“An assaultive, erotic riot of sex and combat and horror and sheer image-making power. There’s great beauty in The Wolf’s blackness.”
– Sean T. Collins, critic (The Comics Journal, Robot 6)
The Wolf is a new graphic novel by Los Angeles-based painter-cartoonist Tom Neely. The book tells a simple love story, but one woven with surrealist horror, werewolf lore and its own brand of nightmare logic. With The Wolf, Neely progresses from the traditional cartooning style he showed off in his previous books, The Blot and Brilliantly Ham-Fisted, to a form that blends comics-style storytelling with a fine arts approach to imagery. The ultimate effect is equal parts touching and chilling.
Neely’s paintings and illustrations have been featured in galleries all over the U.S., in magazines and literary journals, and on records, posters and CDs for bands like The Melvins, ISIS and Wolves in the Throne Room, Groovie Ghoulies, among others. Earlier this year, he garnered a flurry of attention as one of the authors of the cult hit mini-comic
Henry & Glenn Forever. Neely’s debut self-published novel, The Blot, won an Ignatz Award in 2007 and made it onto several of the industry’s “best of” lists that year, including “Best Comics of the Decade” in The Comics Journal.
228 Pages, Black & White and Full Color, Paperback, $25.00 (US)
Available now from I Will Destroy You
P.O. Box 39963, Los Angeles, CA 90039
www.iwilldestroyyou.comBook Release and Signing
July 8th, 2011 at
Secret Headquarters Comic Shop 3817 W. Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026
Some early praise for The Wolf:
"The book talks about a progression, and an inner struggle, but I was most impressed with how Tom masterfully articulates the sentiment of love."
--Trenton Doyle Hancock, artist.
“The Wolf is drawn with skill and heart … It is thrilling to see Neely work this way, and to know that this dedicated artist is in it for the long haul.”
--Austin English, comics author/publisher (The Disgusting Room, Domino Books)
"The Wolf veers from frightening and expressionistic to cartoony at the drop of a hat, sometimes in the same drawing. But Tom pulls it all together beautifully.
--Zak Sally, cartoonist (Sammy the Mouse, Recidivist)
"Tom's work has the unusual ability to provoke anxiety, uncertainty, horror and uncomfortable laughter in equal measure … Mr. Neely has done so here with grace and a crafty precision.
-- Aaron Turner, musician-artist (Isis, Mammifer)
Pre-order the book from the IWDY store now!Watch a preview video of part one of The Wolf here.
