(Photo via Theo Ellsworth)

Larry's brief tribute has emboldened me to talk a little bit about Dylan Williams. I'd been reluctant to say anything here about Dylan's passing since my personal contact with him has been almost entirely as a customer of Sparkplug. I mostly know Dylan through people I work with who were close to him, and through his work as a publisher, which stands on its own as a tribute to his integrity, ethics, and love of the art form. Even knowing him second-hand I can't think of anyone I admire and respect more in this crazy business. The guy was a paragon and an inspiration. Selfishly, I'm sad that I won't be able to enjoy the fruits of his labors to come. For a guy who poured so much into his work, I can't think of a better memorial than the wonderful Sparkplug books and comics on bookshelves around the world, including mine.

As many have pointed out, the efforts to raise funds to cover Dylan's medical expenses are still ongoing. Buy books and art to help out.

If you could color me excited I'd look a lot like the image above: the great Ron Regé Jr. is finishing up his new book The Cartoon Utopia, which (fanfare) we are publishing (tentatively planned for a late-2012 release, schedule TBD), and is looking for a little financial help to enable him to really buckle down on it. Slide him some cash and he will reward you with a drawing or somethin'.

This giant inflatable sculpture was created from a design by Jim Woodring by Pete Hamilton and company at Designs in Air, whose other work also has a decidedly Woodringesque flair. Via The Woodring Monitor.

(click for larger version)

Word has slipped out and is spreading around the Twittersphere like wildfire, so we thought we'd make it official: following our wildly successful edition of A Drunken Dream and Other Stories by Moto Hagio, we will be publishing Hagio-sensei's The Heart of Thomas (Thomas no Shinzō /トーマの心臓 ), edited and translated by Matt Thorn, next year. The book is planned to be a $35.00, 8" x 10" 480-page hardcover, black and white with 16 pages of duotone (as seen above), and is currently scheduled for August 2012, subject to change.

We'll be posting more information about this book and our complete Spring/Summer 2012 lineup in the near future — stay tuned!

[Note: This post has been updated to add the missing "The" to the title.]

Cartoonist and comic book publisher Dylan Williams lost his battle with cancer on Saturday. The alternative comix community lost an effective and passionate advocate. Many Fantagraphics staff members feel the painful loss of a close friend. All of us at Fantagraphics offer Dylan's family and many friends our sincere condolences. We encourage you to visit the Sparkplug Comic Books website and order their wonderful comix in tribute.

(Click here for a larger image; click here for an alternate version!)

Fantagraphics Books Presents:

MICHAEL KUPPERMAN
THE TWAIN IN THE MEMBRANE TOUR

Celebrating the release of
MARK TWAIN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 1910-2010

"Here Mister Kupperman," he said, thrusting a manuscript into my hands. "Publish this, and let the world read of my adventures." 

My name is Mark Twain, and I write these words to you in the good old days of August 2010. "What's that," you say? "Didn't you die a hundred years ago, you old coot?... The truth is I never died, but the same old rumors got exaggerated and then a bunch of other stuff happened, so people forgot I was still alive. 

And with that preface, the celebrated man of letters -thought to be dead for a hundred years but actually surviving due to a wizard's spell- returns with a sequel to his best-selling autography, aided and abetted by humorist and cartoonist Michael Kupperman. From WWI to the Great Depression, WWII to Woodstock, and through the present, Twain details his careers as an ad man, astronaut, hypnotist, Yeti hunter, porn star, drifter, grifter and more, rubbing shoulders and having never-before-told adventures with many major figures of the 20th Century. 

Meet Michael Kupperman at the following events in New York and Connecticut this Fall!

Sunday, Sept. 18th, 1PM
Brooklyn Book Festival
180 Remsen Street, Brooklyn
"Comedy in Comics" Panel discussion with Keith Knight, Kate Beaton, Jennifer Hayden and Heidi MacDonald, in the St. Francis Screening Room

Wednesday, Sept. 21st, 7:30PM
Book Court
163 Court St., Brooklyn
Reading and signing with Ben Katchor

Saturday, Oct. 1st, 7:30PM
Mark Twain House
351 Farmington Avenue, Hartford, CT
Reading and signing

Tuesday, Oct. 4th, 8PM
Littlefield
622 Degraw St., Brooklyn
Twain in the Membrane Comedy Party
Live comedy & cartoons! Twain costume and frog-humping contests! General absurdity! Featuring Michael Kupperman, David Rees, Julie Klausner, Jon Glaser, Kate Beaton, Max Silvestri, Emily Flake and others!

