Pre-2020, BF’s Staff Picks feature had run for many years, with members of the team giving a weekly overview of recommended new releases. Now, retooled and re-imagined to fit the site’s current ethos, it has returned as a monthly series designed to spotlight just a few key releases that appeal to us. This is not, then, intended as a comprehensive, exhaustive or extensive round-up but rather to point you in the direction of some top projects that caught the eyes of BF contributors. Please also remember these aren’t intended as reviews and full coverage of the comics/books below may follow in due course!
Comic of the Month
This Slavery (SelfMadeHero)
The Rickard Sisters have a proven track record when it comes adapting socially conscious historical novels for the comics page. They have already shown that with their comics versions of Robert Tressell’s The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists and Constance Maud’s No Surrender. You can read an interview with Sophie and Scarlett Rickard here at BF.
Creating a trilogy of such projects their latest graphic novel is an adaptation of the first working female British working class novelist’s book This Slavery. Ethel Carnie Holdsworth’s story follows the fortunes of two sisters in a pre-war industrial Britain as they face societal challenges of class and gender. As ever, we’ve seen an advance copy and this one is a must-read.
– Andy Oliver
Acid Box (Avery Hill Publishing)
The tagline of “a darkly comic adventure through club culture, spanning space and time” will certainly grab the attention of many readers. Written by Sara Kenney Acid Box has a fantastic line-up of indie creators including artists James Devlin, Emma Vieceli and Ria Grix, colourist Sofie Dodgson, letterer Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou, and designer Joe Stone.
This is a project that is more than just the front-facing narrative within its pages. Kenney’s Wowbagger Productions have also used it as an opportunity for mentorship for young creators as you will see from its back matter. You can read an interview with Kenney and co here at BF.
– Andy Oliver
My Dad Fights Demons! (SelfMadeHero)
Comics Laureate Bobby Joseph and artist Abbigayle Bircham bring us this YA graphic novel from SelfMadeHero with a diverse cast and a compact size that will no doubt appeal to its target younger demographic.
Rye is already struggling with an unhappy home life but that’s shaken up when their father the Magical Mr Mantrikz, self-styled “greatest sorcerer in the world” comes back into their life. And yes, we have seen an advance print copy of this one too, and it’s great fun. Pick this up for a younger reader in your life. They’ll love it.
– Andy Oliver
Cannon (Drawn & Quarterly)
We don’t need to preview this one because you can read an entire review of it here at Broken Frontier courtesy of Lindsay Pereira. Here’s an excerpt:
“The result, now published, arguably surpasses any possible expectations. There’s a lot going on in these pages—some of it direct, much of it subtle and beautifully nuanced—because what Lai understands implicitly, as a storyteller, is that relationships can be impossible to define within the parameters of fiction. Real life never plays out neatly, dialogue doesn’t come close to mirroring the innumerable emotions that hover beneath the surface of any conversation, and it’s hard to create a character with which a reader can empathise unless the creator feels it first. It is the seemingly effortless manner in which these challenges are met, and the undeniable skill at work, that makes Cannon a great book.”
– Lindsay Pereira
Who Killed Nessie? (Avery Hill Publishing)
Back when Who Killed Nessie? was originally crowdfunded on Zoop we interviewed creators Paul Cornell and Rachael Smith about the book here at BF. Artist Smith spoke about its genesis saying: “Paul and I had a Zoom call where we bounced ideas off of each other – it was such good fun and we ended up with SUCH an amazing premise.”
The story centres around the killing of the Loch Ness Monster at a cryptid convention where new hotel manager Lyndsay must attempt to solve this murder mystery. Two of everyone’s fave comics creators working together long-form for the first time, and a book picked up for publication by Avery Hill. Who can resist that combination?
– Andy Oliver
Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist (New York Review Comics)
New York Review Comics are one of the unsung heroes of the scene, constantly bringing classic or forgotten gems of comics history to new readerships, alongside their cutting edge, avant garde new material.
This month they bring back Hothead Paisan – “an icon of the ’90s lesbian DIY scene” – in a new collection of pivotal strips from that era. This “reflection on oppression, self-destruction, and living it up outside the conservative norms of the ’90s” will hopefully reach audiences unfamiliar with the character as well as those with fond memories of cartoonist Diane DiMassa’s work.
– Andy Oliver
The Weight (Drawn & Quarterly)
A decade ago our Tom Murphy reviewed the first two minicomics issues of Melissa Mendes’ The Weight here at Broken Frontier describing them as “intimate comics storytelling at its very best.”
Now collected by Drawn & Quarterly, who describe it as a story about “a rural family’s cycle of love, loss, and renewal, set against the beauty and adversity of mid-century America”, this will be a perfect introduction to the nuanced narratives of Mendes for those unfamiliar with her style. We have a review coming soon at BF.
– Andy Oliver
Elon Musk: American Oligarch (Seven Stories Press)
For a long time it looked like squeamish publishers were going to eternally pass on an English language edition of Daryl Cunningham’s biography of the world’s richest man. Fortunately, though, Seven Stories have stepped in and we can all now finally read his analysis of the man whose worrying influence has played such a pivotal role in the dark and terrifying times we live in.
Cunningham is unmatched in this kind of work with books like Billionaires, Putin’s Russia and Supercrash being rightly lauded. In due course, of course, you can expect to see this book getting its own moment in the BF review spotlight.
– Andy Oliver
