Loke (Sound) and Chikiamco present an intriguing but scattershot collection of short comics by Southeast Asian creators, including work from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Singapore. Highlights include “Syncopation” by Aime Marisa and Bonnibel Rambatan, about two refugee girls who share a love of dance while waiting for Malaysian citizenship; “The Other World,” in which Cathlyn Vania visualizes the problems of daydreaming through imaginative patchwork paneling; and the lushly illustrated “Delayed” by Peter Lin and Angela Wu, which revisits a grandmother’s past as a glamorous Singapore Superjet flight attendant. Other pieces are less polished or less clearly connected to the theme. While Loke’s previous volume in the publisher’s series of themed anthologies delivered canny depictions of “sound” in comics, the challenge of showing “delay” here seems less inspiring. One clever exception is Paati Philosophy’s “Fish Curry Tastes Better the Next Day,” which demonstrates the power of patience through a slow cooking recipe. “There’s room and space for the occupants of the pot and the house to breathe,” Philosophy explains as characters drift on a rowboat through a giant curry pot. The black-and-white printing showcases a range of artistic styles and the breadth of Southeast Asian comics talent, but only a few entries stand out as exceptional. Still, curious readers with time to pause and peruse will find some treasures. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/10/2026 | Details & Permalink

The aftermath of one woman’s real-life quest for freedom is rendered in stark black charcoal in this haunting historical account by D’Salete (Run for It). In 1866 in São Paulo, Tiodora da Cunha Dias is enslaved by the priest Canon Terra. Long separated from her husband, Luís, and son, Inocêncio, Tio calls on the help of Claro, one of the few enslaved people in the city who can write. Claro crafts letters to Luís in Campinas, pleading with him to “scrape together” enough money to buy Tio’s freedom. The journey of one such missive as it passes from hand to hand illuminates the social and political backdrop, including a growing resistance movement. After missing a cattle drover who was scheduled to carry the request to Luís, a young boy named Benê vows to take the letter himself. Along the way, he encounters a violent white boy, people generous with food and wisdom, and Inocêncio, Tio’s son, now serving as an overseer on a coffee plantation—where Benê is captured and held by men with guns. Inocêncio takes pity and helps Benê escape back to Tio. Back matter includes period photos and research notes and references; while some elements of the narrative are fictionalized, Tio and Claro’s core story is true. Simply told but powerful, it’s an evocative work. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/10/2026 | Details & Permalink

Gomont’s kinetic and assured English-language debut captures the Wild West atmosphere of northern Russia in the post-Communist 1990s. Slava and Lavrin loot abandoned Soviet estates, scavenging artworks, chandeliers, and other remnants of the old regime to peddle to the newly affluent. Lavrin is a born hustler, but this is only a gig for Slava, a lapsed painter demoralized by the “petty gatekeepers of good taste.” After a violent run-in with rival looters, they’re rescued by Nina, a sharpshooter squatting with her bear of a father in a deserted mansion. Through her, the pair stumble into a campaign to save the mine where Nina works from a shady investor whose “restructuring” proposals barely paper over his intention to strip the mine for parts. Slava throws himself into the cause—and into charcoal sketches of Nina in the nude—but Lavrin sees the makings of another score. As the pair’s paths diverge, Gomont’s canvas widens to capture the era’s profiteering, worker marginalization, and industrial collapse. Brushy, gestural cartooning maintains a brisk pace, while the text smuggles in an elegiac, almost Zweigian lilt. It’s an action-packed tale that explores the limits of loyalty when everything is up for sale. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/10/2026 | Details & Permalink

