Leif Goldberg's eighth annual edition of Gear Worms comes as a run of 400 four-colour handscreened calendars. Psychedelic colours, rambling rhyming prose, and green monsters grace its pages. Comes with a one-year warranty to keep the dreary winter blues away.
So: unnamed man in goggles is on a moped with his sidekick (an unspecified species somewhere between a cat and a small bear) and a box with mysterious contents. They are racing through the night, dodging monstrous assailants and pesky cops, going up around and through creepy, decrepit, dirty streets and back alleys of the deserted city night-scape.
You have to read this book.
As soon as you open to the first page you will immediately fall into Imiri Sakabashira's sound-filled, nearly wordless, heart-gripping gekiga adventure...(and I haven't even mentioned the fights between busty, decked out super-heroines and gross alien-brain-headed-men....you'll just have to read to find out as you read).
Being a bit of a procrastinator, I've only just started my own holiday purchasing binge. Here are some things that I love to recommend (or maybe just plain love).
Masterpiece Comics by R Sikoryak There is not enough praise I can heap on this book. See more enthusiasm here. It is on its third printing in three months! Favourites? Action Camus (L'Etranger), "Good ol' Gregor Brown" (The Metamorphosis), and Gogo and Didi (Waiting for Godot).
Eating the Dinosaur by Chuck Klosterman Chuck Klosterman is intermittently brilliant. The rest of the time he is hilarious. Good for anyone who likes pop culture, and maybe even better for someone who disapproves of pop culture. Blueberry Express by Misaki Kawai Brightly coloured animals, scuba divers, and skiers grace the pages of this slim art book.
Changing My Mind by Zadie Smith Zadie Smith writes about writing, writes about reading, writes about being. Everything she has to say, she says in perfectly chosen turns of phrase, using delightfully apt metaphors. This American Life Seasons 1 and 2 If you've ever listened to the radio show and fallen a little bit in love with Ira Glass or public radio, this will further your crush, adding television to the many formats in which you can appreciate TAL's brilliant storytelling. Notations 21 by Theresa Sauer This is a diverse and beautiful collection of graphic scores - composers dissecting their own pieces graphically. Inspired by John Cage's Notations, Notations 21 features significant and noteworthy contributors like Karlheinz Stockhausen, Yuji Takahashi, and Earle Brown.
Pictorial Websters by John M. Carrera
This is exactly what it sounds like it would be: a visual dictionary of curiosities. Featuring a (giant?) squid on the cover doesn't hurt its appeal either.
Skateboard et Vahinés by Morgan Navarro There is a dolphin. His name is Flipper, Flip to his friends. He's not in a kids show, although he is a teenager. Les contes de Flip sont comme les autres livres trouvés ici, a part que tous les personnages sont des animaux. Posted by Julia at 1:04 PM
Slide Show and signing with travel momerist Guy Delisle THURSDAY, 17th December 7pm-10pm211 Bernard Ouest
For Pyongyang: a Journey in North Korea andShenzhen: a Travelogue from China, Delisle travelled by himself to North Korea and China as animator for a French company. In Burma Chronicles, Delisle travelled with his family to Myanmar, where he watched his young son while his wife worked for Doctors Without Borders. His "stranger in a strange land" is bleakly humorous as he subtly relates the realities of living under the watchful eyes of an oppressive government that the western world rarely gets to see.
Delisle has been nominated for two coveted Eisner Awards, for Best Writer/Artist and Best Reality-Based Graphic Novel. He is also the cartoonist of the wordless comics Aline & The Others and Albert & The Others. In addition to Drawn & Quarterly, Delisle is published by Editions de L'Association, Editions Delcourt, and Editions Dargaud in France, and Editions de La Pastèque in Montreal. He now lives in the South of France with his wife and children. He is currently working on a sketchbook for D+Q on his family's recent year spent in Jerusalem. Posted by Rory at 10:41 AM
Monday night! 7 PM! Joey Comeau and Emily Horne from A Softer World will be gracing the Librairie with their presence!
