Literary

When Toronto-based artists Tony Romano and Jay Isaac launched their quarterly arts and culture magazine, Hunter and Cook, they admittedly didn’t have a clue how the magazine industry worked. “Going into it, we knew nothing about magazines. I don’t even really look at magazines,” says Isaac. But their lack of industry knowledge seems to have […]

In many ways, Sunset Park is classic Auster: self-negating male protagonist, plot elements hinging on chance, New York and failure as a mode of operation. However, unlike previous works, this book forgoes surreal qualities in favour of a relatively (for Auster) straight-forward story about the need for human connection, love in all its manifestations and art. […]

In the 1970s, Moto Hagio was part of a wave of female Japanese comic-book creators whose work helped define shojo manga (girls’ comics). Fantagraphics Books has collected 10 different short stories of Hagio’s in one volume, along with an essay and a lengthy interview first printed in The Comics Journal. The stories reflect the effect […]

Not Love but Delicious Foods Makes Me So Happy! is pretty much the comic for foodies. There’s not really a plot beyond the main character (a thinly veiled avatar of the author) going to restaurants with her friends and gushing about the food. Essentially, each chapter is a review of a real-life Tokyorestaurant told in […]

If you have ever (even remotely) followed James Kirkpatrick’s career as a hip-hop/noise maker and visual artist (urban or otherwise), you will already know that his art is in a near-constant state of evolution. He is always staring past a horizon most of us have yet to be conscious of. And so it is with […]

Scott Chantler has explored Canadian history in comics before, but Two Generals is the first time he’s tackled a story with such a strong personal connection (the book recounts his grandfather’s experience in WWII). Chantler’s reverence for his grandfather is the book’s biggest strength, and weakness: the author’s passion for the subject matter shows on […]

Former Haligonian and Coast contributor Ray Fenwick’s latest book extends the work that he began in this city: typography-heavy painting on found book covers. The books’ loose cloth weave is clearly visible through the paintings, and even though Fenwick’s lettering skills should be studied by scientists, there’s a refreshing sense of the typographer’s hand and […]

Male friendship has two types of rooms. Behind one door, dark and dank spaces remain; behind another, all is airy, fresh and bright. Andrew Pyper explores both states in The Guardians. Trevor, Carl and Randy return to their hometown, Grimshaw, where their old fourth, Ben, has committed suicide. Ben had spent years watching the property […]

Comic Patton Oswalt recently pissed off the nerds with a manifesto in Wired suggesting that it was time to kill off modern geek culture. Good thing he still has the alt-literary nerdlings on his side with the release of Zombie Spaceship Wasteland, a memoir, comic and bathroom reader all in one. Bouncing between gags and […]

To get revenge on a criminal organization known simply as The Outfit, Parker asks his many friends in the underworld to hit the group as hard as they can. Darwyn Cooke uses various techniques to depict the different heists, from newspaper-like strips to simply adding illustrations to pages of text. Each heist works as a […]

As a newbie to Vanessa Davis’ writings and artwork, Make Me a Woman is not just a treat, but a feast for the eyes. Eschewing the traditional four-panel format for more complex layouts, her sense of composition and perspective supplies each page with vibrancy and flow. While her line drawings (partial erase marks and all) […]

Life should have been grand for Kristin Hersh: Throwing Muses was about to become the first American band to be signed to seminal label 4AD Records. But right before her 1980s indie band began recording its first major album, Hersh was quietly dealing with a personal hell. As a result of a traumatic bike accident […]