Charles Vess is one of the last -- and best -- practitioners of the lush illustrative pen and ink drawing style that emerged in the United States at the dawn of the twentieth century.  His work occasionally graces the covers and, less so, the interiors of comic books from mainstream comics publishers, particularly Vertigo, where he has teamed up with Neil Gaiman on occasion, but his art is of the careful, detailed and thoughtful -- and therefore highly labor intensive -- variety and cannot flourish in the deadline driven marketplace of the monthly comic book.  Here in the book of ballads we have together in one place the fruits of a decade's labors accomplished in collaboration with some of today's best fantasists.  Emma Bull, Charles de Lint, Neil Gaiman, Sharon McCrumb, Jeff Smith, Jane Yolen and others team up with Vess to adapt a series of popular Ballads from the British Isles to comics form.  - hardcover - Tor • 192 pages • B & W