They will be here to launch their second book, A Softer World: Second Best Isn't So Bad. Joey and Emily will present some of their favourite strips, and then Joey will read from Overqualified, a collection of hilarious cover letters.
Come in to say hello to the Official D+Q MoominTree, stay for the book launch!
Are good-looking people always well-dressed? Or do well-dressed people just always look good-looking. I don't know. The Sartorialist offers plenty of food for thought about this in his book full of colorful snapshots of exceptional style from the streets of the world.
Intertextual drama. Alison Bechdel recreates this whole memoir around the story of her childhood with a closeted gay dad. It's the kind of book that pulls at your heart strings but also keeps you on your (literary) toes with its liberal use of references to classic literature.
In 1958 Swiss born Robert Frank drove across the United Stats of America with a camera and his family. This book collects a selection of the incredible black and white photos of the everyday he took along the way.
Marcel Dzama's c.v. is fourteen pages long. He's young. He's talented. And he's Canadian. The 28 prints in this "scrapbook" exemplify all the reasons Dzama's art is so neat.
This is one of those books you have to read and recommend to just about everyone you know. I'm not just saying that. It's a real pleasure to read because it's extremely well written (notice the Pulizer prize there on the cover...) AND its set in 1940's New York AND it's about the beginning of mass comic-book publishing AND it's based on a slew of real life comic creators. But really, it's just a good book.
Everyone knows non-denominational holiday season is the time for baking. Rapper Socalled's grandmother definitely knew this so she made up a cookie bookie with all her best receipes. Socalled quickly reproduced it in order to profit from her culinary savvy and in turn we all get to taste Grandma Socalled's delicious cookies.
This book is hilarious. Most people agree with me about this. The ones who don't have unfortunately been irretrievably lost to the realm of Maturity.
I like both these Maira Kalman books exactly the same (although technically I guess she really only illustrated the The elements of style).
An oldy but a goody, this book is essential cultural trivia. Biskind unveils all the the kooky random stories from the 'director's decade' in this chronicle of the 1970's Hollywood revolution.
I was thinking about "Best Of Lists" and I find them to be a bit definitive and exclusive. So instead, I thought it would be better to make a Hypothetical Christmas list of books I will be giving, would like to get or will recommending as gifts. (Mom: if you're reading this we should talk first)
Hot Potatoe By Marc Bell
Sure to please the comic appreciator on your list! AND it's massive!
Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer
Maybe a bit of a bummer this time of year when that organic turkey is calling your name, but Mr. Foer brings some important questions to the table (uhg, no pun intended.)
Zeitoun By Dave Eggers
Asterios Polyp By David Mazzucchelli
A recent Libriarie D+Q bestseller (and elsewhere as well I'm sure)
Manhood For Amateurs By Michael Chabon
Invisible Paul Auster (how could you resist that face?)
This is probably the coziest gift you could ever give *Recommended for all ages Wild Things By Dave Eggers
Monumental memoir by a Gekiga master
Drifting Life Yoshihiro Tatsumi
The Book about Moomin, Mymble and Little My Tove Jansonn
George Sprott By Seth
Heads On and We Shoot; The making of Where The Wilds Things Are From the editors of McSweeny's
Book Of Cities By Piero Ventura
Hold Onto Your Dreams: Arthur Russell and the Downtown Music Scene, 1973-1992 By Tim Lawrence
Looking for something to do on Thursday the 10th 7pm, 211 Bernard Ouest? Why not stop by and check out a few films from the the brand new Wholphin 9.
For those of you out of the loop; Wholphin is a compilation of unseen shorts edited by the folks at McSweeney's and The Believer Magazine
Join us for a screening of the recently released Wholphin No. 9, featuring a Maurice Sendak childhood memory acted out by Spike Jonze and Catherine Keener; the Academy Award-nominated documentary, "La Corona," about a high-stakes beauty pageant in a Colombian women?s prison; the Jury Prize-winning short from Cannes; Caveh Zahedi; meteorites; orgasms as acting lessons; and much more.
