failing marriage, his jealous brother’s deteriorating health, and the innumerable pitfalls that await him in the competitive manga market of mid-twentieth-century Japan. He dreams of following in the considerable footsteps of his idol, the manga artist Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy, Apollo’s Song, Ode to Kirihito, Buddha)—with whom Tatsumi eventually became a peer and, at times, a stylistic rival. As with his short-story collection, A Drifting Life is designed by Adrian Tomine.

The Iguana


Anna Maria Ortese - 1965
    When he discovers, to his utter amazement, that their ill-treated servant is in fact a maiden iguana, and then proceeds to fall in love with her, the story of Aleardo, Estralitta and don Ilario becomes universal -- the fantastic merges with the commonplace until a resonant reality emerges with subtle distillation. From first page to last, the reader is given a tale of tragic love and delusion that ranks among the most affecting in contemporary literature. The Iguana has the force of "The Tempest," and is written with a grace comparable in every way to the works of Izak Dinesen and Djuna Barnes. Little wonder, then, that this novel was called by the noted critic Pietro Citati, "one of the very few books destined to redeem the honor of Italian literature since the Second World War." First published in Italian in 1965, where it was awarded the Fiuggi Prize, this masterpiece is by one of the original Italian "magic realists."

The Professor and the Siren


Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa - 1957
    In the last two years of his life, the Sicilian aristocrat Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, in addition to his internationally celebrated novel, The Leopard, also composed three shorter pieces of fiction that confirm and expand our picture of his brilliant late-blooming talent.In the parable-like Joy and the Law, a mediocre clerk in receipt of an unexpected supplement to his Christmas bonus (an awkwardly outsize version of the traditional panettone) finds his visions of domestic bliss upset by unwritten rules of honor and obligation.At the heart of the collection stands The Siren and its redoubtable hero, Professor La Ciura, the only Hellenist scholar to claim firsthand experience of ancient Greek—from the mouth of the beautiful half-human sea creature he loved in his youth.The volume closes with the last piece of writing completed by the author, The Blind Kittens, a story originally conceived as the first chapter of a follow-up to The Leopard, a novel that would have traced the post-unification emergence of a new agrarian ruling class in Sicily, coarser than its predecessor but equally blind to the inexorable march of change.This elegant new translation of Lampedusa’s complete short fiction, the first by a single hand, updates and corrects previously available English versions.

Sandcastle


Pierre Oscar Lévy - 2010
    Soon everybody is growing older—every half hour—and there doesn’t seem to be any way out of the cove. Levy’s dramatic storytelling works seamlessly with Peeters’s sinister art to create a profoundly disturbing and fantastical mystery.

Une Semaine de Bonté


Max Ernst - 1934
    1891), one of the leading figures of the surrealistic movement and among the most original artists of the 20th century. From old catalog and pulp novel illustrations, Ernst produced this series of 182 bizarre and darkly humorous collage scenes of classic dreams and erotic fantasies which seem mysteriously to lure the unconscious into view: Stern, proper-looking women sprout giant sets of wings, serpents appear in the drawing-room and bed chamber, a baron has the head of a lion, a parlor floor turns to water on which some people can apparently walk while others drown.Une Semaine de Bonté is divided into seven parts, one for each day of the week, with each section illustrating one of Ernst’s “seven deadly elements.” “Oedipus,” “The Court of the Dragon,” and “Three Visible Poems” are among the startling episodes of Ernst's week. The Dada and surrealist epigraphs which introduce each section appear in this edition in both French and English.Une Semaine de Bonté first appeared in 1934 in a series of five pamphlets of fewer than 1,000 copies each, and has never been reprinted before this present edition. Previously available only to a few libraries and collectors, this is a major source and great treat for anyone interested in the surrealists and their work, in collage, visual illusion, dream visions, and the interpretations of dreams.

Blacksad


Juan Díaz Canales - 2006
    Guarnido's sumptuously painted pages and rich cinematic style bring the world of 1950s America to vibrant life, with Canales weaving in fascinating tales of conspiracy, racial tension, and the "red scare" Communist witch hunts of the time. Guarnido reinvents anthropomorphism in these pages, and industry colleagues no less than Will Eisner, Jim Steranko, and Tim Sale are fans!Whether John Blacksad is falling for dangerous women or getting beaten to within an inch of his life, his stories are, simply put, unforgettable.* Dark Horse is very proud to present the first three Blacksad stories in a beautiful hardcover collection, completely relettered to the artist's specifications and with the latest album, Red Soul, in English for the very first time.* This internationally acclaimed series has won nearly a dozen prestigious awards — including the Angoulême Comics Festival prizes for Best Series and Best Artwork-and is a three-time Eisner Award nominee.

