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Kang The Conqueror: Only Myself Left To Conquer Marvel UK Edition

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Kang The Conqueror: Only Myself Left To Conquer Marvel UK Edition

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The time traveler called Kang the Conqueror has led many lives across many eras. He has been a pharaoh, a villain and a warlord of the spaceways - even, on rare occasions, a hero. Across all timelines, one fact seemed absolute: Time means nothing to Kang. But the truth about the Conqueror is much mo…

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Written by Alan Moore

Illustrated by Dave Gibbons

Published by DC Comics

Paperback

Watchmen is an exploration of the history and purpose of the superhero genre, how readers connect to it, and what it means philosophically. Many consider this to be Moore's magnum opus.

It starts with a murder. This is the story of a group of super heroes who don't fight crime anymore, because vigilantism was outlawed. Can they figure out who the murderer is before he/she strikes again?

Cover subject to change.

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OK Comics | Written by Alan Moore Illustrated by Dave Gibbons Published by DC Comics Lenticular Cover Watchmen is an exploration of the history and purpose of the superhero genre, how readers connect to it, and what it means philosophically.

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The Excelsior Award is the only fully independent, nationwide book award for graphic novels and manga - where kids aged 9-18 decide the winner (via four age-appropriate categories) by rating each book as they read it! The award now regularly attracts over two hundred schools from all over the UK and Ireland.

In 2023, twenty graphic novels/manga will be selected for the four age-appropriate shortlists. The overall goal of this scheme is to encourage reading amongst teenagers. However, its secondary target is to raise the profile of graphic novels and manga amongst school librarians and teachers. This storytelling medium has been a largely underused resource within education for many years. The Excelsior Award attempts to highlight some of the amazing books that are out there - books that fully deserve to be in our school libraries alongside regular fiction!

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The Excelsior Award is the only fully independent, nationwide book award for graphic novels and manga - where kids aged 9-18 decide the winner (via four age-appropriate categories) by rating each book as they read it! The award now regularly attracts over two hundred schools from all over the UK and Ireland.

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9th Art Comics & Graphic Novels UK - Cinebook Publishers - 9th Art Comics & Graphic Novels UK - Cinebook Publishers

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Publishers of European Comics

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9th Art Comics & Graphic Novels UK - Cinebook Publishers

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For many English-speaking readers, knowledge of European comic books is limited to popular characters Tintin and Asterix.

Lucky Luke, Iznogoud, Blake & Mortimer, XIII, Valerian, Thorgal, Largo Winch, Spirou & Fantasio, Billy & Buddy, Yakari, the Bluecoats, Yoko Tsuno, Buck Danny, Cedric . . . These European comic book characters, already boasting more than 300 million copies sold, are featured stars in Cinebook's catalogue.

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9th art comics & graphic novels uk - cinebook publishers

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9th Art Comics & Graphic Novels UK - Cinebook Publishers - 9th Art Comics & Graphic Novels UK - Cinebook Publishers

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For many English-speaking readers, knowledge of European comic books is limited to popular characters Tintin and Asterix. Lucky Luke, Iznogoud, Blake & Mortimer, XIII, Valerian, Thorgal, Largo Winch, Spirou & Fantasio, Billy & Buddy, Yakari, the Bluecoats, Yoko Tsuno, Buck Danny, Cedric . . .

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OK Comics | Written by Tom King Illustrated by Mitch Gerads Published by DC Comics Only Mister Miracle can stop the scourge of Darkseid and restore peace. This is one of the best DC Comics to come out in the past ten years!

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Just a stone’s throw from London lies the manor house of the illustrious Phantomhive earldom, its master one Ciel Phantomhive. Earl Phantomhive is a giant in the world of commerce, Queen Victoria’s faithful servant . . . and a slip of a twelve-year old boy. Fortunately, his loyal butler, Sebastian,…

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Punisher Paperback Omnibus Volume 1 by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

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When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock.
﻿﻿Frank Castle, the one-man army known as the Punisher, is back! But not everyone is happy about Frank's return.

