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Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee Vol. 1

By Hiroyuki Asada
200 pages, black and white
Published by Viz

There’s no official creed of the United States Postal Service, but you often hear the following attributed as such: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds." (Turns out it’s actually based off of Herodotus’ Histories.) I like to think that Hiroyuki Asada was inspired by something along those lines, though, when creating Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee. Of course, Tegami Bachi‘s postal carriers have bigger foes to worry about than snow or rain or heat, thanks to gigantic killer insects and worse.

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Doom Patrol #1

Written by Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis
Penciled by Matthew Clark and Kevin Maguire
Inked by Livesay and Kevin Maguire
40 pages, color
Published by DC Comics

I love the Doom Patrol. Grant Morrison’s Doom Patrol was one of my favorite comics back in the day, John Arcudi and Tan Eng Huat’s revival never got the attention that it deserved, and now that I’m reading the original run of the series, I’ve fallen in love with it too. Keith Giffen’s resurrection of the title, then, had me both intrigued and worried. When done properly, Doom Patrol can be a really fun and clever book. But it’s easy to take a misstep with the basic concept of outcast/freak heroes (the number of failures along those lines is staggering), and without the weirdness, there’s not much point to the book.

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Sir Edward Grey, Witchfinder: In the Service of Angels #1

Written by Mike Mignola
Art by Ben Stenbeck
32 pages, color
Published by Dark Horse

At the end of the first issue of Sir Edward Grey, Witchfinder: In the Service of Angels, editor Scott Allie mentions that Sir Edward Grey himself first showed up 13 years ago in Hellboy: Wake the Devil. That’s a long time to be planning a character turning from a cameo to a star. I feel like I need to give credit where it’s deserved, though. I might not remember Grey’s appearance in Hellboy: Wake the Devil, but this was a good enough first issue that I’ll certainly remember it down the line.

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Popeye Vol. 1

By E.C. Segar
200 pages, black and white, plus color
Published by Fantagraphics

Like most readers below a certain age, I only knew Popeye from his more modern-day incarnations; in my case an animated version from late ’70s television, and Robert Altman’s infamous live-action movie in 1980. I’d never, however, read the original E.C. Segar strips, and two years ago I picked up the first Popeye collection from Fantagraphics, at which point its huge, oversized dimensions made a semi-permanent home on my coffee table. Finally, though, I got around to giving the book a whirl. I’m definitely not waiting two years until I read the next book.

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Photographer

Written and drawn by Emmanuel Guibert
Photography by Didier Lefèvre
Design, color, and layout by Frédéric Lemercier
288 pages, color
Published by First Second Books

I’m a little mortified to admit that it’s taken me a couple of months to finally read The Photographer, the story of photojournalist Didier Lefèvre’s journey with Médecins Sans Frontièrs (Doctors Without Borders) into Afghanistan in 1986. It seemed like the kind of book that I couldn’t take lightly, that I wanted to reserve extra time to read. Finally, the rest of the world slowed down around me, and over the course of two days I dove into the book. What I found made me wish that somehow I could relive that initial experience of reading it all over again.

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Saturn Apartments Chapter 1

By Hisae Iwaoka
32 pages, black and white (with color pages)
Published by Viz

It’s fun watching Viz fully embrace the power of online comics. After all, it’s letting them release Rumiko Takahashi’s Rin-Ne simultaneously with Japan. With the launch of their version of IKKI magazine, we’re getting a wide collection of off-beat and different comics and (presumably) letting them build up an audience and good word-of-mouth as people check out the stories for free. Now that IKKI is full of all sorts of different comics, I have to say that I’m glad all these new series are available. If nothing else, it means that I now know that I’ll buy any Saturn Apartments books that are eventually released.

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Prince Valiant Vol. 1: 1937-1938

By Hal Foster
120 pages, color
Published by Fantagraphics Books

"Prince Valiant? Really?" That was more or less the response I got when my boyfriend discovered I’d bought Prince Valiant Vol. 1: 1937-1938. From there, he explained why this was such a bad idea, and what a dull, boring comic it was. And you know something? I understood where he was coming from. I remember Prince Valiant strips growing up being an exercise in dullness, like all the serial strips that I didn’t care to follow. But after seeing Dave Gibbons and Ryan Sook pay homage to Prince Valiant in Wednesday Comics #1, well, I just had to give it another shot. As it turns out, it was a good decision.

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Britten and Brulightly

By Hannah Berry
112 pages, color
Published by Metropolitan Books

I must admit, of all the "buddy story" creations out there, a man and his tea bag hardly seems like the most gripping one. With Hannah Berry’s debut graphic novel Britten and Brülightly, though, the idea almost seems to work. What we end up is not really a story about a man and his tea bag, but rather about a private investigator delving into the uglier side of life and what he finds waiting for him.

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Finding Nemo: Reef Rescue #1

Written by Marie Croall
Art by Erica Leigh Currey
32 pages, color
Published by Boom! Studios

Writing a comic book sequel to a hit movie has got to be a thankless task. It’s a project that by very definition will be compared to something that’s a different form of media, and as a result run the real potential of falling short in the reader’s mind. I guess that’s why I was so impressed, then, with Marie Croall’s script for Finding Nemo: Reef Rescue #1. Reading the comic, it’s hard to not feel like this is something that’s perfectly in tune with the Finding Nemo film.

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Little Mouse Gets Ready

By Jeff Smith
32 pages, color
Published by Toon Books

One of the things I appreciated about Toon Books’s line-up from the very beginning was that their books for children are all targeted at different age ranges. For the youngest readers, they’ve already released two books in a landscape (9×6") format, Jack and the Box by Art Spiegelman, and Silly Lilly and the Four Seasons by Agnes Rosenstiehl. With Jeff Smith’s Little Mouse Gets Ready, though, the bar for Toon Books’s ages 4-and-up books has most definitely been raised.

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