Zombre #2 – The Magic Forest: Ansis A. Purins
A friendly but awkward zombie awakens in a campground overseen by a hippie park ranger. After causing some accidental mayhem, he befriends Acorn, a lonely girl with an overprotective father. Entirely cute and fun, this is probably the sweetest, friendliest comic featuring a zombie you’ll ever read. Even the scary part turns out to be OK (the lesson is obviously that zombies are misunderstood and just trying to be nice). The sight gags and general slapstick tone, as well as Ansis A. Purins’ art, reminded me of old Hanna-Barbera cartoons. This was a delight.

Conniption: Erin Gallagher
A beautiful and elegantly designed comic, the story — about a little girl (presumably Erin Gallagher herself) throwing a fit and refusing to do what she’s told — is almost secondary to the format. With bold, screen-printed pages and vellum inserts, this is artistic and moving.

Team Girl Comic Vol. 2: Various artists
The collective Team Girl Comic are back with their second volume. Longer and more diverse than the first, this has some familiar creators from the first volume, including Gill Hatcher and Emma McLuckie, as well as introducing some new ones, such as Karena Moore and Mhairi Hislop. The result is once again an exciting collection of young female creators having fun. I’m glad they’re continuing with this project and I know I’ll be happy to keep reading.

Papercutter #10: Damien Jay, Jesse Reklaw, Minty Lewis
Who does not love Tugboat Press’ anthology series Papercutter? Admittedly, I am not a regular reader of the series, but I’ve loved everyone I’ve picked up.

I know Damien Jay mostly from “Frankie Pug Dog” (although, sadly, that’s not all of it) but his story here, “Willy,” is much more somber. A young woman is the only one who can see her dead brother, who keeps coming to her every night. It’s a moody, inconclusive story that Jay’s loose art done in washes of ink compliments perfectly.

Jesse Reklaw’s contribution is much more fun — a two page-spread called “Perils of the Sea.” It’s full of throw-away jokes and funny images.

Minty Lewis offers another of her office dramas featuring anthropomorphic fruit with “Hello Neighbor.” The content is depressing — mostly about urban (and suburban) loneliness and the disconnect of being coworkers with people without really knowing them. But since it’s fruit, it’s also hilarious. Lewis has a wicked talent in capturing awkward work situations unflinchingly and her spacious, clean drawings are always wonderful.

I’m not going to write a full review of Prison for Bitches: A Lady Gaga Fanzine, but it is pretty awesome and I’m happy to own it. It has a selection of ridiculously good contributors and I think if you’re even the most casual of Lady Gaga fans, you’d probably like this (although, understandably, at $10, it’s probably a bit more than you’d want to pay).

Review copies provided by Ansis A. Purins and Gill Hatcher.

I’ve felt a little critical of The Best American Comics in the past, and that could just be that I wasn’t that familiar with them, but I’ve always felt they had a somewhat limited perspective on literary comics. You were going to find the approved creators — you know, the kinds of people who create “graphic novels” and those that your non-comics friends would possibly read, but not much else.

And then I read Neil Gaiman was the guest editor for the 2010 edition. Yes, I kind of rolled my eyes at bit there. I like Gaiman as a writer, yes, and his contributions to comics have been notable, but they’ve mostly been in the past and his work is fairly mainstream (maybe not initially, but I think once he’s showing up on CBS Sunday Morning, yes, he’s mainstream). He wouldn’t have been my first pick to put together a book of the best comics of the year.

However, Best American Comics 2010 is pretty cool and I think a lot of that is because of Gaiman’s perspective. I think since he’s not as closely connected to comics as someone else would’ve been, he’s more open-minded in his selections. The stories being told are what’s important here — not who is made them.

Yes, you have a lot of the usual suspects (too much Chris Ware for my tastes, but then, I’m not really a Ware fan), but you also have Theo Ellsworth, Bryan Lee O’Malley, C. Tyler, Lilli Carre. In other words, you have a lot of my people. It’s a wonderful mix of high-profile releases, like R. Crumb’s The Book of Genesis and Jonathan Ames and Dean Haspiel’s The Alcoholic and smaller releases, like Jesse Reklaw‘s Slow Wave and Fred Chao‘s Johnny Hiro.

That’s awesome. That’s what comics is. It covers a broad range of styles and subjects. It encompasses creators and publishers of all ages, experiences and fame. This didn’t feel like “Oh, here’s a bunch of creators you’ve probably heard of and one guy who got a Xeric.” It felt more like “This is what was great in comics between Aug. 2008 and Sept. 2009.” I loved seeing a lot of the comics I loved in that time period showing up here.

Is the perspective still a little limited? Maybe. But overall, this ended up feeling a lot like a collection of comics I’ve read or would read.

So yes, it’s still not for me, since I’ve read a lot of these comics (and I bet you have to). But would I give it to a friend or family member who was interested in comics but didn’t know where to start? Absolutely. That’s what this book is designed to do and it does it incredibly well.

Advanced reading copy provided by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt through NetGalley.