Two unlucky cops have him, while the ruthless mobster Ma Gnucci and her gang will stop at nothing to see him dead!

The Punisher must also contend with a colourful crew of nosy neighbours and the arrival of three copycats ― the Holy, Elite and Mr. Payback ― who want him to join their crime-cleansing force.

Welcome back, Frank!

Collecting: PUNISHER (2000) 1-12

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Punisher Paperback Omnibus Volume 1 by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

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When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock. ﻿﻿Frank Castle, the one-man army known as the Punisher, is back! But not everyone is happy about Frank's return.

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Daredevil Born Again by Frank Miller and David

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When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock.
﻿ ﻿Daredevil, the stalwart defender of the innocent and oppressed of Hell's Kitchen, New York. While other superheroes battle villains of unimaginable power and defend the Earth from alien powers, Daredevil is down in the streets protecting the ordinary citizen from the scum of the alleys and the corrupt and powerful who believe they are above the law. However, when Karen Page, Matt Murdock's former lover, trades the Man Without Fear's secret identity for a drug fix, Daredevil must find strength as the Kingpin of Crime wastes no time destroying his life. The definitive Daredevil tale!

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Daredevil Born Again by Frank Miller and David

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When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock. ﻿﻿Daredevil, the stalwart defender of the innocent and oppressed of Hell's Kitchen, New York.

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Black Hammer Volume 1 by Jeff Lemire and Dean Ormston

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Written by Jeff Lemire

Illustrated by Dean Ormston

Published by Dark Horse Comics

Paperback

Comes with OK Comics Exclusive Signed Print

Once they were heroes. Now, banished from existence by a multiversal crisis, the old champions of Spiral City lead simple lives in a timeless farming town.

But as they attempt to free themselves from this strange purgatory, a mysterious stranger works to bring them back into action for one last adventure!
﻿Please note that when purchasing multiple items in one order, we will dispatch the order when all titles are in hand.

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Black Hammer Volume 1 by Jeff Lemire and Dean Ormston

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OK Comics | Once they were heroes. Now, banished from existence by a multiversal crisis, the old champions of Spiral City lead simple lives in a timeless farming town. But as they attempt to free themselves from this strange purgatory, a mysterious stranger works to bring them back into action for one last adventure!

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Meet Snoopy, Charlie Brown and the rest of the Peanuts gang while learning about the world-famous comic strip by Charles M. Schulz.

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Sonic the Comic was a British children's comic published by Fleetway Editions between 1993 and 2002. It was the UK's Sega comic, featuring stories about its mascot Sonic the Hedgehog and related characters, as well as comic strips based on other Sega video games, along with news, reviews, and tips for games released for Sega systems.

The original price for Sonic the Comic was 95 pence, but it incrementally increased over the comic's lifespan, until the price had reached £1.50 by the final issue. The comic generally contained four comic strip stories, each usually following different storylines and being written and drawn by different writers and artists. The first was always a seven-page story about Sonic himself (except for #148 which began with the Tails strip), and in the earliest issues, the remaining three would involve a different Sega game character (see list below). Later, the Sega backup strips were supplanted by stories focusing on supporting Sonic characters such as Tails, Knuckles, Amy and the Chaotix. The anthology "Sonic's World" featured a variety of events in the STC world not covered by the main character strips.

The different strips could at times contrast heavily with each other, with different strips aimed at different age groups or with a different balance between comedy and drama: the humour-based Decap Attack strip could appear alongside the darker and more violent Streets of Rage strip. Lew Stringer has stated that majority of readers were aged between five and ten and many strips were written with this in mind: "That doesn't mean that older readers can't appreciate the stories and artwork of course but it's worth bearing in mind that if the stories sometimes seem juvenile, it's because they are. Having said that, it doesn't mean we can be sloppy because we're 'just' writing for kids".

