Slated to be our first release of 2009, Anders Nilsen's Monologues for Calculating the Density of Black Holes is the second Monologues... collection of darkly humorous strips and stories from one of comics' great young experimentalists. Click this link if the embedded slideshow doesn't appear above, and/or to open it in a new window.

The 2008 Best-Of lists are rolling in fast and furious:

• Bookmunch goes Fanta-crazy this week with reviews of Bottomless Belly Button by Dash Shaw ("graphic novel of the year"), Funeral of the Heart by Leah Hayes ("dazzling") and Abandoned Cars by Tim Lane ("spirited")

• The Independent counts the Love and Rockets reprints Perla La Loca, Beyond Palomar and Amor Y Cohetes among the best comics of the year

• Critic and commentator Alan David Doane names The Education of Hopey Glass by Jaime Hernandez his Graphic Novel of the Year; Abandoned Cars by Tim Lane is his Debut of the Year; Ghost World: Special Edition by Daniel Clowes is his Reissue of the Year; Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko by Blake Bell is tied for Comic Art Book of the Year; and 4 more of our titles are Other 2008 Titles of Note

• New York Magazine names Bottomless Belly Button the #2 Graphic Novel of 2008, saying "Shaw's dysfunctional-family epic is so funny and engrossing we'd expect Oprah to pick it, but for all the graphic frog sex"

• The Globe and Mail recommends Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko for holiday gift-giving

• From Steven Stwalley, here's photos of the "Hot Ink: Comic Art" show at the Minnesota Museum of American Art (mmaa.org) that includes Zak Sally and Tom Kaczynski among others

• In this video from Comicology.tv, Mort Walker talks about the history of the International Museum of Cartoon Art (look for our collection of Walker's Sam's Strip early next year)

• Publishers Weekly talks to Lilli Carré about The Lagoon

• PW also presents a 10-page excerpt from Anders Nilsen's soon-to-arrive Monologues for Calculating the Density of Black Holes

• Wall Street Journal book critic and Laura Warholic novelist Alexander Theroux weighs in on The Paris Review Interviews, Vol. III

• The Beat goes digging through back issues of The Comics Journal, finds gold

Anders Nilsen has a solo show opening tomorrow at Little Bird Gallery in Los Angeles. "It's my first proper solo show. It's mostly a bunch of drawings and paintings I've been doing over the last year or so, of various sizes, and a few covers from issues of Big Questions." Seeing a collection of Nilsen's original work would surely be a great experience.

Jim Woodring fans might want to check out the Kaiju Invasion at Art Center South Florida.

Jesse LeDoux show in Rhode Island Saturday.

Also, TONIGHT: Portland's Grass Hut has a grasshutgang show. Le merde, Scrappers, Bwana Spoons, APAK, and Martin Ontiveros will all have new works up.

Anders Nilsen says:

[Above is] the postcard for a show I am doing at Littlebird Gallery in L.A., called Landscapes and Smoke. It opens on December 6th and features a bunch of big drawings, a few gouache paintings and a few covers from Big Questions. Included are Batman, Captain America, The Archangel Gabriel, Adam and Eve and an upside down tree. Oh, and Bison Man. If you're around you should come check it out.

• Dash Shaw's animated trailer for Bottomless Belly Button is now available to watch on ComicBookTrailers.com (in addition to on our own site)

• Speaking of Bottomless Belly Button, Matthew Brady takes a good look at the book

• Congratulations and good luck to Linda Medley for being named a finalist (and the only American on the list) for the Prix de la Critique 2008 by the Association des Critiques et Journalistes de Bande Dessinée for Château l'Attente, the French edition of Castle Waiting

• More stunning sketchbook pages from Anders Nilsen

• Austin English has some very nice things to say about Lilli Carré's The Lagoon

• Ellen Forney has some bad-ass Brazilian jiu-jitsu desktop wallpaper for you to download

• Stickers and Donuts declares "Ray Fenwick is my boyfriend"

• Brian Ralph asks: "Did Charles Burns make this mask?" Note: Pee-Wee Herman is involved

Robin McConnell and the Inkstuds crew talk to Anders Nilsen about Big Questions and more.

Van Jensen of CBR talks to Jacob Covey and Femke Hiemstra about BEASTS! 2.  

• BBC News talks to Zippy the Pinhead creator (and, next week, Seattle visitor) Bill Griffith (streaming audio)

• Austin English poses 20 questions to Dash Shaw

• Blog Flume looks at Charles Schulz's use of punctuation in Peanuts

• More sketchbook pages from Anders Nilsen

Chicagoans! You've got 2 hours to hie ye'self down to Quimby's to see a reading by Anders Nilsen at 7 PM. Sez Anders on his blog, "I'll be showing a sort of preview of the forthcoming Monologues for Calculating the Density of Black Holes (Monologues II-Fantagraphics Books, due out in February) as well as a video-ized version of the strip Event, which first appeared in Mome, back in 2005, and was originally conceived as a video, not a comic strip. Which explains why it doesn't really look like one. Joe Meno and Arthur Nersesian are also reading."

The latest batch of sketchbook comics from Anders Nilsen ranges from pure abstraction to some trenchantly funny political commentary.

Anders, as he occasionally does, posts more moleskine pages.