InFurNation Rotating Header Image

Graphic Novel

The Return of Inspector LeBrock

Steampunk and furry fans may both rejoice as writer/artist Brian Talbot brings us the latest edition of his anthropomorphic alternate history series in Grandville Noel, coming this November in hardcover from Dark Horse Press. “With his trusty adjunct, Detective Sergeant Ratzi, away for Christmas, there’s no holiday for Detective Inspector LeBrock of Scotland Yard as he embarks on an investigation into the disappearance of his housekeeper’s niece, Bunty Spall.  The trail leads to a growing religious cult, where a charismatic unicorn messiah and his con men cronies, already responsible for mass murder in the United States, are about to lead a crusade for the ethnic cleansing of the French Empire’s doughfaces – the derogatory nickname for humans used by the majority, animal-headed population. Teaming up with Chance Lucas, a gun-slinging operative of the Pinkerton Detective Agency, and reigniting his steamy love affair with the voluptuous Parisian badger prostitute Billie, LeBrock clashes with both cult fanatics and doughface terrorists, uncovering in the process a centuries-old religious conspiracy that threatens to plunge the world into bloody civil war.” Find out more about this full-color series at Brian Talbot’s blog page.

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

Mom and Dad are Rats

Canadian artist and writer Eric Orchard makes quite a big splash with his first graphic novel, Maddy Kettle: The Adventures of the Thimblewitch. This is from Previews: “Maddy is an eleven year old girl with a pet toad named Ralph. And they’re on a rather big adventure right now, as her parents are currently kangaroo rats – having been put under a spell. On their way to find the Thimblewitch to sort everything out, they battle Spider Goblins and befriend two endearing Cloud Mappers, Harry the bear and Silvio the raccoon, who help them get where they’re going. We won’t tell you what happens next, but we can assure you that it’s a beautiful and magical ride.” Top Shelf Productions will release this full-color all-ages fantasy in trade paperback this October.

image c. 2014 Top Shelf

image c. 2014 Top Shelf Productions

What’s Black and Yellow, But Not A Bee?

Everyone’s favorite hard-boiled black cat detective has been busy lately — and those of us on this side of the pond are seeing more of his adventures thanks to the folks at Dark Horse Press. Now they’re bringing us Blacksad: Amarillo. “Hardboiled feline detective John Blacksad is back in the latest tour de force from the multiple-award winning duo of writer Juan Díaz Canales and artist Juanjo Guarnido. Taking a much-needed break after the events of A Silent Hell, Blacksad lands a side job driving a rich Texan’s prized yellow Cadillac Eldorado across 1950s America, hitting the back roads from New Orleans to Tulsa. But before long, the car is stolen and Blacksad finds himself mixed up in another murder, with roughneck bikers, a shifty lawyer, one down-and-out Beat generation writer, and some sinister circus folk. When John Blacksad goes on the road, trouble is dead ahead.” Find out more at Comics Beat, before it comes out in hardcover this October.

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

Help Start a New Fantasy Graphic Novel

The artist known as Alector Fencer has begun a new full-color graphic novel series called Myre (pronounced ME-reh). And she’s actively seeking some crowd-funding help to bring it into being. In the artist’s own words, “Since the beginning of this year I have been working tirelessly on writing and drawing out the story and the characters, resulting in a big collection of stories, scripts and tons of paintings/sketches and drawings. Over the past years I have collected many paintings of characters of the storyline, including Myre and her dragon mount Varug. Despite all the planning, there were many things coming in between and dragging me away from this very big and heartfelt dream of mine. The dream of sharing a world with you which had been captured in my head for so long.” To find out more about the story and the world it takes place in, visit Alector Fencer’s Indiegogo campaign page. In addition to a lot of the usual swag for helping out, some contributors will be treated to a special audio play created by the famous 2 the Ranting Gryphon, set in the Myre universe.

