"Chapter One: The Boxing Kangaroo." Acclaimed rising talent Marco Coronatransports us into the life of a woman called Miranda, flashing back to her daysas a child visiting her sickly twin brother Riccardo at the seaside hospitalwith her wise and knowing Gramma, reflecting on and dreaming about herrelationship with her loopy mother. As Miranda pads around her house, feedingher cats, Corona's rich, elegantly stylized art seamlessly moves between past,present, dream and (in Riccardo's case) hallucination to weave the portrait of aunique woman living a unique story.

An elderly lady-killer, living out his last years in shabby gentility. Amysterious young man wandering aimlessly through an urban wilderness. A chanceencounter between two petty lives, each with its own secrets. Insomnia #2continues Matt Broersma's comics-noir dissection of American society, renderedin uncannily moody two-tone drawings.

Jim Woodring's charcoal drawings take the otherworldly qualities of his comics ( The Frank Book ) to a higher level of clarity and nuance. These crisply rendered images reflect his life-long obsession with hidden worlds, alternate realities and the inexplicable resonance of the unprecedented and irrational in lucid art. Seeing Things collects the most toothsome of these drawings and arranges them in four sections. "Lazy Robinson" is a series of portraits of forms taken by a cognizant object during the course of a specific and identifiable stream of thought. "Frogs" celebrates the tender proclivities of the most noble of all animals, by placing them in situations that would dismay a horde of saints. "The Visible World" is a roundup of appalling scenes of sub-rational political activity involving catalytic entities with a high ratio of motivation to altruism. And "The Portfolio in Color" appears like a rainbow at the end of all this exalted storminess to send readers out into the world whistling with delight. Many of these images were created for "Mysterio Sympatico," Woodring's multimedia stage collaboration with guitarist Bill Frisell. There is plenty of echoless, glowing furniture to add to that already crowded storeroom which is briefly, but brilliantly, illuminated in the pages of this stately book.

Annotated comic panels inspired by the life and writings of Franz Kafka offer insight into his philosophies and style beyond common stereotypes, in a volume that introduces the plots of many of his works and features a complementary mini-biography. Reprint.

Confessions, Romances, Secrets, and Temptations is the companion volume to John Benson's popular anthology of romance comics, Romance Without Tears. Published in the 1950s by Archer St. John, the stories in that volume were decidedly different from the typical romance comics, just as St. John was decidedly different from the typical comics publisher. This new book explores the background of these comics and their publisher, including a short biography, interviews with the editors and artists who worked for the company, and critical commentary. In his research for Romance Without Tears, the author was left with a rich body of material about one of the few quality-driven 1950s comics publishers. St. John's reputation as a fair and honest publisher attracted many of the top artists of the day, including Matt Baker, Ric Estrada, Everett Raymond Kinstler, Joe Kubert, Bob Powell, Leonard Starr, and George Tuska. In addition to interviewing Estrada, Kubert, and Starr, Benson talks with several St. John staffers, including editor Irwin Stein, production man Warren Kremer, and editorial assistant Nadine King. Together they provide an engaging account of Archer St. John and the atmosphere he nourished to create these distinctive comics. Confessions contains a time chart of every title published by St. John (all genres), showing issue number and date, and a complete, detailed checklist of all the company's romance comics, giving story titles, artist credits, and cross-indexing the extensive reprints. The book is lavishly illustrated with examples of the comics, and includes rare photos and other visuals from the period.