Thursday, Oct. 13th, 7PM
Desert Island
540 Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn
Book and Print release party/signing

Nov. 19th & 20th, Details t.b.a.
Miami Book Fair
Miami, FL

Michael Kupperman lives and works in Brooklyn with his wife Muire and son Ulysses, where he creates the ongoing Tales Designed to Thrizzle comic book series. His most recent book is Mark Twain's Autobiography 1910-2010. His cartoons and illustrations have appeared in magazines from the New Yorker to Fortune, newspapers from The New York Times to the Village Voice, and numerous books, including many published by McSweeneys. His first book, Snake'N'Bacon's Cartoon Cabaret, was also adapted by the author as an Adult Swim animated pilot which can be seen online; two strips from that book were also adapted into cartoons for the Comedy Central series TV Funhouse. Other television work including drawing a TV Funhouse cartoon for Saturday Night Live, and writing for The Peter Serafinowicz Show on BBC2 in the UK. He can currently be found on Twitter, where his user name is @MKupperman.

"Kupperman may have one of the best comedy brains on the planet right now." - CONAN O'BRIEN

MARK TWAIN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 1910-2010
By Michael Kupperman
$19.99 USA
ISBN 978-1-60699-491-7

Published by Fantagraphics Books

Today is the day that Major League Baseball honors the late great Roberto Clemente by naming the winner of the Roberto Clemente Award, given each year to the MLB player who best exemplifies Clemente's legacy of athletic and humanitarian achievements, which you can read all about in Wilfred Santiago's beautiful and universally acclaimed graphic biography 21: The Story of Roberto Clemente. We still have the book available with a limited-edition signed bookplate for no extra charge, so get your copy now!

Heads up! Jim Woodring has added "ten crisp, punchy and potent new Frank drawings in various sizes, strengths and wavelengths" (his words, not mine!) to the Comic Art Collective!

They're all magnificent and ridiculously-reasonably priced, so go get 'em! (The piece above, titled "Libra," sure would make a good birthday gift for this Libra right here, cough cough, hint hint...)

School is back in session! And this Thursday, September 15th, EMP curator/editor Jacob McMurray will "school" you all on the Seattle music scene, as documented in Taking Punk to the Masses: From Nowhere to Nevermind!

Join Jacob at the University Book Store in Seattle at 7:00 PM, as he discusses the "grunge" phenomenon... on the very street where a lot of those unwashed musicians first bumped into each other, perhaps reaching for a Mudhoney 7" at Cellophane Square at the exact same time?

Sub Pop poster, from the pages of Taking Punk to the Masses, featuring artwork by Peter Bagge AND one of my all-time favorite bands, Velocity Girl

The University Book Store is located at 4326 University Way, N.E. or "The Ave," as it is called 'round these parts. Flannel optional.

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec Vol. 2: The Mad Scientist and Mummies on Parade
by Jacques Tardi

96 page full-color 9" x 11.75" hardcover • $24.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-493-1

Ships in: October 2011 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now

After establishing the world of the prickly heroine with the first two episodes of this classic series (combined in Fantagraphics’ The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec Volume 1), Jacques Tardi plunges us back into Belle-Époque Paris for another double dosage of heroic derring-do, evil and crazy malefactors, mad actresses (yes, "Clara Benhardt" makes a return appearance) and monsters!

In “The Mad Scientist” the science that brought us revived dinosaurs now results in a pithecanthrope stalking the streets of the City of Light, climaxing in an amazing car chase involving a foe from the previous volume. Will the perpetually inept Inspector Caponi just make things worse? Probably. Then in the second episode, “Mummies on Parade,” the mummy glimpsed in Adèle’s apartment in previous episodes comes alive! The volume concludes with the sudden startling (and delightful) incursion of some characters familiar to Tardi fans, and a shocking climax that leaves the future of both Adèle and this series in doubt as World War I erupts. (It’s the only story in the entire series not to feature an “in our next episode” teaser.)

The Extraordinary Adventure of Adèle Blanc-Sec Volume 2 is the lucky seventh book in Fantagraphics’ acclaimed series of Tardi reprints, showcasing the rich variety of graphic novels from one of France’s greatest living cartoonists.

Download an EXCLUSIVE 12-page PDF excerpt (2.1 MB) with the beginning pages of each story.

Exclusive Savings: Order The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec Vols. 1 + 2 together and save 20%!