Friday, June 01, 2007

RYAN IN NYC


I'm out in New York for a few days, and will be working this weekend at BookExpo America, the largest book fair held in the United States. I'll be at the fair from Friday to Sunday, and spending my downtime as I usually do at these things: visiting publishers' booths, trying to meet up with cool folks, and picking up ARCs (advance reader copies) of soon-to-be-released books. I will post pictures from the floor early next week.

Yesterday, I took an hour and stopped by BOOK-OFF again. It was a short but auspicious visit!


NEWEST FINDS
1. Hellstar Remina by Junji Ito

I finally got my hands on this, Junji Ito's most recent big release. Once I get back to California, I'll scan some pages for you guys to check out. My original description from first encountering it at Frankfurt Book Fair still stands: flying cars, female protagonist, CRUCIFICTIONS in the STREET, PLANETS EATING PLANETS, HELL ON EARTH and COLLAPSING QUASARS causing hooded LYNCH MOBS to run amok. OH YES.

2. 天国の悪戯 by 喜国 雅彦 (Tricky Plays by The God by Masahiko Kikuni)

This was an exceptional find... The book is a 200 page collection from 1995 by Kikuni (famed sicko creator of 4-panel classic Heartbroken Angels, released by Viz). It's very much in the style of Koji Aihara and Kikuni's own Heartbroken Angels, and the strips are nasty, irreverent and existentially odd. Perhaps we might scanlate a few to whet yonkoma appetites next month?

Off to bed now, but we have a few new posts in the works, including details on:
1) An original zine that Evan, My GF and I are working on, which will tentatively include art, articles, interview and comics from our crew of cartoonist and writer friends :B
2) The upcoming Tezuka exhibit at the SF Asian Art Museum
3) Jason Thompson's soon to be released Ultimate Guide to Manga book
4) Our favorite online shops: SEIBEI and LE LEZARD NOIR
5) MORE GOOD SHIT!

6 comments:

C.M.B. said...

I was in NYC not even 2 days ago, on a rare trip to the big apple. I wish I would've known about this! GODDAMMIT!

I would've loved to have seen this Book-Off place.

C.M.B. said...

OR Kinokuniya! DAMMIT!

Anonymous said...

yes. scans of the second book please. I am sad that you don't upload anymore, this shit is great.

Ryan said...

@Clint: Dude, I'm sorry I missed you... I was in NYC from 5/29 until today (6/4). We'll hang out sometime in the future, and you should totally hit up bookoff next time you are in the area.

@j : I'll talk to evan about getting a few strips scanned and on the blog :) Funny you mention us not uploading-- I was just bugging evan about our sensha and kikuni scanlations that have stalled out. we're gonna work on them again soon, I swear!

-best, Ryan

Bully said...

I love BookOff...it's right around the corner from where I work and it's a lovely lunchtime adventure. Looking forward to your BEA report!

Ryan said...

@bully: Lucky you! I know that i'd buy way more comics than I could read in a year if I had easy access to the shop; visiting 2-3 times a year is a healthy limit for me, I think :)

Your BEA recap was unbeatable-- I've been busy here trying to catch up on work, but will definitely polish it off by the end of the weekend! Thanks , Ryan