Aside from the comic strips, for its first few years STC regularly featured content related to Sega videogaming. Fitting in with the Sonic convention of calling levels "Zones", these sections were given such titles as the "Q-Zone" (which featured videogame tips and cheats), the "News Zone" and the "Review Zone". Readers' artwork was printed in the "Graphic Zone", and letters were featured in "Speedlines".

The mascot of the comic was a robot named Megadroid, composed of parts of a Sega Genesis/Mega Drive. Megadroid was the persona used by the editors of Sonic the Comic to answer letters and provide story recaps and general magazine news (much like Tharg in , and in fact created by former Tharg Richard Burton). He acted as a liaison between the readers (whom he called "boomers") and the "humes who think they're in charge".

Megadroid had a one-off strip, in which he ran away from the STC offices to a seaside town only to return from his harrowing experience to attend to the needs of the boomers.

Megadroid was dropped from the comic in 1998, and with him the "Speedlines" letter page vanished. Speedlines returned in 2000, though it was no longer a regular feature and instead of Megadroid, the letters were supposedly answered by Sonic himself (actually editor Andy Diggle and later Steve MacManus).

The bulk of the work in the comic was written by either Nigel Kitching or Lew Stringer, while art was provided by Richard Elson, Nigel Dobbyn, Carl Flint, Woodrow Phoenix, Roberto Corona, Mike McMahon, Kitching himself and many others. The first editor was Richard Burton.

Several of the comic's contributors have found success elsewhere in comics. Mark Millar, who wrote the first Streets of Rage storyline and some Sonic strips, has since written major titles for DC and Marvel Comics such as and ; editor Andy Diggle has since become a comics writer; and Road to Perdition illustrator Richard Rayner contributed to Decap Attack scripts.

The demise of STC began when budget cuts at the comic led to the number of pages being cut from 36 to 32 beginning with issue 95 in 1997 and as a result, the loss of the news, game review and game tips sections (though the slow phasing out of these sections had already been ongoing since early 1995). Despite being one of Fleetway's biggest selling comics in 1998, from issue 133, published that July, one strip an issue was given over to reprints to save money as part of Fleetway's policy of five-year reader cycles (issue 133 was published shortly after the comic's fifth birthday). Later in the year, the mascot Megadroid was removed, along with the "Speedlines" letters page. Two further strips were replaced by reprints in issues 155 and 157, leaving just the main Sonic strip and the cover as the only new material in each issue. With the lack of new supporting character strips, Nigel Kitching was asked to share the main strip with Lew Stringer, causing the plans for the "Shanazar" story arc to be heavily altered.

During this time, the main strip's stories came under the "Time Zone" banner, mostly being set on Shanazar and then later involving dimensional portals leading to other dimensions and Earth's history (identical to the previous Amy and Tekno stories) due to editorial preference. Neither Mobius nor any of the main characters bar Sonic and Amy featured, and the lack of ancillary strips meant no other stories could be told. Following issue 157, Lew Stringer replaced Nigel Kitching as the comic's sole writer.

After Andy Diggle became the comic's editor, Stringer's run concluded with an apocalyptic final storyline, and Kitching returned with issue 175 for a ten-part adaptation of the videogame Sonic Adventure. From issue 185, the comic became fully reprint, aside from new covers drawn by Richard Elson. This happened at short notice - even Kitching was not aware that issue 184 would be his last until he requested an extension for the ten-issue storyline he was in the middle of writing, having apparently already made plans for future stories that would follow it. He revealed the cancellation to fans on the unofficial STC Yahoo! Groups mailing list on 19 April 2000, a little over two months before the last issue was published and only a few weeks after he himself had been made aware of the fact. As a result, the final story ended with a handful of loose ends from earlier stories left untied.

Fully reprint issues continued to be published until issue 223, which reprinted the four-part storyline "The Evil Empire" and featured an article by Nigel Kitching about his time working on the comic, an abridged version of which was posted to the STC Mailing List.