The sweeping English-language debut from Chinese creator Xiaoyu brings the florid, raucous spirit of Peking opera, with a touch of Frankenstein, to the comics page. In war-torn 1930s Yangtze, Western-educated scientist Fan Zhihuai toils away at the creation of a robot/puppet duplicate of his lost love, Mingfeng. He earns his keep at a streetside theater, where the artificial Mingfeng becomes a star dancer and performs so well that audiences think she’s human. But Feng’s creation attracts troublemakers, too, including a gang of foulmouthed street kids, a crime syndicate whose boss falls for the faux Mingfeng, and a cocky American soldier. The theater itself houses many more characters, with its bustling backstage of actors, musicians, acrobats, and impresarios. Soon the cast is dealing with murder and a missing head, and the plot has reached an operatic pitch even before the real Mingfeng shows up. Xiaoyu’s ink-washed black-and-white art evokes the period setting with equal parts elegance, drama, and earthy humor. He works in marvelous period details, like the vendors selling peanut candy in the theater, and the story has the scope and spirit of opera: characters recite poetry, break into song, and invoke classic Chinese folk characters like the Monkey King or Green Serpent and White Serpent. Replete with action, melodrama, music, martial arts, and even science fiction, this show entertains in high style. Readers will be transported. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/10/2026 | Details & Permalink

With gore caking its grill and devil’s blood boiling in the tank, the heaven-sent 18-wheeler starring in musician Malone’s antic and enthusiastically lowbrow metal-as-metal-gets comics debut mows down demon hordes in a besieged medieval Europe. It’s driven by a holy roller sporting scraggly sideburns, a trucker’s cap, and a tragic backstory. Known now only as Trucker (formerly John), the driver antihero hails from a Templar order that somehow boasts a working-class road-warrior division. How exactly Trucker goes from excommunicated priest to ramming this war-truck packed with 21st-century weapons into fiends outside walled cities is not immediately explained. The script surges along through the end-of-days action, inviting readers to roll with it. While the creators make a minor mystery out of their conceit, the focus remains on the mayhem at present. Artist Gooden (Barbaric) excels at toothy beasts, vehicular mayhem, and the pleasures of a winsome Viking witch greeting the demonic host with a chainsaw (“Come get some, you maggot-hearted filth!”). There are promising characterizations within the ensemble that forms around Trucker—and in their tense confrontations with hell’s princes and generals. The episodic storytelling loses some momentum in late chapters. Still, readers who light up at the thought of a rig crashing into Lucifer will relish the frenzy. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/03/2026 | Details & Permalink

This creepy-cute collection introduces English readers to Naono, a cult favorite artist of horror manga originally published in 1970s Japanese girls’ magazines. The volume’s gruesome material arises from the conflicts and petty jealousies of children’s everyday lives—gone melodramatically awry. In “Whose Child Is Mariko?” a little girl envies her new baby brother enough to kill him; in “Wool Pants,” a boy goes to murderous extremes to avoid the embarrassment of wearing his grandma’s hand-knitted clothes to school; in “Our First Family Trip,” a masterpiece of tension escalating to histrionics, a girl is driven to distraction worrying about whether she turned off the iron before leaving for vacation. Many of the stories revolve around guilt, revenge, and protagonists doing horrible things only to realize, too late, that they misunderstood a crucial detail. Naono’s beguiling, comical artwork—characters mug for the camera and get into Looney Tunes–type dust-cloud fights—contrasts the psychologically unbalanced plots. Her doe-eyed, doll-like characters slide through fluid backdrops that turn shadowy and sinister. Included on the title pages is the delightfully over-the-top magazine promo text: “Prepare for your soul to be seized and never let go!” Horror fans and shojo manga fans alike will want to seek out Naono’s strange delights. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/03/2026 | Details & Permalink

New Yorker cartoonist Hook’s insightful graphic memoir debut proves that the topic of identity is endlessly ripe, despite her own admitted “reluctance to engage” with her experience of growing up biracial. The work comprises linked personal essays in comics form. The daughter of a white American father and a Chinese mother (both linguists), Hook grows up hearing “What are you?” from peers and strangers. Each essay looks at biracial and bicultural identity through a different lens. Standout pieces delve into extended metaphors, such as “The Vine and the Fish,” where Hook unpacks negative narratives about “invasive species”—in this case, the kudzu vines that cover foliage in her home state of Virginia. The false dichotomy of “good native” vs. “bad invasive” creates a framework in which “a war of extermination seems inevitable and righteous.” Hook draws herself with straight hair and simple clothing, pushing back on others’ tendency to be confused or dazzled by her “exoticism,” such as when she works for a Beijing art gallery and finds herself cast as “eye candy.” The final chapter is devoted to Hook’s efforts to paint her own self-portrait, which also recalls her experience sitting for a painting her parents commissioned when she was a child. The result is layered and colorful, complicated and bold—just like the collection itself. Agent: Chad Luibl, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 04/03/2026 | Details & Permalink

