New books from this month!

Just a reminder!  This month we added two new books to Sparkplug's published catalog.  Reich #11 is the second to last book in Elijah Brubaker's Reich series.  Reich's world is beginning to crumble in this not-to-be-missed issue!

Also out this month, we added the first of the Sparkplug Minis Series, Hungry Summer by Asher Craw.  Craw's modern spin on fairy tale tropes is exactly as weird and hilarious as you hope it will be.

We also managed to snag a couple minis from Yumi Sakugawa when she was in town for her book tour - please check out Intergalactic Telepathic Pen Pal and Moon Between the Mountains for more Sakugawa goodness.

LA Zine Fest this weekend!

Hey all!  Sparkplug will be tabling at LA Zine Fest this Sunday, February 16th, at Helms Bakery in Los Angeles.  For more info on the fest, click here.   We'll have our normal, awesome collection of books and zines PLUS the new issue of Reich and the first of the Sparkplug Minis Series, Hungry Summer.  Hope to see you there!

Sparkplug Highlight: Intergalactic Telepathic Pen Pal by Yumi Sakugawa

A friend of a friend said that she found another of Sakugawa's comics to be very sad.  I agree, but I think they are my favorite kind of melancholy: the kind that reminds you that, however impermanent this world is, there is a place for you in the universe.  You belong here.
Intergalactic Telepathic Pen Pal very much embodies this sentiment.  It is a collection of Sakugawa's short stories, many of which deal with death and endings.  From the sudden inexplicable spaceship departure of family members in "Happy Birthday, Lisa" to the self-reflective grief of "Cigar Butt", these are stories that are very sad but also a reminder to breathe and that you are not alone.

Book Announcements and Convention Schedule!

HELLO ALL!

Hope you are enjoying your winter and New Year so far!  Sparkplug has a couple announcements for you.

First, due to some paper mix ups, Reich #11 is taking a little longer than expected to print.  It is still available to pre-order here.  I am expecting to have it in time for LA ZineFest or directly afterward, so if you have pre-ordered it already, expect it in the next couple weeks.

Second, you may remember me announcing a new project we're doing called the Sparkplug Minis Series.  It's a series of short-run (500 copies) mini comics by new and/or underappreciated artists.  I don’t plan on reprinting  these so when they sell out, they are gone.  Be sure to order yours early!

The first of the series, Hungry Summer by Asher Craw, is now available for pre-order.  It's six dollars and you get a 4.5"x5.5" original drawing by the artist when you pre-order!  Here are some examples:

Hungry Summer is a strange, beautiful tale of bros, Baba Yaga and curses – thoroughly enjoyable and utterly bizarre.  I will have Hungry Summer available at LA Zine Fest next week as well!

And speaking of the Sparkplug Minis Series – I’ve already let you know that the second in the series is Infinite Astronaut: Corpse Exquisite by Ariyana Suvarnasuddhi.  It will be AMAZING.  The preliminary sketches look great.  Infinite Astronaut: Corpse Exquisite will be debuting at CAKE at the end of May.

And now I’m happy to confirm the third in the series will be The Anthropologists by Whit Taylor!  The Anthropologists is an autobiographical story about Taylor’s trip to the Australian Outback, with a focus on her personal and philosophical thoughts  about the field of anthropology.  I’m really interested to see where Taylor goes with this, and hope that you are too!  The Anthropologists will be debuting at the Portland Zine Symposium in July.

Our convention Schedule for 2014 so far:

Feb. 16^th: LA Zine Fest, Los Angeles, CA
April 12th: Linework NW, Portland, OR
May 31st & June 1st: CAKE, Chicago, IL

July  12^th & 13^th: Portland Zine Symposium, Portland, OR
Sept. 13th & 14th: SPX, Bethesda, MD

And finally if you'll forgive a little personal promotion - I have started doing a webcomic called The WHYs about queer teen superheroes.  I'd be so grateful if you would check it out!  Thanks.

-Virginia

Sparkplug Highlights: Gin Palace, Issue One

In this funny, sweet, and bizarre British anthology, a variety of stories and styles are presented for your reading pleasure! Gin Palace features seven different comics, all of which are pure entertainment. In Rob Jackson's two-part "The Ballad of Hatty Jack," a plucky young man in a parodic Victorian London puts on a giant hat to battle hat-based injustice wherever it is found -- and in part two, he pairs up with Murdock Bones, brilliant detective and master of disguise, in order to take down a nefarious organization! Dave Hughes takes on weird science in "Little Scary Monsters," while Simon M. details the love-hate relationship with his local pub. In Francesca Cassavetti's "Measuring Up," she examines her relationship with alcohol, from small child lulled to sleep by her parents' parties to alcohol-swilling wild child to grown-up mother at peace with her drinking habits. Ant Mercer presents a two-page gag comic about a terrible interview (and, later, another one about a certain Kennedy assassination), and Jarod Rosello contributes a wordless cartoon about a dog, a man, a cafe, and a rainy afternoon in "The Rain." Finally, Lee Johnson's "Sin Cat" is a jagged, trippy combination of drawings and collages that follows the adventures of the eponymous feline. With gorgeous full-color covers and forty pages of comics, you'll finish this issue raring to read more from these brilliant Brits!