image c. 2014 by Alector Fencer

image c. 2014 by Alector Fencer

A Science Fiction Classic, Illustrated

If you’re not familiar with Larry Niven, you should be. For one thing he was Guest of Honor at Further Confusion once — largely for his creation of the brutal tiger-like aliens known as the Kzin. In 1970 his novel Ringworld received both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novel. Now, many years later, Tor Books is creating a series of black & white manga-style graphic novel adaptations of the book. “Two-hundred-year-old human Louis Wu is recruited by a two-headed alien named Nessus to join him, a felinoid warrior alien named Speaker-to-Animals, and the infinitely lucky human Teela Brown to explore an alien artifact. They find a Ringworld, a ribbon millions of miles long built around a distant sun. The civilization has fallen into savagery, though, and after crashing into the Ringworld, Louis must come up with a clever plan to get back to known space, hundreds of light years away.” Adapted by Robert Mandell (script) and Sean Lam (illustration), Part 1 is available now in paperback at Amazon.

[And with that, we’ll see you after Comic Con!]

image c. 2014 by Rory McLeish

image c. 2014 by Rory McLeish

Beasts Invade the Rain Forest

It might seem like an age ago, but earlier this year the animated sensation of the moment was Rio 2. Now that we’ve moved on to the summer, Paperkutz have announced a new tie-in graphic novel, carrying on after the events of that film. “While recording bird calls, Linda loses her new digital recorder, but when Blu finds it, it’s full of strange and horrifying growls! Is some sort of new predator on the loose in the sanctuary? Before the gang can solve the mystery themselves, monster-hunters and reality shows invade, turning their quiet jungle home into pandemonium. ” Rio 2: The Creature from Blu’s Lagoon is written by Arie Kaplan and illustrated by James Silvani. The full-color trade paperback is available for pre-ordering; otherwise look for it in stores this fall.

image c. 2014 Paperkutz

image c. 2014 Paperkutz

One Scared Little Bird

Lauri and Jaakko Ahonen created an Indiegogo campaign for their darkly comic full-color graphic novel Jaybird. Evidently it was quite successful, as now it’s been published! “Little Jaybird lives in a very large house alone with his bedridden mother. Portraits of dignified ancestors look down upon him from dusty walls. At times also a curious spider peeks from between the cobwebs. Even though it’s safe inside the house, with its doors barred and windows boarded up, reality can’t be shut outside forever.” It’s available now for download (complete with original soundtrack music), and this September Dark Horse Press will release it in a hardcover book edition.

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

Nine Lives, Many Adventures

Sometimes it’s best to just let the thing speak for itself: “Allison Breaking is a talented journalist with her own blog and a lot of bills to pay, so when she receives an offer from a mysterious stranger named Burma to write his memoirs, it’s an offer she can’t refuse, not even with all the red flags popping up. But Burma is quite literally unlike any man Allison’s ever known – because he’s a cat. And this cat has stories to tell about how he (over the course of a few lifetimes) has shaped the world – and another, darker story that Allison must risk all to uncover… a story of what this particular cat has been doing with the last of his nine lives.” That’s the story of I Was The Cat, written by Paul Tobin and illustrated in full color by Benjamin Dewey. The hardcover graphic novel is coming this August from Oni Press.

Image c. 2014 Oni Press

Image c. 2014 Oni Press

The Lion Blocks

Perhaps it was inevitable that someone would turn Lego toys’ popular anthropomorphic fantasy series Legends of Chima into a comic book — and Papercutz were the ones to do it. No less than three volumes of Lego: Legends of Chima have hit the stands now, in both hardcover and trade paperback editions. They’re written by Yannick Grotholt with full-color art by Comicon (yes, that’s the name). “Chima— a world reigned by animal tribes, divided by the battle of the noble lions against the evil crocodiles. In High Risk [Volume 1] Laval, prince of the Lions and his friend Eris, a warrior of the Eagle Tribe, engage in a training race on their Speedorz. As the two speed through the jungle, they stumble upon a Gorilla convoy transporting CHI that is being attacked by the Crocodiles. Will Laval and Eris save their Gorilla friends? Or will they become Crocodile Meat?” Papercutz has a web site dedicated to the series.

image c. 2014 Papercutz

image c. 2014 Papercutz