This is the final installment of the "Project Trilogy" which provides the up-and-coming generation of cartoonists to work with traditional comics themes. Inititated by Project: Telstar, which dealt with science fiction themes with a focus on robots, and continued by Project: Superior, which had super heroics as its unifying theme, this time around, as the title suggests, the same generation of cartoonists is given a chance to tackle the romance comics genre. As with the first two anthologies, the works assembled here bear little semblance to their generic progentiors in the mainstream comics of yore, a guided tour of which we are given in the introductory essay by Bill Boichel (which is currently available online as a downloadable PDF, HERE ). "True" romance seems mostly a thing of the past in the stories that follow, which here primarily focus on -- at best -- snatching a moment of happiness with a fellow being. Many of the pieces center on unrequited love, heartbreak, romantic disaster, murder, mayhem and confusion. Sometimes it's played for laughs and sometimes for tears. Exceptions include Aaron Renier's "Reflectors and Rutabegas," which comes closest to being a traditional romance, and McGovern & Leandri's Dr. Id story, which employs a 1960s-Dr.-Strange-as-sex-therapist narrative that is certainly traditional in its form, if not in its content. As with all AdHouse Books, the production values are excellent and the quality of the artwork is uniformly high. Stand-outs for us include the contributions of Paul Rivoche, Hope Larson, Roger Petersen and Junko Mizuno, but doubtless every reader of this anthology will find their own favorites. And there's no way we can avoid singling out Robert Goodin's contribution: if there were an award for excellence in the service of perversion, this one would have the comics category all wrapped up.  PLEASE NOTE:  This is the limited edition hardcover edition that we are offering here.  Limited to 500 individually numbered copies, it features front and back covers, as well as endpapers that consist of four apocryphal romance comic book covers featuring Afrodisiac, all by Pittsburgh's own megatalent, Jim Rugg!  We are offering this at half off it's original price – need we say it? – while supplies last! (LIMIT:  ONE PER CUSTOMER)

<<• edited by Chris Polkki •>>  Don't let the fact that some of your favorite comics anthologies are concluding their runs get you down:  there's a world of comics out there waiting to be discovered.  Take this swell 100-page anthology from 2005, for example.  We thought it was long gone, but we stumbled on a source and so are eager to let late-comers in on this swell package of comics from around the world, with a special emphasis on the Japanese avant garde.  Bête Noire features what we believe was the first North American publication of Yuichi Yokoyama, as well as works by fellow Japanese manga masters Junko Mizuno, Ichiba Daisuke, Takeshi Nemoto and Suzy Amakane.  Also on hand are Helge Reumann of Switzerland, Anke Feuchtenberger of Germany, Ludovic Debeurme, Lucie Durbiano and Caroline Sury of France, as well as artists from Italy, Spain, Finland, along with Kevin Scalzo, Renée French and cover artist David Heatley from the USA.  Recommended for readers of Kramers Ergot, MOME and Blood Orange (which Mr. Polkki also edited).

It is difficult to explain the work of Junko Mizuno to the uninitiated.   Cutey, squishy, squeezy drawings delineated in dense black ink depict and portray twisted, perverse and often bizarre takes on archetypal characters and situations.  The only close touchstone we can think of is the work of Vaughn Bodé.  In this volume we have the second (and final?) volume of her story about the adventures of a cute and "fluffy" alien gigolo loose on the streets of an alternate, "Mizuno-reality" Tokyo in search of a baby-mama.  

It is difficult to explain the work of Junko Mizuno to the uninitiated.   Cutey, squishy, squeezy drawings delineated in dense black ink depict and portray twisted, perverse and often bizarre takes on archetypal characters and situations.  The only close touchstone we can think of is the work of Vaughn Bodé.  Here we have her story about the adventures of a cute and "fluffy" alien gigolo loose on the streets of an alternate, "Mizuno-reality" Tokyo in search of a baby-mama.