BILLIE THE BEE HC

(W) Mary Fleener (A) Mary Fleener (CA) Mary Fleener

At once light and playful, dark and complex-the compelling graphic novel debut of comics legend Mary Fleener. Meet Billie, an oversized honeybee with an even bigger personality! She's bold, boisterous, and always singin' up a storm. Billie lives a sweet life exploring the marshes of San Diego and making friends with Kay the kind Fox, Rayleen the rattlesnake, and Flo and Mo, the dirty joke-telling turtle sisters. But one day humans arrive and illegally release some rabid creatures into the marsh lands, upsetting the delicate ecological balance of the habitat. Can Billie and her woodland friends band together to repel these wild outsiders? And when a natural disaster strikes, does Billie have what it takes to lead the hive? Fleener's intricate crosshatching and signature mind-bending forays into cubist storytelling masterfully conjure up the world of her plucky honeybee protagonist. A deep dive into the secret life of bees, Billie's story is by turns both charming and harrowing.

COMPLETE CREPAX HC #4

PRIVATE LIFE

(W) Guido Crepax (A) Guido Crepax (CA) Guido Crepax

The fourth volume of Fantagraphics' groundbreaking Complete Crepax series puts the author's sexy proto feminist heroine Valentina, the globe-trotting Milanese photographer, front and center in a series of erotic comics narratives. Most of the comics in this volume, spanning 1965 to 1985, have never before been published in English. It includes Crepax's first foray into comics magazines-"The Curve of Lesmo"-in which our heroine is introduced as an adventurer's sidekick! Elsewhere in this volume, she becomes a mother, outwits a gang of jewel thieves, flashes back to her childhood and adolescence, encounters a mysterious cello, and much more! Not only is Crepax's impeccable draftsmanship on full display, but this deluxe package highlights the innovative visual storytelling techniques that made him an international sensation.

COMPLETE CREPAX HC BOX SET VOL 03-04 SPELLS & PRIVATE LIFE #2

(W) Guido Crepax (A) Guido Crepax (CA) Guido Crepax

Italy's Guido Crepax is one of the most acclaimed cartoonists in the world. In the 1960s and '70s, he created and chronicled the adventures of Valentina, arguably the strongest and most independent female character in European comics up to that time, and legitimized the erotic genre. Fantagraphics' ambitious Complete Crepax series launched in 2016 to international acclaim, and this handsome boxed set contains our third and fourth columes, Evil Spells and Private Life. Vol. 3 introduces Baba Yaga, the villainous witch of folklore, and includes Crepax's sinuous adaptations of several literary masterpieces by Robert Louis Stevenson, Henry James, and Edgar Allan Poe. In Vol. 4, the author's sexy proto feminist heroine Valentina becomes a mother, outwits a gang of jewel thieves, flashes back to her childhood and adolescence, encounters a mysterious cello, and much more!

EDDIE SPAGHETTI HC STORY BOOK

(W) Rutu Modan (A) Rutu Modan (CA) Rutu Modan

Eddie Spaghetti gets into all kinds of delightful mischief in this early reader's instant classic. Eddie Spaghetti is just an average kid who finds himself caught up in silly, sweetly innocent adventures. In these charming stories Eddie, accompanied by his big goofy dog, goes fishing in his goldfish bowl, saws the legs off a too-high table, and takes a bath with his clothes on! The bright colors, lively drawings, and sing-songy rhymes will delight young readers as they follow along Eddie's lighthearted mischief. Eddie Spaghetti, originally created by Israeli artist Aryeh Navon and poet Lea Golberg in the 1930s, is one of the most beloved characters in the Hebrew language. As a tribute to these renowned creators, cartoonist Rutu Modan offers her own playful take on this classic character for a new, international generation of young readers. This is an exceptional book of high-quality comics designed specifically for children four and up.

