Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Three

Every year Drawn & Quarterly offers an anthology of lengthy stories by emerging young cartoonists; this installment is the strongest thus far, and a visually stunning book to boot. Elverum's "We're Wolf" is composed of a trilogy of adult fables about happiness, sadness and companionship drawn in a graceful, languid style. The vibrant colors, rarely seen in comics, give the artwork a fantastic life on the page, and the story announces Elverum as a major young talent. Occupying the middle spot is Kramer's Ergot editor Harkham's "Somersaulting," a tale of two friends and a long summer. Using a muted color palette of yellow, orange and black, Harkham effortlessly controls the story's mood, summoning the languid pace of summer as well as the gradual discovery of love and sex in the suburbs. Neither cynical nor sentimental, this tale plays like a long, clear-eyed tone poem to teenage summers. After two such dreamy stories, Broersma rounds out the book with the two-part "The Mummy," a charming and funny romp through a mythical mid-20th-century European locale, featuring tongue-in-cheek romance, intrigue and ghosts. Entertaining and wittily executed, it's the perfect complement to the more serious works in this essential new volume. (June)