Akira, Vol. 1


Katsuhiro Otomo - 1984
    The science fiction tale set in 2019 in Tokyo after the city was destroyed by World War III, follows the lives of two teenage friends, Tetsuo and Kaneda, who have a consuming fear of a monstrous power known as Akira.

Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth


Apostolos Doxiadis - 2009
     This graphic novel recounts the spiritual odyssey of philosopher Bertrand Russell. In his agonized search for absolute truth, he crosses paths with thinkers like Gottlob Frege, David Hilbert & Kurt Gödel, & finds a passionate student in Ludwig Wittgenstein. But his most ambitious goal—to establish unshakable logical foundations of mathematics—continues to loom before him. Thru love & hate, peace & war, he persists in the mission threatening to claim both his career & happiness, finally driving him to the brink of insanity. This story is at the same time a historical novel & an accessible explication of some of the biggest ideas of mathematics & modern philosophy. With rich characterizations & atmospheric artwork, it spins the pursuit of such ideas into a satisfying tale. Probing, layered, the book throws light on Russell’s inner struggles while setting them in the context of the timeless questions he tried to answer. At its heart, Logicomix is a story about the conflict between ideal rationality & the flawed fabric of reality.

Palestine


Joe Sacco - 1996
    Like Safe Area Gorazde, Palestine has been favorably compared to Art Spiegelman's Pulitzer Prize-winning Maus for its ability to brilliantly navigate such socially and politically sensitive subject matter within the confines of the comic book medium.Sacco has often been called the first comic book journalist, and he is certainly the best. This edition of Palestine also features an introduction from renowned author, critic, and historian Edward Said (Peace and Its Discontents and The Question of Palestine), one of the world's most respected authorities on the Middle Eastern conflict.

Kingdom Come


Mark Waid - 1996
    Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, and almost every other character from DC Comics must choose sides in what could be the final battle of them all.

Mother, Come Home


Paul Hornschemeier - 2003
    Mother, Come Home is Hornschemeier's graphic novel debut—the quietly stunning tale of a father and son struggling, by varying degrees of escapism and fantasy, to come to terms with the death of the family's mother. The story seamlessly weaves through the surreal and the painfully factual, guided by the careful, somber colors and inventive pacing unique to Hornschmeier's storytelling. Mother, Come Home extracts almost tangible drama from the most tranquil of moments, making that which is unspoken in each panel easily audible, and almost uncomfortably experienced.

The Walking Man


Jirō Taniguchi - 1990
    Every corporate American should have a copy on their desk and, in times of stress, take two chapters, twice a day. Take a little stress out of your life and relax with The Walking Man, a little step every day. Lovingly reversed in collaboration with the creator to read left to right.

The Photographer


Emmanuel Guibert - 2003
    This graphic novel/photo-journal is a record of one reporter’s arduous and dangerous journey through Afghanistan, accompanying the Doctors Without Borders. Didier Lefevre’s photography, paired with the art of Emmanuel Guibert, tells the powerful story of a mission undertaken by men and women dedicated to mending the wounds of war.

Garlandia


Lorenzo Mattotti - 2017
    Their shaman, Zachariah, helps them to interpret the spirits that foretell their future. But a strange vision bodes ill. This long-awaited second collaboration between Italian artists Lorenzo Mattotti and Jerry Kramsky, ten years in the making, is masterfully drawn in soft, psychedelic black and white.

Hey, Wait...


Jason - 2000
    This superbly evocative graphic novella by the award-winning Norwegian cartoonist Jason (his first appearance in the English language) starts off as a melancholy childhood memoir and then, with a shocking twist midway through, becomes the summary of lives lived, wasted, and lost. Like Art Spiegelman did with Maus, Jason utilizes anthropomorphic stylizations to reach deeper, more general truths, and to create elegantly minimalist panels whose emotional depth-charge comes as an even greater shock. His sparse dialogue, dark wit, and supremely bold use of "jump-cuts" from one scene to the next (sometimes spanning a number of years) make Hey, Wait... one of the most surprising and engaging debuts of the year.