EIGHTBALL PUSSEY TP (CURR PTG)

(W) Daniel Clowes (A) Daniel Clowes (CA) Daniel Clowes

A vicious satire of pop culture and the commerce of art returns! New edition, cover and intro by Clowes! This hilarious classic from Dan Clowes is a brutal and scathing peek into the insular, pathetic world of the comic book industry, as seen through the eyes of antihero Dan Pussey (pronounced "Pooh-say"), creator of the smash superhero comic "Nauseator." From cradle to grave, Clowes presents the complete saga of Young Dan Pussey, mercilessly skewering the business and medium of comics, bouncing from art to commerce to culture high and low. Clowes not only parodies the superhero genre (notably Stan "The Man" Lee), but also his own peers, from his publishers and fellow authors at Fantagraphics to artistic heavyweights like Art Spiegelman (seen here as "Gummo Bubbleman"). Through it all, Pussey dreams endlessly about having sex with a woman, but even those fantasies degenerate into superhero scenarios. If you think Comic Book Guy on The Simpsons is pathetic (and hilarious), wait 'til you read Pussey!

I RENE TARDI PRISONER OF WAR IN STALAG IIB HC #2

(W) Jacques Tardi (A) Jacques Tardi (CA) Jacques Tardi

The conclusion to a Magnum Opus from one of our greatest contemporary cartoonists. Picking up where Vol. 1 left off, the second volume of Stalag IIB begins when captured French soldier Ren. Tardi finally gets a taste of freedom, as prisoners and German officers alike are forced to evacuate the POW camp he has languished in for the past four years. Thus begins the long, grueling journey eastward, where Tardi and his fellow POWs must evade the pursuing Russian Army, stave off their gnawing hunger, and contend with the increasingly illtempered and vicious German soldiers accompanying them. Throughout this harrowing odyssey, the only thing that keeps him going is the hope that he'll one day return home to France, where his wife Henriette patiently awaits him. Featuring meticulous line work punctuated by stunning splashes of color, Jacques Tardi's grim yet heartening biographical portrait of his father's life as a soldier during WWII is a personal and artistic triumph.

MR FIBBER HC STORY BOOK

(W) Yirmi Pinkus (A) Yirmi Pinkus (CA) Yirmi Pinkus

Mr. Fibber's absurdist adventures will delight early readers and their parents! Enter the whimsical world of Mr. Fibber, where events unfold in the absurd, amusing logic of a dream. When Mr. Fibber accidently drops his coin in a jar of juice, he magically shrinks so he can dive down and retrieve it. On a walk one day, he stumbles upon a giant dog with a smokestack on its back, towing a train behind it-and hitches a ride. And just to make sure it stays sunny and warm during his vacation, he catches the sun in a net and packs it in his suitcase! These playful adventures, illustrated in a bouncy colored pencil style and bursting with imagination, will enchant young readers. Based on Lea Goldberg's classic rhyming stories from the 1940s, Mr. Fibber introduces this charming character to a new generation of young readers and their parents. This is an exceptional book of high-quality comics designed specifically for children four and up.

PERINEUM TECHNIQUE HC

(W) Florent Ruppert (A) Jerome Mulot (CA) Florent Ruppert

JH and Sarah meet online, connecting on a regular basis for virtual hookups. Their unromantic connections, brief and solitary, eventually obsess JH, who tries to convince Sarah to meet him in person. A strange game of seduction ensues, eventually resulting in JH accepting a challenge of abstinence in the hopes of gaining intimacy with Sarah. The Perineum Technique is a masterful meditation on intimacy in our era of hyperconnectivity, brilliantly employing visual metaphor in lieu of sexual explicitness - the couple's acts of online congress often begin with naked plunges off giant obelisks - to create a wildly original graphic novel tour through the subconscious of young romance. Originally serialized in the pages of Le Monde, the prestigious French newspaper, The Perineum Technique is one of the country's most acclaimed graphic novels of recent years, by two of its most exciting creators.

WRITING WRITTEN HC SHORT STORIES

(W) Stephen Dixon

The newest book from the acclaimed National Book Award nominee. In this collection of interconnected short stories, two-time National Book Award-nominee Stephen Dixon illuminates the psychological state of a writer whose wife suddenly, tragically passes away from a debilitating illness. Dixon's evocative vignettes paint a complex portrait of the man's life, zipping backward and forward in time from the creatively fruitful but often tumultuous period of his marriage to his twilight years when, struggling with his loss, he fumbles to find clarity and certainty in his writing. Through his characteristically restrained prose, Dixon navigates the entire breadth of the human experience-from life's joyous highs to its devastating lows, and the pensive moments in between-grappling with themes of love, grief, and companionship with grace and subtlety.