 

 

 

Sparkplug Highlights: Service Industry, by t edward bak

Though Service Industry came out of the last years of George W. Bush's time in office and deals in part with the fear and anger of a rational man living during an irrational war, this oversized comic feels as fresh and important today as it did upon its release. Bak uses his job in the service industry (as a dishwasher, predominantly) and his Bukowskian exploits to frame his autobiographical narrative, which floats in and out of the real world as he thinks about race, identity, fractured families, and the soul's response to drudgery and insanity. His art is in turns ultra-detailed, brilliantly colored, fantastical, and somber. Some of the most startling pages come at the end, when suddenly everything is shown as negative -- white-on-black. Certain images permeate the entire book: robots, angels with visible skeletons, clouds, trees, and an ever-present black cat who leads the narrator back and forth between worlds. Service Industry reads like a dream; it follows its own logic. Elements are pulled here and there from life and fantasy to create a bizarre plane of existence, somehow both like waking life and not. It is an existential, melancholic, contemplative piece of work that will make you think about the paths you've taken -- and which one you will take next.

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he'll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a "Lil" (as in "Lil Archie") version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of the comic's beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you're reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he's dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn't haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we're still reeling." -Tom Devlin, The Believer

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding his time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he’ll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a “Lil” (as in “Lil Archie”) version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of this comic’s beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you’re reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he’s dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn’t haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we’re still reeling." Tom Devlin, The Believer - See more at: http://sparkplugcomicbooks.com/shop/comic-books/service-industry/#sthash.JYwlFKSc.dpuf

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding his time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he’ll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a “Lil” (as in “Lil Archie”) version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of this comic’s beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you’re reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he’s dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn’t haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we’re still reeling." Tom Devlin, The Believer - See more at: http://sparkplugcomicbooks.com/shop/comic-books/service-industry/#sthash.JYwlFKSc.dpuf

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding his time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he’ll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a “Lil” (as in “Lil Archie”) version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of this comic’s beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you’re reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he’s dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn’t haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we’re still reeling." Tom Devlin, The Believer - See more at: http://sparkplugcomicbooks.com/shop/comic-books/service-industry/#sthash.JYwlFKSc.dpuf

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding his time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he’ll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a “Lil” (as in “Lil Archie”) version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of this comic’s beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you’re reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he’s dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn’t haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we’re still reeling." Tom Devlin, The Believer - See more at: http://sparkplugcomicbooks.com/shop/comic-books/service-industry/#sthash.JYwlFKSc.dpuf

"Bak the cartoonist is possessed by his past. What we see are the inner musings of a man in his late twenties/early thirties, biding his time at his dishwashing job. He rehashes his history in straight narration, sometimes leaving little room for actual drawings. Then he’ll cover the same territory as a nearly wordless allegorical adventure comic featuring a “Lil” (as in “Lil Archie”) version of himself, a black cat spirit guide, and chattering demons. Then back to a political screed that blots out the drawings again.
Part of this comic’s beauty is that Bak printed a page a week in Flagpole magazine in Athens, Georgia, so you get the feeling that much of what you’re reading is off the cuff. The story is leading Bak, and he’s dredging up stuff from his past that surely surprises even him, but the result isn’t haphazard. Bak slowly builds to the heartbreaking sixteenth page, then leads us away quietly as we’re still reeling." Tom Devlin, The Believer - See more at: http://sparkplugcomicbooks.com/shop/comic-books/service-industry/#sthash.JYwlFKSc.dpuf

Happy New Year & Thanks!