"The novels we know best have an architecture. Not only a door going in and another leading out, but rooms, hallways, stairs, little gardens front and back, trapdoors, hidden passageways, et cetera. It's a fortunate rereader who knows half a dozen novels this way in their lifetime. [...] When you enter a beloved novel many times, you can come to feel that you possess it, that nobody else has ever lived there. [...] Even the architect's claim on his creation seems secondary to your wonderful way of living in it."
With this perfect little parable, Zadie Smith opens an essay on Nabokov and Barthes, and the role of the author in a postmodern literary world. Changing My Mind is the name of her latest offering, a collection of essays. The book is divided into five sections (Reading, Being, Seeing, Feeling, and Remembering), and in each, Smith touches on a broad variety of topics with characteristically thoughtful, clear-headed, and open-minded analysis. Perhaps most importantly, as the book jacket notes, each essay's subject is explored through a personal lens, "creating a criticism that is scholarly but never solely academic, rigorous without turning dogmatic."
These are essays that will renew your faith in criticism and remind you why you love to read (fiction and non-fiction lovers alike). Posted by Julia at 12:01 PM
The latest Taiyo Matsumoto book to be translated in english is now in store! GoGo Monster comes in hardcover, with a colorful slipcase and the pages died red on the side, it's beautiful.
The new story by the acclaimed author of Tekkon Kinkreet follows Yuki Tachibana, a nine-year-old weirdo who sees creatures from another world. They like to play innocent tricks on his classmates, but they are soon joined by another set of monsters that want to do more than just steal erasers. Is this paranormal scenario imagined by Yuki as a way of coping with a cruel and alienating system, or is the world in actual danger?
Click here to see a great preview of the Japanese edition by Same Hat's Ryan - you'll notice Viz got rid of the fancy bookmark tassel :-( The book's totally worth it though!
Two big beautiful hardcover books on the making of Where The Wild Things Are and The Fantastic MR. Fox respectively. It's interesting that these movies based on books came out at the same time. Kind of reminds me of the There Will be Blood, No Country For Old Men Sinclair/McCarthy phenomenon of '07.
Yeah for books about the making of movies that are based on books!
Heads On And We Shoot The Making of Where The Wild Things Are from the editors of McSweeny's published by HCP
The Making Of Fantastic Mister Fox from Rizzoli Posted by Rory at 5:03 PM
I'm really into this new kids title; Never Smile At A Monkey is a very curt and forthright description of animals. While most kids books characterize cute talking bears, this one's all: "You wanna pet a Platypus? Don't you know it's got venomous spurs on it's hind legs?" And remember Curious George? Turns out if you smile at him he might "Give you a serious bite with his long sharp fangs."
I love me a realist! Maybe not appropriate for the nieces and nephews on Christmas day... Posted by Rory at 12:19 PM
As a book nerd, I love it when publishing houses make editions of books so beautiful that I don't even care what is inside. If there is a book series which will leave you drooling for Victorian novels, it is Coralie Bickford-Smith's Penguin Classics hardcovers. Each cloth-bound book features a different pattern that ties in to its story, and they just look so lovely stacked up together, with all their colours and patterns.
We are currently carrying The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wuthering Heights, Pride and Prejudice, and Jane Eyre. You can drool over every single book at the Penguin flickr stream andasalways, ifit is available, we would love to special order it for you. But that's not all! Faber and Faber (probably my favourite literary publishing house) just produced a limited series of six books, each on a different 20th century poet. We've got W.B. Yeats, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, and T.S. Eliot. These little books feature gorgeous covers with matching endpapers, and each is curated by a different influential writer (Seamus Heaney on Yeats, Hughes on Plath, and Simon Armitage on Hughes).
