A (deceptively) short treat to Tempin' Bear, the author's party high and scribbled snaps from life among family and friends. I mention "the author's party high" as its central to the feelgood of this booklet. Its an all-happy kind, beaming from this comix core. "Its just a day", an absolutely beautiful centre spread of visuals representing festival life with some image-enhancing prose to accompany it. This love and jolly of it, is in some aspect of every strip in the book.

As with #1, theres a sense of a funfair ride with its twists and turns, a focus on subject matter that is most content not dwelling on one ride for too long. This is fun comix, and theres nothing bland about it. Clearly.

Drop Dierdre a line and offer her trades in comix, booze or sweetie mice and you'll maybe get a copy of #1, #2 or the forthcoming three. Thats druane @ gmail.com

Oh yes, and the single word to describe this comix,
"Patterns !"
(accompanied by right hand held upward, with a 20° bend)

Prolific Doug Noble tries an experimental approach in this issue of SFM, a "strange" self-contained story. It doesn't work for me, but only just. Stay with us and I'll tell you why.

Each page of A5 "The Space Between Words" is titled, with four pieces of prose,
and what looks to be four panels of about 4x4 cm between each. Sticking to this for 20 pages with tidy composition is an applaudabble extension of the format: not new, just rarely seen. The panel formatting forces the author to develop a dense concentrate, painting like the work of John Robbins having gone through the cut-up porocess. Like a bitesize Chris Ware (which can surely only be a good thing) The narrative subject matter is reminiscent of the final quarter of Cerebus - that is to say there seems to be a Fitzgerald Hemingway influence here, or cetainly its emoted.

My main problem is the formatting. Big Man Doug Noble is definitely telling a story here, solid, and it comes over as classy. I find it just a little difficult to retain, dense and impenetrable, this tale of a landlocked sea captain and his love, fading like an old photograph and torn by the elements. So no sorry Doug, not my cup of tea, didn't work, much too ballsy for me. I'm going to have to read it all over again to get what you're on about. You reader who hasn't seen this, should definitely pick it up. Doug Nobles still pushing the medium's potential, and for a pound fifty, well..

Theres no one doing things in comics today like Douglas Noble is doing them.

Three more characters from an Unfolded Earth, each brought to us in a set of discourses with the unseen interviewer. As well as creating seamless sequential moments and high-definition visual coherence, the strips feature matters of personal histories and meta-narratives, labour relations and linguistics. Merlin-Goodbrey has crafted a collection of sociological case studies. "The Man Who Fell To Earth" is poeti8cal also, comics poems of the sort that sneaks up on you and doesnt tell you its a poem. It just comes on all manner-of-factly and does beautiful things. "She could smell tomorrow" is probably one of hte most modest, coy and optimistic things Merlin-Goodbrey has done so far. It seems tame initially, ends the collection with the best synopsis and final line. Time will tell on "She could smell tomorrow".

"The Girl Who Talked" is 32 pages, A5, available for £2 at UK expos handling, although no longer available online. (If you want a mail order copy I suggest dropping Daniel a note at merlin @ e-merl.com to see if there are any left in stock. The whole collection is reprinted within the pages of The Last Sane Cowboy & Other Stories. At $12.95 its a five-book collection. Its also likely to be one of the top ten best comic books this year, and next year, period. Its available from http://www.e-merl.com/shop.htm

Well, Arthur Goodman (with Brother Dave) have been self-publishing their comix for ten years, and this colllection of strips from 2001-2005 is a good no superb way for anyone who appreciates comix to participate in the celebrations. By my reckonings, its not so much a 'greatest hits' collection, more a 'best of lesser seen', great hits nonetheless. "The Cat Bird" kicks off with arts visual, leaving proof of expression and emoticon. There follow six character favourite crayon stories which I've previously given my highest recommendations to. Including a simple gag 'I want' piece which I swear I'd not seen before and rates as one of those Arthur Goodman classics. Thats my highest recommendations. This is slice-of-life at its very best.

Theres the welcome addition of Zip Gun Noir in the form of 'Joey Garcia kills a guy' which doesn't overestimate Goodman's ability to create a visual horror and is all the richer for what it does with that. Representative, theres some dangerously crude and high funny manga cats. Rounding off the collection is 'Sparraz', a tale of two ASBO chav mite ruffians is told in full oddy-o phone netticks. Quality material. A recommended collection. 'Gimmick' is A5, b & w, 24 pgs and available from www.favouritecrayon.co.uk or many an expo for £2 or €3, US $4, at an expo.

Also find out more about the front cover and order via Paypal at the website.

Artuhr is also approachable talking trading mini-comics. Don't miss !!

Modelled initially on 'Action' - blood, guts,vengeance and vile of yore, this old issue of Violent sports a cover classic in that style with a superhero war comix esque 'Hard-Boiled Hitler' smacking the allies champ. Artist Andy Baker turns in a big dumb pop cartoning on that Frankenstein serial. Theres also mix and mash distortions on crime gang films, and a fun pastiche of the Bond genre, involving a golfing protagonist no less. The comics influence here is clearly 2000AD IPC house, that sardonic telling attitude in abused protagonists finding hope in delight of when their abusers are dealt a hand of GBH. The continuing stories in the booklet don't leave too much more - an agility of editing perhaps. Then again, they come in,m ,deliver the action required, most manage to incorporate a few artistic spectacles (as well as good art skills), then leave. Only with one strip fell short this, not quite badly executed, just being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The 'flip of this', personal fave, 'Cinderella Syndrome' is completely out of character with the rest of the book. A light innocent uplifter by Jay Eales and Toby Ford who embellishes basics with a warm photo scenery and manages to make it look very easy.

This issue of Violent is colour cover, int. b & w, 32 pages and is £1.50 from the archives section of Factor Fiction Press. Or you may wish to try an issue more recent of which there are quite a number. Twelve in fact at time of writing. (Steve Green reviews Issue 11 here)

Copies are available at all good UK expos, by adding 50p for postage and writing a cheque to Selina Lock, 38 Clarkes Road, Wigston, Leics, LE18 2BE, or by using Paypal through the Factor Fiction Website Shop.

(2005)
Well, its a comic book manifesto on the dangers of climate change thats text heavy and is more representative of activist circles than any UK comics nexus club.

Skeptical of the dangers of the postmodern threat I am, Kate Evans succeeds in using the power of comics to guide and educate, in good pace.

The central protagonists of this book are carefully and dimensionally crafted variations on the type usually found in this sort of tract literature. Reflecting Evans' rationalist and non-sensationalist approach is 'the scientist', a product of masses of work out sheets. Its to Evans' credit that 'the (globalist) fatcat' manages to be a genuinely likeable rapist of the earth's resources, and not an obvious instantly alarming monster.

This is an accessible read and cartoon Kate's cartoons manage to be the sharperst of political cartooning and the sociable of autobio graphix. Whay aren't there more small press comics like this ?
For more details check out www.cartoonkate.co.uk or support agency www.risingtide.org.uk
Colour cover, A5, 20 pages

Update:Of course I check the website over here, over here, I find this alternate version of the comic, both versions of which are probably available in this graphic novel

"Kate Evans is one of the most original talents in comics I've seen in a long time" - Steve Bell