Hey Kids! Comics! Inaugurating 2025
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Below are some comic strip and cartoon books scheduled for January 2025 release (or so).
Images and links from a variety of publishers and outlets,
though ordering through your local comic shop or independent book store is a good idea.
Jimmy! The Comic Art of James Swinnerton edited by Peter Maresca and Michael Tisserand (review)
James Swinnerton is one of the most creative, respected and prolific comic artists from the first half of the 20th century. Yet to the disappointment of classic comics lovers, his work has seen little reproduction. Until now. This sumptuous volume covers Swinnerton’s six-decade career in comics, from his beginnings as a sports/editorial cartoonist for William Randolph Hearst in San Francisco to his years in the America’s Southwest desert, where his love for the land and its people came through in his comics and illustration.
Swinnerton is an excellent storyteller offering a cinematic style with humor that is both slapstick and sophisticated. At the forefront is his long-running Little Jimmy comic strip.
Jimmy! includes an illustrated biography and essays by co-editor Michael Tisserand and Eddie Campbell. The comic strips in this volume are carefully restored to their original colors and printed at near-full size.
Dr. Seuss Graphic Novel: Green Eggs and Ham Take a Hike By James Kochalka
Dr. Seuss’s iconic, original dynamic duo is back—and this time, Sam-I-Am is going to show his grumpy pal the world beyond green eggs and ham in their own chapter book graphic novel!
With brand-new illustrations and easy-to-follow paneled storytelling, this graphic novel is an excellent bridge for kids transitioning to chapter books—a must-have for young readers and Dr. Seuss fans alike.
Jack Kirby Collector 92 – Alter Ego 191 – Back Issue! 157
Jack Kirby Collector 92: There’s a never-published 1973 San Diego Con panel with Jack discussing DC’s coloring with Neal Adams, newly discovered strips that Jack ghosted for other syndicated artists (including Frank Giacoia on Johnny Reb & Billy Yank), unused newspaper strip concepts, collages, a never-reprinted Simon & Kirby Headline Comics tale, a Jimmy Olsen and the Newsboy Legion pencil art gallery, our regular columnists, Mark Evanier’s 2024 Kirby Tribute Panel from Comic-Con International, and more!
Alter Ego 191: Documenting the influence of Mac Raboy’s Captain Marvel Jr. on the life, career, and look of Elvis Presley during his stellar career, from the 1950s through the cataclysmic concerns of the 1970s! Plus: Comic Jungle – Part II” with Yeates, Williamson, Crandall, Morrow, Bagnoli, Giolitti, et al., Michael T. Gilbert in Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, and other sensational surprises!
Back Issue! 157: Keith Giffen Tribute Issue! A star-studded celebration of the work of the prolific writer/artist of Legion of Super-Heroes, Rocket Raccoon, Guardians of the Galaxy, Justice League, Lobo, Blue Beetle, and many more hits from the Bronze Age and beyond!
Krazy Kat: 1929 Daily Strips by George Herrriman
KRAZY KAT daily strips of 1929 are included within these covers, a famously historical year in numerous ways. The book also provides 1924 – 1927 daily strips not included in previous volumes.
Public domain dailies collected.
by William Schoell
This volume scrutinizes the output of many different publishers: DC Comics with their long-running Strange Adventures and Tales of the Unexpected, among others, series that specialized in gimmicky covers geared to attract and pull in the juvenile reader; EC comics with its more adult, occasionally controversial tales in Weird Science and Weird Fantasies; Marvel Comics, who populated its various series with many monsters and grotesque alien creatures; Charlton with its numerous fantasy magazines; American Comics Group, a publisher that contrasted humor and whimsy with more sobering stories in its Forbidden Worlds and Adventures into the Unknown, along with comics from Dell, Gold Key, Avon, Fiction House, and many others. The most notable stories, writers and artists are highlighted.
Lauren Ipsum Under Cover by Charles Brubaker
Lauren Ipsum returns in her third book! Join her as she juggles mermaids, an egg-loving fox, bowling romance, fanfics, and more as she runs the St. Paws Library.
Moebius By Nicolas Labarre
This first book-length, English-language study of Moebius finally brings international attention to an artist whose influence on the medium was profound and immediate, making him a role model for aspiring comics creators throughout his career. He was widely imitated while at Métal Hurlant in the 1970s, was “prominent among the spiritual fathers of the comic book rebels” in the 1990s, and again an example for the independent artists identified as the “new bande dessinée” in France in the early 2000s. Featuring close readings of key texts, including Blueberry, The Airtight Garage of Jerry Cornelius, and “The Long Tomorrow,” this volume examines Moebius’s style and aesthetic achievement. Notably, the volume explores the tension between Giraud and Moebius—one name for westerns, the other for science fiction; one name for the domestic market, another as a global brand; one name for the brush, another for the pen; one for the mainstream and the other for the underground.
The Secret Lives of Candy Hearts By Tommy Siegel
Tommy Siegel’s Candy Hearts comics reveal the most awkward and amusing truths about relationships, and since their viral debut in 2020, the inner world of Candy Hearts has only gotten stranger. This new collection of Candy Hearts comics explores topics like commitment, cohabitation, family dynamics, pets, dating apps, and wedding planning. With dozens of comics never before seen in print or online, The Secret Lives of Candy Hearts hits everything from disaster to happily-ever-after, with hilarious results.
In our twenty-fifth issue, we dip into the immersive world of panel-format storytelling and all the world-building, character-developing, plot-twisting details. Check out interviews with our cover artist, Jillian Tamaki, and other series artists who share how they get ideas (and keep getting ideas) over time. Discover wordless comics, DIY comics, and autobiographical comics about real life. Feeling brave? Gather friends and try performing your own comic. Find all this and much more as you tear through this unforgettable unputdownable issue panel-by-panel.
The Atlas Artist Edition No. 2: Al Williamson
After the Comics Code forced EC to reduce their business, Williamson found himself at the door of Atlas Comics, the largest employer of freelancers in the field.
Across two short periods in 1955-57 and 1959-60, Williamson would draw 99 stories for Atlas (both solo and with help by “Fleagle Gang” studio cohorts Angelo Torres and Roy Krenkel, plus Gray Morrow and Ralph Mayo) in mostly western and fantasy genres, with a smattering of war, romance and “jungle girl adventure”. He flourished on Westerns, freely and loosely rendered four-page morality plays, many scripted economically by Stan Lee … his Atlas stories collectively are the largest single body of work Williamson would ever do as a primary creator for one company.
feature image by Mark Tatulli from Lio
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