Hello and Happy New Year everyone!
First off, I would like to thank everyone who has already donated and pre-ordered Reich #11.  You guys are the best and we really appreciate it.  Amy at 1984 said the books will be shipping next week, so you should be getting your copies soon.
On that note, you can still pre-order Reich #11!  This issue has all the drama and weirdness that you crave and Brubaker has outdone himself with both the art and writing.
Second, I'm working on getting Hungry Summer by Asher Craw together and hope to have it up for pre-order next week.  I'll make sure to announce it on here and our other social media when that happens.  I'm super excited about this book and think you will be too.  If you're not familiar with Craw's work, we have his amazing series Zebadiah available in the store.
Thanks again for all your support.  This is gonna be a great year.
-Virginia

Sparkplug Highlights: Tales of Tiger Balm, by Ariyana Suvarnasuddhi

The first thing that stands out about Ariyana Suvarnasuddhi's hilarious comic Tales of Tiger Balm! is the fact that it looks like the coolest newspaper you've ever seen-- it's 11.5" x 14", on newsprint, and has a gloriously colored cover that includes tigers, flames, flowers, a jar of Tiger Balm, and a triptych of two Ariyanas scratching their rashy skin into oblivion and a third, covered in Tiger Balm, crying in painful ecstasy. Her drawings are highly textured, joyful, and heavily inspired by Asian art. The inside of the comic (though uncolored) is just as rich and funny, featuring six full pages detailing Ariyana's experiences using Tiger Balm to soothe her eczema, musings on the origin and ingredients of Tiger Balm, a behind-the-scenes look at the month she spent creating the comic, and a meditation on her heritage and parents' vast, mysterious collection of old Chinese medicine. The back cover is just as interesting as the front: in color once again, it takes the form of a cabinet of curiosities, displaying some of the most interesting finds Ariyana has pilfered from her parents' Chinese medicine hoard. Her attention to detail, really put to work in depicting these tiny bottles, labels, powders, pills, tins, and jars, is exquisite. Tales of Tiger Balm! gives you a lot for your two dollars and serves as a great introduction to Ariyana's work if you've never had a chance to see it before. And, if you love this comic as much as we do, be sure to grab a copy of her contribution--issue #2--to the Sparkplug Minis series, debuting at CAKE (the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo) on May 31st-June 1st!



Sparkplug Highlights: Gay Genius, edited by Annie Murphy

Looking for a wonderful holiday gift for a friend, lover, or family member who could use some incredible queer comics in their life? Look no further! Gay Genius, a 144-page anthology edited by Annie Murphy, will satisfy, invigorate, and deeply touch anyone who sits down with it.

From Rob Cough's thorough and thoughtful review in The Comics Journal:

"At the end of the Gay Genius anthology, its editor, Annie Murphy, uncovers some interesting definitions of the word 'genius.' One of them, dating back to ancient Rome, is 'a guardian spirit.' Reading this anthology, it felt as much like a ritual prayer or invocation as it did a series of stories. Throughout history, gay culture has frequently been underground culture–hidden, for fear of reprisals, yet always bubbling under the surface. In a sense, Gay Genius is the underground’s underground, invoking a number of storytelling devices not usually seen in the gay comics scene (or in the more conventional alt-comics scene, for that matter) that first arose in the ’70s and have become much more mainstream and prominent today. In discussing a number of transgender experiences, it also touches on some issues that are little-explored in comics (Joey Sayers being a notable exception). Murphy weaves together traditional comics narratives, cruder artwork that borders on outsider art, paintings that have a narrative quality, and nearly abstract images. There’s a sense in which this anthology resembles Kramer’s Ergot in terms of featuring work whose relationship to narrative is tenuous and is designed to challenge the reader. However, the book’s most prominent quality is its warmth and humanity; the work itself seems designed to invoke that guardian spirit for its readers as well as its creators."

 



Sparkplug Highlights: Danny Dutch, by David King

A brilliantly absurd collection of strips, David King's Danny Dutch features the eponymous Danny and his gang of friends going about their lives and pondering the various vagaries and truths of existence. Let me just prepare you right off the bat: the pictures and words don't line up. That's the beauty of it. Without the text in the perfectly placed speech bubbles, most of these strips could be in a newspaper; the characters' chubby, highly detailed bodies recall classic cartoons of yesteryear, though the occasional landscape or city scene is so finely rendered it puts the average comic strip to shame. The text, though, is all dull malaise, contemplations on life, death, and sex, soul-crushing observations of relationship politics, reflections on art and childhood--and more. Soon enough, however, through some strange alchemy, the two disparate elements (visual and verbal) begin to line up and inform each other, until suddenly you're laughing at your own mortality or feeling melancholy over your favorite childhood memory. It's a weird ride, one that will leave your stomach feeling wobbly for a while after you get off, but you'll want to hop back on again nonetheless.

 



Support Sparkplug and get fantastic original art - here's how!

Hi folks, Emily Nilsson here.  I'm throwing lots of art on eBay for the benefit of Sparkplug's future endeavors.  We had a few pieces left over from the Indiegogo upper donation tier gifts, for which the artists have granted permission for us to sell.  I'm also adding a lot of stuff that my husband, Dylan Williams, and I collected over the years.  There are great originals and a number of high-quality prints that are being added to the mix.  Work by Sparkplug alums Jeff Levine, Elijah Brubaker, Chris Cilla, and Aron Steinke have been featured.  Be sure and at least check it out! 

