Blammo #10
by Noah Van Sciver
It’s here! It took us a minute to get these in stock and up on the site, but the latest issue of Noah Van Sciver’s Blammo – one of a tiny handful of outstanding single-creator comics-anthology titles currently being produced in North America (see below for more) – has at last arrived. And, this time around, all 48 pages are in duo-tone and full color! Historical, contemporary, short story, speculations, reminiscences, biographical, autobiographical, comedy, tragedy, pathos – it’s all here, in comics ranging in length from one to fourteen pages. Don’t miss it!
retail price – $8.00 copacetic price – $7.25
King-Cat Comics and Stories #78
by John Porcellino
And here’s the latest from Noah’s mentor, John Porcellino. Lots more animal comics this time around: cats, dogs, shrews, birds, butterflies – even aphids! – and, of course, a few fellow humans, for good measure. 40 pages of black and white comics and stories (and lists).
retail price – $5.00 copacetic price – $5.00
Comix Skool USA #11
by Kevin Huizenga
And, here’s another new work by a Porcellino pal! Kevin Huizenga’s new issue of Comics Skool downshifts to mini-comics size. Here’s your chance to get familiar with what this power-packed pint-sized format is capable of delivering in the hands of a master.
retail price – $5.00 copacetic price – $5.00
Tinderella
by M.S. Harkness
In Tinderella, Minneapolis-based cartoonist, M. S. Harkness has produced her most accomplished work yet: a graphic memoir of a Christmas Break past that, while it covers many aspects of her life including family, friends, school and work, places a special focus on her sex life, particularly her experiences on the contemporary online/phone-app dating/hookup scene. Its 120 black and white pages give an up close and (very) personal look at this slice of her life. She doesn’t pull any punches or make any attempts to sugarcoat the events chronicled in these comics (quite the contrary, in fact), but also works to situate them in her overall life. In addition to portraying her exterior life, Tinderella contains some excellent comics representations of her interior life as well, including mental images and flights of fancy, all rendered with a self-assured yet simultaneously self-deprecating sense of humor. Her portrayal both of the strengths and weaknesses her own character and that of the milieu in which she finds herself together provide a portrait of the artist as a young woman that is a sign of the times.
retail price – $12.00 copacetic price – $10.75
Your Black Friend
by Ben Passmore
One of 2017’s best selling small press comics here at Copacetic, Ben Passmore’s Your Black Friend is now the “title track” in this 120 page full color, hardcover collection. Within these pages readers will also find works previously published by The Nib, VICE, and the As You Were anthology, along with brand new and unreleased material. Anyone not already familiar with Passmore and his work should take a moment to learn more about this New Orleans-based creator – and take a peep at his vibrantly colored comics – on his “super-professional portfolio website”, HERE. Passmore’s work strives to provide a much needed perspective on life in these United States and is well worth checking out.
retail price – $20.00 copacetic price – $16.75
But Is It… Comic Aht? #1
edited by Austin English
At last! A new print publication focusing on comics, and edited by Austin English – whose Windy Corner Magazine is still (just barely) in stock here at Copacetic. This initial issue runs 48 pages and includes original comics by David King, reviews, essays by comics makers Josh Bayer and Matthew Thurber, Inés Estrada’s scene report, “So, What’s the Comics Scene in Mexico Like?”, a massive 20-page interview with Megan Kelso, and more!
retail price – $6.00 copacetic price – $5.75
Shit Is Real
by Aisha Franz
And now, we’re off to Europe, as Berlin-based, Aisha Franz returns with a meditation on the porous border between dream, fantasy, and reality. Shit Is Real posits that, contrary to normative conceptions, dreams and fantasies are real life – simply of a different order than what we consider as constituting reality. In nearly 300 pages of crisp black and white comics, Franz delves into the subjective experiences of a young woman being out and about and within and without. Consciousness is perceived in layers and conveyed in levels, making for a conception of living taking place simultaneously in/on different dimensions. Experiences are had, decisions are made, and actions are taken – each on various planes of being, each interacting with the others, weaving a tapestry of temporality.