Herrmann makes his English-language debut with a tender coming-out story. Frank, a 14-year-old with a talent for drawing, lives with his sensible librarian mother, Sandra, and his severely depressed father, George. To help with George’s deteriorating mental condition, Sandra hires an alternative healer named Thea, whose arsenal of new age techniques are punctuated with Christian rhetoric. To purge the family of “negative energies,” she instructs each member to carry around their own crystal and avoid screen time (she sticks a rose quartz on the desktop computer). Meanwhile, Frank grapples with his same-sex attractions and feeling out of step at school. He finds he can curry favor with his classmates by drawing monsters—particularly for his crush, jock and jokester Michael. Thea discovers and disapproves of his art, implying that the monstrous images are impeding his father’s healing, and leads the family in a ritual of painting them over in pink. She then senses Frank’s queerness in “a dark premonition,” and tries to intervene. What she doesn’t count on is Frank’s strong sense of self—and the unwavering support of his mother. The storytelling is straightforward, while Herrmann’s fluid, softly sketched grey pencil character designs are dotted resonantly with spots of pink. This clear-eyed tale charms and empowers in equal measure. (May)

Reviewed on 04/03/2026 | Details & Permalink

Comedian Hill’s comics debut, with art by Topilin (I Hate This Place), conjures a joyfully hellish celebration of heavy metal music that blends autobiographical storytelling, infernal battle-of-the-bands fantasy, and goofy horror comedy. In 2004, Hill invented a “Satan-y” band called Witch Taint for a prank in which he emailed real Norwegian black metal bands (calling himself “Lance the King of Black Metal”) and accused them of insufficient “extremity.” The comic re-imagines that viral lark as an exaggerated fiction in which one of the bands, led by chagrined ghoul Lucifuge, “the most feared man in all of Norway” (or so he claims), confronts Witch Taint at a Satanic ritual space (with wine tasting) in Gary, Ind. The ensuing tale is rife with beastly rock gods and horned demon lords, who, in Topilin’s wickedly fun rendering, prove both menacing and hilarious. The strongest material centers Hill’s personal fandom, from his discovery of the genre via a gatekeeping record store clerk to his relatable efforts at a metal god makeover (“Do you have corpse paint?” he asks an employee at Planet Makeup). Hill’s lovingly parodic band names (Viking Colon, Misery Buffet) match Topilin’s gleeful depictions of the vital catharsis of rocking out. Less assured is the busy, sometimes wordy second half, as rote, supervillain-style conflict erupts between bands. Still, metal lovers with a sense of humor will find much to enjoy. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 03/27/2026 | Details & Permalink

Collaborators Shobo and Shof (New Masters) team up with artist Tefenkgi (The Good Asian) for a thrilling anti-colonialist heist comic. Timi’s estranged father, Osage Asoro, one of Nigeria’s most respected artists, has died. He was known for making bronze masks that tell the stories of their family and the culture of their people. As part of a deal he arranged before his death to offset his debts, the British museum acquires his art. When the masks are showcased at an exhibition, Timi begrudgingly attends and runs into Sango and Gbonka, two women he grew up with 15 years ago, who were also raised by his father. When their efforts to have the masks officially returned fail, Sango suggests they steal them in honor of their baba. After a successful, if clumsy, theft, they discover documents that catalog the locations of other Benin masks, sparking a heist campaign to reclaim stolen African art. The vigilante crew they bring together calls themselves Ogiso, donning bronze masks to pull off a series of “spectacular thefts across the globe.” The nonlinear timeline, fraught team dynamics, and scandal-ridden detective hot on their trail add flavor to this Robin Hood–esque adventure. Earthy color work grounds the dynamic art, which peppers in Nigerian cultural details, including the stylish mixing of traditional cloth into contemporary fashion. It amounts to a riveting, fast-paced fable of restorative justice. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 03/27/2026 | Details & Permalink