Collecting more than a decade’s worth of excavations, comic strips, animation stills, storybook covers, and much more, this broken jigsaw puzzle of a graphic novel tells the story of Pim & Francie ― childlike male and female imps ― whose irresponsible antics get them into horrific, fantastic trouble. The brilliant, fairy tale-like backdrops hint at further layers of reality lurking under every gingerbread house or behind every sunny afternoon. Their loosely defined relationship only contributes to the existential fear that lingers underneath the various perils they are subjected to, which are threaded together by text and notes by the artist.

Five interlinked horror tales, told in the form of a graphic novel, follow a young girl into a booth at an amusement park called "Cinema Panopticum," an attraction that introduces her to four chilling nightmarish worlds in "The Prophet," "The Wonderpill," "La Lucha," and "The Hotel." Mature.

In this unique volume, a number of scholars spanning diverse areas and backgrounds offer fresh insight into how perceived concepts of horror and dark subject matter influence cultures and societies around the world. The contributions here explore how topics considered disturbing, mysterious, or fascinating are found not only in works of fiction and entertainment, but also in the cultural fabrics, belief systems, artistic creations, and even governmental structures of societies. Topics discussed in this book include witchcraft, voodoo, zombies, spiritualism, serial killers, monsters, cemeteries, pop culture entertainment, and the sublime in transcendental experiences. As the academic study of horror becomes more mainstream, collections such as this are instrumental in realizing just how much it impacts our lives—past, present, future, and imaginary. Thus, this volume of intriguing and profound topics offers scholars, students, and lovers of learning a much-needed fresh and innovative intellectual exploration of the horror genre and the cultural fascination with the mysterious unknown.

"Designing different 'types,' conveying emotion, adding props and costumes, developing a personal style

Alberto Breccia's Dracula is composed of a series of brutally funny satirical misadventures starring the hapless eponymous antihero. Literally defanged (a humiliating trip to the dentist doesn’t help), the protagonist’s glory days are long behind him and other, more sinister villains (a corrupt government, overtly backed by American imperialism) are sickening and draining the life out of the villagers far more than one creature of the night ever could. This is the first painted, full-color entry in Fantagraphics’ artist-focused Alberto Breccia Library, and the atmospheric palette adds mood and dimension. It also includes a sketchbook showing the artist’s process.

This ninth issue of Now is anchored by the longest story featured in the magazine to date: "Misguided Love," a 40-page autobiographical tour de force by Texas artist Raquelle Jac. Ping-ponging among relationships, hospitalizations, internet "fame," international travel, sex, romance, and trauma, Jac's dense, obsessive pages read like a manifesto, announcing the arrival of a remarkable new voice in comics. This issue also features Now debuts from Hartley Lin (Young Frances), James Harvey (Masterplasty), and Emil Friis Ernst (Doctor Murder), as well as work from Now regulars Keren Katz (The Academic Hour) and Noah Van Sciver, who homages Basil Wolverton’s cult favorite, science-fiction hero, Spacehawk.

Justine Moppett is 34, pregnant, and fleeing an abusive relationship in New York to dig up an even more traumatic childhood in Austin. Waiting for her there is a cast of more than a dozen misfits — a hemophobic aspiring serial killer, a deranged soprano opera singer, a debt-addicted entrepreneur-cum-madam, a matchmaking hermaphrodite — each hurtling toward their own calamities, and, ultimately, toward each other. A Texan Gabriel García Márquez who writes tragicomic twists reminiscent of John Kennedy Toole, Bill Cotter produces some of the most visceral, absurd, and downright hilarious sentences to be found in fiction today. The Parallel Apartments is a bold leap forward for a writer whose protean talents, whose sheer exuberance for language and what a novel can do, marks him as one of the most exciting stylists in America.