retail price – $24.95 copacetic price – $21.75
Vanishing Perspective
by Alexis Beauclair
Let’s move on to France, where anyone searching for a formalist comics minimalism will find quest’s end in the works of the aptly named Alexis Beauclair. Here in this collection of four pieces, the longest of which, the title track, is in turn divided into eight parts, Beauclair explores the possibilities that inhere into arranging lines in sequence through time. To get an idea of what this mean in practice, just take a minute to scroll through a few choice spreads, HERE.
retail price – $20.95 copacetic price – $18.75
Arab of the Future 3
by Riad Sattouf
And now we head off to Syria via France where the highly acclaimed memoir of growing up in the Middle East – primarily in Syria – and Europe – primarily in France – continues to be created. We’ll have more to add once we crack it open, but wanted to let it be known that it’s now in stock, and on sale at a copacetic price. Here’s the lowdown from the publisher: In this third volume, (1985–1987), Riad’s mother, fed up with the grinding reality of daily life in the village, decides she cannot take it any longer. When she resolves to move back to France, young Riad sees his father torn between his wife’s aspirations and the weight of family traditions.
retail price – $27.00 copacetic price – $22.75
Shaolin Cowboy: Start Trek
by Geof Darrow
And now we’ll segue back to the states via Geof Darrow, who, while American, was influenced by Moebius at a critical juncture in his career, which resulted in some of his transformative works being published in France, which in turn granted him a certain perspective with which to skewer the land of the free with his over-the-top comics. Finally, his long-out-of-print, original Shaolin Cowboy series published by the Wachowski sibling’s Burlyman Comics a full decade ago have at last been collected in this deluxe, oversize hardcover volume, as part of the uniform edition of Geof Darrow works currently being published by Dark Horse Comics. This one is an extra-chunky edition, as it collects a seven-issue series, compared to the four issues collected in earlier Shaolin Cowboy collections. In addition, tnis one includes an amazing bonus gallery of pin-ups by an all-star lineup of artists including Moebius, Mike Mignola, Kevin Nowlan and John Severin.
retail price – $24.95 copacetic price – $21.75
The Best of Archie Americana: Silver Age
by Harry Lucey, Frank Doyle, Don DeCarlo, et al
And what could be more American than Archie? And who more fully realized the Archie æsthetic than Harry Lucey? OK, then, here it is: the most Harry Lucey art for your hard earned dollar that you’re likely to find. This 416 page digest includes 18 great Lucey stories, most from his strongest period during the 60s, and most, if not all, scripted by Frank Doyle – plus a dozen classic Lucey covers to boot! Not only that, the rest of the material on hand is well worth while as well, including close to a dozen DeCarlo stories. These comics, in addition to being highly entertaining, offer a sociologically meaningful window through which to view the decades of the ’60s and ’70s, and, from an art history perspective, include many excellent examples of the short form of comics that can be quite instructive to comics creators of all stripes in their concise, compact conveyance of (occasionally calimitous) narrative content. RECOMMENDED
retail price – $9.99 copacetic price – $9.50
American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassination
by Terrance Hayes
The latest poetry collection by the National Book Award-winning MacArthur Fellow, Pittsburgh-based poet, Terrance Hayes features 70 poems sharing the same title, identical with that of the collection itself. Preapre to be challenged.
retail price – $18.00 copacetic price – $15.75
Room to Dream
by David Lynch & Kristine McKenna
As with all things David Lynch, expect the unexpected. Here we have not a biography or an autobiography, but instead, both. The book is fairly evenly split between world-class interviewer and longtime Lynch intimate, Kristine McKenna’s biography of Lynch – based on over 100 interviews with “surprisingly candid” ex-wives, family members and professional collaborators of all stripes – and Lynch’s own personal reflections on his life and work, which – intriguingly – riff off of McKenna’s work, making for a sort of auto/biographical jam session. There is a lot to chew on and mull over here. And then there is the copious selection of rare and previously unshared photographs, among which there are some real gems.
retail price – $32.00 copacetic price – $28.75