Heading to Alternative Press Expo this weekend? Top Shelf's West Coast dream team, Leigh Walton and Brett Warnock, will be at tables 320-322 all weekend, together with the following creators:
--Jeffrey Brown (SULK #1 starring Bighead & Friends!)
--Renée French (THE TICKING, MICROGRAPHICA)
--Robert Goodin (THE MAN WHO LOVED BREASTS)
--Bill Kelter and Wayne Shellabarger (VEEPS: PROFILES IN INSIGNIFICANCE)
--Nate Powell (SWALLOW ME WHOLE)
--Liz Prince (DELAYED REPLAYS)

And don't forget to come by Isotope on Saturday night for Top Shelf Happy Hour at 8pm, leading into the Isotope Award for Minicomics! Brett Warnock will be shaking up the tasty drinks, while Nate Powell rocks a live art jam with Joshua W. Cotter! You can't miss it!

See you there, everybody!

James Kochalka Superstar!

10 Years of his incredibly influential American Elf daily diary strip. Wow, that's freaking cool as hell. Big ups to you, James!

• Jeff Lemire appears on the podcast Comic Geek Speak.

• Occasional Top Shelf freelancer Chris Ross had this to say, regarding his type decision on our awesome new book Veeps:

Veeps is set in a typeface called Adobe Caslon Pro. From my research, I found that Benjamin Franklin, in addition to being a ladykiller drunk, and perennial not-veep, was a printer. He had two favorite typefaces: Baskerville (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baskerville), which many typesetters of the day called "illegible" and a typeface called Caslon. And it was Caslon that Franklin chose when he typeset the mass-produced "Declaration of Independence." The unique properties in Veeps are the ligatures, which I've jumped up to eleven to reach for the hyperbolic nature of the text. It's noticeable as being archaic and boosie, but once you finish the introduction, you definitely get in on the joke. This specific typeface, Adobe Caslon Pro, is the closest and most complete recreation of the typeface that I could find. When I read Bill's words, and saw Wayne's portraits, and saw what Brett had in mind with the decorative elements, this whimsical voice of you three (plus the specter of Staros) came out, Borg-like. It sounded like Caslon.

• Speaking of Veeps, check out this extensive interview with Bill and Wayne by Tim O'Shea.

• And just to add some color to this post... YAM author Corey Barba does more than cute kid's stuff. He's also done some racy adult entertainment (with the Fantagraphics porn line Eros, for example). Here's a boss little image titled Lipstick Bikini.

Alex Robinson's video interview with Jonah Weiland is up on Comic Book Resources. I got to attend this interview and suck down some suds on the infamous CBR Party Yacht in the San Diego Marina. Now THAT's the way to do San Diego!

• So, here's a piece by Eric Powell, and two by Jim Rugg, which was supposed to run in a reprinted edition of Doug TenNaple's Top Shelf graphic novel Creature Tech. Oh, but wait, Doug took it away from Top Shelf, in spite of the fact that Chris did a mighty tight job story-editing the book into the kick-ass version it ended up being. Sadly, these images will now never see print. I'm going to have to style Eric and Jim with some Top Shelf swag next time i see them.

• Nate Powell is interviewed at my favorite podcast, Indie Spinner Rack!

• Nifty new piece by David Chelsea.

• Tom Hart, Matthew Thurber and Lauren Weinstein are in a show of original art together called GODDESS, MOUSE and MAN at the brand new 92nd St Y Tribeca.

• Finally, i must mention my favorite new comic in a long time. I'd heard some folks talking about this at the San Diego Con, so i picked it up on a whim. Matt Furie's Boys Club might be something of a guys comic, but holy crap, it is awesome. Containing the mostly 1-3 page self-contained adventures (?) of four slacker, 20-something roommates, the first issue was self-published, while the second issue was picked up by Buenaventura Press. On paper this comic shouldn't be anything more than stupid poop jokes. But there's something very real about these characters. At various points in my life i've lived with, or been any one of these cats. Matt uses lots of fun formal techniques to add odd layers to his humor. Ultimately, i'm having a hard time describing this. Needless to say, both issues come highly recommended.

WHAT'S THAT UP IN THE SKY?!

It's Bobby Kennedy and Greg Palast releasing the flaming hot full-color investigative comic book, STEAL BACK YOUR VOTE!

Pow! Zap! No more joking with our rights, Mr. Rove!

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With the full story of the investigation you'll soon see in Rolling Stone magazine - illustrated by razor-sharp pencils of Ted Rall, Lukas Ketner and Lloyd Dangle.