Link here to the auctions currently in full swing!

If you have any questions feel free to email: emily@sparkplugcomicbooks.com.  If you live in Portland, I'll waive shipping and work with you on a pick-up arrangement.

Thanks friends!  You're the best!

Active right now - "Crazy Legs" by Chris Cilla.  Start the insanity!

Sparkplug Highlights: Zebadiah, by Asher Z. Craw

It's actually a little difficult to express in words how wonderful and affecting Asher's Zebadiah is. It's not just the art, though it is breathtaking. Asher's artistic style recalls rough-but-intricate woodblock etchings and works equally well at depicting the deep woods of Appalachia and modern-day Portland, Oregon. Every character's face, even (especially) the animals', is infinitely expressive and intimately human. The religious iconography, ethereal supernatural entities, and visually referential characters blend seamlessly into the narrative to create a world that feels both rooted in very specific, portentous periods and, paradoxically, timeless. It's this amazing art in conjunction with a truly brilliant story, though, that makes Zebadiah such an incredible creative achievement that has won the adoration of everyone I know who's read it. Asher takes two stories--that of Zebadiah and Eula-Lee, a reclusive couple living in the Appalachians in the 1970s, and that of (somewhat fictionalized versions of) Asher and, later, his wife Lillie in the present day--and weaves them together with an overarching narrative that explores the intersection between rural and urban lifestyles, separated souls, Asher's character's trans experience, damnation versus salvation, and (most importantly) eternal love.

On top of it all: ANTHROPOMORPHIC GUARDIAN POSSUMS (possibly some relative of the Grumplords?!).

To say too much more is to deprive you of your own experience with the story, but trust me: you will feel changed after you finish reading it. It is a perfect example of everything a great comic should be; it hurts your heart, it's so good. Read it today, and don't forget to pick up Asher's contribution to our upcoming Sparkplug Minis series, due out on February 16th at LA Zine Fest--his will be the inaugural issue, and it's a modern tale of Baba Yaga. You're going to love it.

 

 

 



Sparkplug Highlights: Reich #1 and #2, by Elijah Brubaker

We hope that you've had a chance to see our awesome presale for Reich #11, which is the penultimate issue in Elijah Brubaker's comic biography of Wilhelm Reich. However, if you're just now coming to the series, you should definitely pick up the first issues! The biography does move chronologically and is much more powerful when read in order. To introduce our new readers to the series, we wanted to shine some light on the first two issues. Elijah writes in his intro,

"Most people who know of the man know him as a crazy character who battled the US government and paid the ultimate price. . . .Generally those that know or Reich seem to see him as nothing more than an accumulation of sound bites and weird ideas. Those privy to the minutia of Reich's life are dedicated to arguing the merit of Reich's science but often overlook him as a human being. All these conflicting viewpoints are equally intimidating to me and spur me to tell the story from my own point of view. I see Reich as human above all else. He was dedicated to the betterment of the human race and the advancement of his ideas. Reich the man was flawed and complex and that is what attracts me to him as a subject for biography."

Issues 1 and 2 cover Reich's early life at the tail end of his service in Italy during WWI and at the University of Vienna immediately after the war's end. In Vienna as a young medical student, he becomes swept up in the promise of psychoanalysis and sexology, leading him to take control of his academic seminars and become a protégé of Sigmund Freud. We see early on, though, behaviors that will continue to plague his relationships throughout his life: philandering, egomania, verbal abuse. For all his brilliance, Reich is a man filled with dark potential.

Elijah's series only gets better from here, we promise! Do yourself a favor and check out issues 1-10 before you grab a presale copy of issue 11, and then with bated breath for the explosive last issue!

 

 

New In the Store: Vantage!

Everyone, listen up, and listen like crazy: we have a new Eroyn Franklin book in the store! Vantage is an incredible addition to both her creative oeuvre and your personal comics collection. This fold-out book documents The Long Walk, a socially engaged project in which Susan Robb leads fifty people on a four-day, fourth-five-mile walk from Puget Sound to Snoqualmie Falls using the Regional Trails System. Franklin's art, of course, is as excellent as ever, but Vantage stands out as a totally unique work of art and narrative, simultaneously tiny and vast in size and scope. You see, Vantage is a 2.5" x 2.5" square -- little enough to fit in the palm of your hand. It's real impact comes when it is opened: a series of pages fold out into beautiful 10.5" landscapes that are absolutely breathtaking. See:

$5.00 is a small price for something so innovative and lovely. Get it today!