Sonic the Comic began its run with a series of fairly inconsequential one-shot stories, and only established its identity and ongoing storyline and setting with the new team of writer Nigel Kitching and artist Richard Elson for the issue 7 story "Super Sonic" and issue 8's "The Origin of Sonic". The comic adopted a version of the "Kintobor origin" of Sonic and Doctor Robotnik, which had originally been featured in a promotional comic for the first Sonic game printed in Disney Adventures and had been elaborated upon in Mike Pattenden's book Stay Sonic. Like other UK Sonic publications, STC used the Stay Sonic version as its basis. This origin story established that Sonic was originally a normal brown hedgehog on the planet Mobius, who burrowed his way into the underground laboratory of Dr. Ovi Kintobor, a scientist who wished to rid the planet of all evil through the use of powerful gems called the Chaos Emeralds. In addition, he helped Sonic increase his running speed with the gift of red shoes designed to handle the incredible friction he generated, until the hedgehog eventually broke the sound barrier with a sonic boom which turned him blue. However, an accident involving the unstable Chaos Emeralds and a rotten egg transformed Kintobor into the evil Dr Ivo Robotnik, leading to the events of the games Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

"The Origin of Sonic" led into a storyline in which Sonic, Tails and their friends were sent forward in time six months. During their absence, Doctor Robotnik had successfully conquered the entire planet of Mobius, and Sonic and co. were forced underground, operating as " freedom fighters" attempting to bring down Robotnik's rule of the planet. This situation remained until issue 100 (1997), when Robotnik was deposed.

In the comic's early issues, three of the four strips in each edition were based on popular Sega video games. As time went on, these strips dwindled and were phased out entirely in favour of other stories about Sonic and related characters. The first of these was a Tails solo series which saw him return to his home in the Nameless Zone, where it was believed that he, not Sonic, was the great hero of Mobius. In addition to Tails and Sonic, other members of the Freedom Fighters included Johnny Lightfoot and Porker Lewis, characters based upon the generic rabbit and pig sprites freed from Badniks in the video games. The team soon added the "Kintobor computer" to their ranks - an artificial intelligence based on the brain patterns of Doctor Robotnik's former self - and were later joined by Amy Rose, a female hedgehog infatuated with Sonic, whose lies about being his girlfriend had made her a target for Robotnik's forces. Robotnik himself was later redesigned to match the appearance of his counterpart in the animated series Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog; and he gained a close ally in the green-skinned scientist Grimer, the comic's equivalent of Snively from the cartoon Sonic the Hedgehog. Grimer was instrumental in creating Metallix, the Metal Sonic, an enemy that featured prominently in Sonic the Comic's first major multi-part Sonic story, an adaptation of the video game entitled "The Sonic Terminator".

Knuckles the Echidna and the Floating Island soon made their debuts as Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Sonic & Knuckles were adapted, and Knuckles subsequently featured in his own storylines in which he attempted to learn more about his lost race of Echidnas and their relationship with the Floating Island and the Chaos Emeralds. The comic also introduced original characters such as the sky pirate Captain Plunder, rebellious super-Badnik Shortfuse the Cybernik and engineering genius Tekno the Canary, who occasionally featured in their own dedicated strips. The comic's incorporation of characters from Knuckles' Chaotix established the alternate dimension called the Special Zone as a major location, and also introduced the Brotherhood of Metallix, an army of Metal Sonic robots who rebelled against Robotnik and embarked on a plan to alter the timeline and take over Mobius.