SIX ways they're STEALING your vote - and SEVEN ways to STEAL IT BACK.

(C'mon - 'fess up - do you really know what to do if they hand you a 'provisional' ballot?)

Make a $100 tax deductible donation at StealBackYourVote.org and we'll send you 25 to pass out to troublemakers of your choice.

And, for every $100 donation, we will give away another 400 to voters to vulnerable voters in swing states. We just sent eight cases to Santiago Juarez. Santiago's working with young Hispanic voters of New Mexico.

Can you help us send him more? Or donate $75+ and get a half dozen comix plus the DVD (signed), The Election Files, my BBC reports on the vote snatchers.

Pick up 10 copies of the guide for a donation of $50. We send'm right away by priority mail.

Get five hundred copies for your local school or group for a $1000 donation at www.palastinvestigativefund.org/print-copies-of-steal-back-your-vote.

Or give us the donation, we'll send'm to a church designated by our co-sponsor Jesse Jackson's Operation Rainbow/PUSH.

Thanks to your prior generosity, we're offering the printing plates FREE of any fee to us to any magazine or weekly that wants to insert comic. (You want to reproduce the guide on a mass scale - you got it. Contact zach (at) gregpalast.com)

Or you can download the comic for a donation of a penny or more (more, PLEASE), at www.StealBackYourVote.org.

Spread this link! Pow! Zap! Take that, Katherine! Steal Back Your Vote is a project of the not-for-profit non-partisan Palast Investigative Fund.

WHAT'S THAT UP IN THE SKY?! It's our Super Sponsors! Voto Latino, Operation Rainbow Push, Air America Radio, Juan Gonzales of Democracy Now! and other crusaders for Truth, Justice and the American Way.

Contact us at interviews (at) StealBackYourVote.org.

Getting caught up, finally. Even though the change of venue has changed the dynamic of the old locale, this is still one of my favorite comics festivals North America has to offer. Hands down. Special props to my great friend Greg Bennett, who helped pull me out of a special kind of tailspin. I love you, m'man!

Here's a smattering of what i picked up at the show. No time for even bullet reviews... needless to say, i read this stuff at the airport and on two planes back home. In keeping with my tendencies towards dreaded "Team Comics" boosterism, i won't waste my time or yours talking about lame books, instead focusing on the good shit. So if you read about it here, that means it comes recommended.

Inside, by J.P. Coovert. Published by One Percent Press.

Teeny Bikini #5, by Rob Ullman. (Self-published.) Image below is a terrific print he made for the show, titled Stir Crazy.

Papercutter #8. Edited by the great Greg Means. Published by Tugboat Press. (Also just finally read Papercutter #7... easily my favorite anthology being published today. Kramers what?)

Do Not Disturb My Waking Dream #2, by Laura Park. (Self-published.) It's only a mtter of time until Laura is hailed as one of the greatest cartoonists in the history of the United States. She deserved won the Ignatz Award at the show for Outstanding Artist. Whoo hoo!

The Quest for the Missing Girl, by Jiro Taniguchi. Published by Ponent Mon. STUNNING! (Have i ever mentioned how much i love this author, my favorite manga cartoonist of all time? Oh, i have?) Special thanks to Deb, whom i met for the first time at the show.

:01 First Second: Great Graphic Novels for Everyone. This is a little mini-comic done by Editorial Director Mark Siegel.

The Factoids, by Dan Zettwoch, Ted May, and Kevin Huizenga. Published by U.S.S. Catastrophe?

Dharbin #1, by Dustin Harbin. (Self-published.)

Fight or Run, by Kevin Huizenga. Published by Buenaventura Press.

Bets Are Off, by Nate Powell / flipbook / Cakewalk, by Rachel Bormann and Nate Powell. (Self-published.)

Mesmo Delivery, by Rafael Grampa'. Published by AdHouse. (This is so freaking amazing!)

Fierce Ease, by Miriam Libicki. (Self-published.) I'm so into Miriam's incredibly beautiful drawn essays.

• Bwana Spoons has a spectacular new print available at Grass Hut!

• Here's an early rough by James Kochalka for the 2009 Top Shelf Free Comic Book Day comic.

• From the classified dossier on (Veeps authors) Bill Kelter and Wayne Shellabarger, a photo has turned up with them in attendance at the swearing in of LBJ... seriously, these guys are such wonks! (And there's Jackie Kennedy, no less!)

• McCain / Palin? Oh sweet Jesus help us all.