Online Commentary & Diversions:

• List: Your Official Selection nominees at the 37th Festival International de la Bande Desinée d'Angoulême include the French editions of Dungeon Quest Book 1 by Joe Daly (coming in May from Fantagraphics), Eightball by Daniel Clowes (a collection with no English analogue), and Misery Loves Comedy by Ivan Brunetti

• Lists: The Comics Reporter asked its readers to "Name Five Comics You Enjoyed This Year" — spot the Fantagraphics releases in the results

• Gift Guide/List/Plug: At Comic Book Resources, Kelly Thompson's "Awesome Women in Comics Holiday Gift List 2009" includes Ghost World by Daniel Clowes: "This tale of smart alternative teens just never gets old... Enid and Becky are both incredibly savvy teens that I think women can both relate and aspire to."

• Review: "The bewildering events of this fourth volume [of Delphine] race towards a stunning conclusion, one that is quietly horrifying, yet terrifying in its sadness. ... The fourth book is a must for those who have read earlier issues, but it will make the uninitiated really want Delphine." – Leroy Douresseaux, Comic Book Bin

• Review: "Fortunately for today’s readers, Blazing Combat — nearly impossible to find for over a generation — is now conveniently available and immaculately produced in hardcover from Fantagraphics.  Anybody who wants to read great great comics, war stories, or a superb tutorial in short form comics writing and unsurpassed comics illustration needs to read this one." – Michael C. Lorah, Newsarama

• Review: "It was, frankly, a nostalgic blast of fresh air to be able to read a graphic novel of Peter [Bagge]’s again, even if this is a series of unconnected pieces instead of a coherent narrative. ... Anybody who read Hate back in the day already knows to pick [Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me] up just because it’s Peter, and for you kids today who never read Hate, this is a good place to start with the guy." – Kevin Bramer, Optical Sloth

• Review: Greek site Comicdom seems to have a positive review of Pim & Francie by Al Columbia (the autotranslation is a bit mangled)

• Plug: "This is an uber-cool title by Jacques Tardi and Jean-Patrick Manchette... you can add this graphic novel West Coast Blues to the list of greats by this total fab (and late) French author." – Book Soup Blog

• Profilish: At Robot 6, Sean T. Collins gives an update on his "Sinister Six" alt-horror cartoonists, including Hans Rickheit, Josh Simmons and Al Columbia (Elsewhere: The Comics Reporter reviews Simmons's disturbing Cockbone mini)

• Profile: Possibly apropos of the above-mentioned nomination, French blog Beware looks at the work of Daniel Clowes in an article titled "Cynisme et Comic Books" (autotranslation)

• Plugs: Robot 6's Chris Mautner and guest columnist Charles Hatfield are both reading The Comics Journal #300; the former says "regardless of what kind of comics reader you are, there's something in here you're going to want to read," while the latter says "in good Journal fashion, [it] contains a lot to chew on and some stuff that I emphatically disagree with. It’s a great issue that leaves me with both a nostalgic wistfulness... and a keen desire to write about comics into the unforeseeable future!"

• Things to see: Dash Shaw's new minicomic (almost missed it)

• Things to see: Stephen DeStefano presents a selection of inspirations and references for his in-progress Lucky in Love

• Things to see: Just a reminder that Renee French continues to kill it on her daily art blog

Speaking of Kevin Huizenga, his conversation with Art Spiegelman (moderated by Gary Groth) from The Comics Journal #300 is now available to read on the new TCJ.com website (about which more later).

Kevin Huizenga presents the first part of a presumably new Glenn Ganges strip on his blog.

You want to make art with a medium that restricts your ability to make said art? Try an Etch-A-Sketch instead of glorified finger-painting. Knock yourself out with an iPhone for studies and sketches -- just please don't present it to me as finished art.* Thanks!

* Exceptions may apply, but I haven't seen any yet.

(Spider-man by Keith Drake from Wanderline.com.)

Tomorrow at 6:30 PM at the Multnomah County Central Library in Portland OR, T. Edward Bak gives a presentation about his in-progress story "Wild Man," about naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller, currently being serialized in our quarterly anthology Mome. More info here. If I lived there I would totally go!

Just arrived in our warehouse and ready to ship:

Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS Box
By Jacques Boyreau

Harken back to those thrilling days of yesteryear when the advent of rental videos astonished the movie-going consumer who could only feed his addiction by going to the theater or watching chopped up movies in between commercials on TV. Like vinyl, here is the revenge of another analog cast-off: the VHS is once again insinuating itself into American culture, and this book celebrates the anarchic design art of those early VHS boxes.

Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS Box is a feast for exploitation cognoscenti, reprinting some of the most louche, decadent, minimo-pervo artwork to ever grace a VHS box, featuring such movies as From Beyond, Penitentiary II, Beast of the Yellow Night, Cop Killers, Bay of Blood, Escape from Death Row, and Cocaine Wars. Readers will be agog at the plethora of supertrash movie titles, and then move on to rediscover the anarchic box designs. Throughout, editor and cultural historian Jacques Boyreau succinctly narrates the household-piercing story of VHS: “On par with the jukebox, disco, and neon, VHS reformatted the world’s product-intake and boosted a libertarian aesthetic that conquered TV in the same way TV conquered comic books in the 1950s, and allowed us to hold movies in our hands. Posters in the lobby could advertise, even fetishize a movie; credit sequences could identify the participants, but somehow, VHS box-art ‘became’ the iconic equivalent of the movie.”

Portable Grindhouse is published in a VHS “format,” slyly packaged inside a facsimile VHS box, and contains almost a hundred reproductions of VHS art with commentary.

Download an EXCLUSIVE PDF excerpt (3.6 MB) featuring seven 2-page spreads from the book.

200-page full-color 5.5" x 9.25" softcover with slipcase • $19.99
ISBN: 978-1-56097-969-2
Add to Cart • More Info & Previews

Paul Hornschemeier and Jay Ryan resume their joint book tour behind their respective new releases All and Sundry and Animals and Objects In and Out of Water with a West Coast leg beginning tonight in L.A. and wrapping up at our blowout Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery 3rd Anniversary party on Saturday. Full list of West Coast dates:

Mon., Dec. 7, 6pm
Giant Robot
2062 Sawtelle Blvd.
LOS ANGELES, CA

Tues., Dec. 8, 7pm
Foundation Editions@NOMAD
1993 Blake Ave.
LOS ANGELES, CA

Wed., Dec. 9, 6-8pm
Giant Robot
618 Shrader St.
SAN FRANCISCO, CA

Thurs., Dec. 10, 7pm
D. King Gallery
2284 Fulton St.
BERKELEY, CA

Fri., Dec. 11, 6pm
Goodfoot Gallery
2845 SE Stark
PORTLAND, OR

Sat., Dec. 12, 6-9pm
Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery
1201 South Vale St. @ Airport Way S.
SEATTLE, WA
*Fantagraphics Bookstore's 3rd Anniversary party*

Now available for preview and pre-order: the new 3rd volume of our anything-goes, eyeball-poking, laff-inducing, psyche-jolting comics anthology Hotwire Comics, brought to you by editor (and cover artist) Glenn Head. This edition features contributions from two dozen creators including Michael Kupperman, Mary Fleener, R. Sikoryak (with some brand-new "Masterpiece Comics"), Onsmith, Mats!?, Stephane Blanquet and many more! Download an exclusive 15-page PDF excerpt containing a page each from a sampling of contributors right here (16.5 MB). This book is scheduled to be in stock and ready to ship later this month and in stores shortly thereafter (subject to change).

View a photo & video slideshow preview of the book embedded here. Click here if it is not visible, and/or to view it larger in a new window (recommended).

In today's New York Times Sunday Book Review, Douglas Wolk turns in some short reviews of recommended comics for the holidays, including:

"The blandly didactic sobriety of old educational comics and earnest advertisements... is Michael Kupper­man’s default tone for the deranged, gaspingly funny work collected in Tales Designed to Thrizzle: Volume One. Kupperman has a stiff, deadpan drawing style that suggests the textures of woodcuts, clip-art and old 'Mary Worth' strips; his writing, on the other hand, jumps the rails at every opportunity."

 "The artists assembled by Andrei Molotiu for his anthology Abstract Comics push 'cartooning' to its limits: the selections have few if any words, no characters or plot, and very few clearly identifiable representations — just abstract images in sequence. ... It’s a fascinating book to stare at, and as with other kinds of abstract art, half the fun is observing your own reactions..."

(Edited to add: There's also a very nice review of Lilli Carré's new Little Otsu book Nine Ways to Disappear.)

Meanwhile, over at Entertainment Weekly, Strange Suspense: The Steve Ditko Archives Vol. 1 is #9 on this week's "Must List":

"This exhilarating collection of stories by the comic-book artist who co-created Spider-Man captures all the glorious chills and blood spills from the first two years of his career."

A message from Hans Rickheit:

In a desperate effort to raise funds to escape Philadelphia, I am now offering the original pages from my 2001 Xeric-Winning graphic novel, CHLOE for purchase. (I am also using this as an opportunity to try out PayPal.) The pages are listed HERE and are priced accordingly. Each page will be mailed to any area within the U.S.A. in a flat cardboard envelope with no shipping charge. Adorn your home with a unique piece of cartooning perversity, or conceal your newly-obtained treasure in your precious vaults! Frame it or deface it with your own doodles! Give it as a gift to your stranger relatives or discerning friends! Don't delay: they are available only first come - first served basis!

(Note : Those unfamiliar with the book can obtain a copy here.)

And don't forget Rickheit's phenomenal new book The Squirrel Machine, available here.