No one’s story is as smooth and clear as it looks from outside. It might seem like someone has had only success after success, rising quickly, winning awards and conquering worlds at a young age. But you’d have to ask that person what it was really like. The Fire Never Goes Ou t is a…
When you’re talking about people who have an inordinate fondness for insects, you probably mean either God or E.O. Wilson. And only one of them is a person you can actually have a conversation with. (Well, Wilson is 91, and probably still busy enough that it would be tough to get some of his time…
This is, obviously, a sequel. The first volume of Rene Tardi’s WWII war memoirs, as interpreted, reimagined, and made into a graphic novel by his son Jacques, was published in French in 2012 and English in 2018. That one covered the bulk of the war: how Rene got into it, his capture and transfer far…
It is an odd and interesting thing: the biography of someone whose life is badly-recorded and full of gaps. It’s even more quirky when that person didn’t really do anything in his life, and even the records of where that person was are messy and often missing. But Bill Griffith, cartooning king of all things…
Nobody would want Brian Fies’s career, not matter how many books he sells and how many awards he wins. Two of his three major books to date have been pure “making lemonade” activities: he went through things no one wants to and came out the other side to write about them. First was Mom’s Cancer,…
I probably should say this first: this book is titled I, Rene Tardi, Prisoner of War in Stalag IIB, Vol. 1 . And it’s credited to “Tardi.” One might easily assume “Tardi” means “Rene Tardi,” the chap who was a POW. But one would be wrong. Rene died in 1986, and never drew comics. (There…
I recently finished reading Book Three of March, the graphic novel autobiography of Atlanta Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis. I had never heard of Lewis prior to encountering March, but having now read it, I’ve gained a better picture of not only his life, but of the internal and external obstacles that the…
The 2018 Mike Wieringo Comic Book Industry Awards Nominees have been revealed, and we at ComicMix are proud to announce that Mine! A Celebration of Liberty and Freedom For All Benefiting Planned Parenthood has been nominated for Best Anthology. The awards are to be presented at the Ringo Awards Banquet and Ceremony in conjunction with…
A family of six flees a war-torn country, after American troops abandon it and let “invaders” from the other half of what used to be the same country conquer the portion they used to protect. The family has to sneak out by boat, crammed in with others, across an open sea, and hope for help…
Black Friday is not my thing. It involves a bunch of stuff I don’t like: Getting out of bed when it’s dark out… crowds… pants. But a lot of people enjoy it, despite my skepticisms, and there are even reasons that explain the brain chemistry of this pleasure. Far be it from me to deny…
It is more than a little likely that, as you read this, I am getting a root canal. Dentists terrify me. Not on purpose — they are not the stars of It — but, nonetheless, they fill me with dread. I’m sure that most people who go into dentistry as a career are motivated by…
I’m celebrating San Diego Comic-Con this week by reading some new comics. As you may remember, Constant Reader, this is something I try to do all the time. Last week, among the new titles I picked up was Calexit, which caused varying political outrage because people thought it was a commentary on Trump (maybe it…