One element of Sonic the Comic that was distinct from other Sonic fiction was its depiction of Sonic's powered-up form, Super Sonic or known to fans as "Fleetway Super Sonic". In STC, Super Sonic was a monstrous, inhibitionless alter-ego, the Mr. Hyde to Sonic's Doctor Jekyll, into which Sonic transformed in times of stress or exposure to the Chaos Emeralds. The appearances of Super Sonic were few and far between in the first eighty or so issues of the comic, although he became a prominent threat during the build-up to issue 100. Following a storyline in which the Chaos Emeralds' energy was transferred out of Sonic and into the Special Zone, Super Sonic continued to exist as a separate entity, forcing Sonic to pursue him. After Super Sonic was defeated by being frozen in time within the time-travelling, dimension-jumping Omni-Viewer, Sonic was left isolated in the Special Zone; on Mobius, Shortfuse joined the Freedom Fighters, and Knuckles ended a long quest back to the Floating Island. Super Sonic's subsequent escape from the Omni-Viewer triggered a planet-wide electromagnetic pulse that the Omni-Viewer shunted to Mobius, deactivating all of Robotnik's robots and computer systems. With no technology or troops to protect him, Robotnik was finally deposed as Mobius' ruler in the comic's 100th issue.

After establishing the new state of play on Mobius-including the now-amnesiac Super Sonic's befriending of magician Ebony and psychic Pyjamas-the next major move for STC was its adaptation of Sonic 3D Blast, which proved to be the last game adaptation for a prolonged period of time. Although it ultimately amounted to little more than use of the different elements from the game (Flickies Island, the birds used for Badniks and dimensional travel via Mobius Rings), with the added introduction of a new Metallix villain (with its design based on Knuckles this time), it was a key stepping stone in shaping the direction of Sonic stories right up until the conclusion of the series. The story introduced the interdimensional alien race known as the Drakon Empire (spun out of a dangling plot point from nearly one hundred issues prior), who allied themselves with Doctor Robotnik in an attempt to acquire the Chaos Emeralds, revealing their previous ownership of the gems ages prior. Alliances, betrayals and double-crosses culminated in Robotnik's successful capture of the Emeralds and a 4-issue epic in which he had god-like powers & reshaped Mobius entirely, but when his body was drained of Chaos Energy, he vanished into a sub-atomic dimension.

A series of dimension-hopping adventures by Amy and Tekno resulted in Mobius being briefly invaded by Earth military forces, after which Sonic pursued Grimer and Nack the Weasel in their quest to recover Robotnik. Trapped on the sub-atomic world of Shanazar, Sonic found it hard to adapt to the local culture, and when Amy's adventures led her to join him on the planet, the two explored the world's numerous vastly different zones, combating myriad threats. Robotnik had his own plans, however, using the dimensional technology that brought Sonic, Grimer and Nack to Shanazar to enlarge the world, fusing it with Mobius in a Crisis on Infinite Earths-style event. Shanazar's zones could now be accessed from portals on Mobius, and various doorways had also opened to various points in Earth's history. Infuriated with yet another failure, however, Robotnik decided to bring his long war with Sonic to an end by destroying Mobius once and for all. Entering into a partnership with the living plastic alien hive-mind, The Plax, Robotnik used their technology to absorb elemental energy from both Mobius and Earth, forcing both worlds into total ecological collapse. His scheme was again foiled, however, by Shortfuse, who wired his armour into Robotnik's machine, undoing the damage and draining the energy from the villain, with the added bonus of the feedback finally liberating him from his armour.

This proved to be one defeat too many for Robotnik; retreating physically and mentally, he languished in darkness until Grimer, desperate to snap his master out of his depression, initiated the events of the comic's final storyline, the adaptation of Sonic Adventure (although in practice, this would prove to be the loosest game adaptation yet, as the game's wildly different approach was largely incompatible with the STC universe). Discovering a canister containing a creature of living chaos energy, Grimer unleashed the fear-inducing "Chaos" upon the Freedom Fighters, leading to the death of Johnny Lightfoot. Rampaging out of Grimer's control, Chaos then attacked the Floating Island, intending to absorb the Chaos Emeralds; however, Knuckles jettisoned the emeralds before he could absorb more than one, causing the island itself to plunge into the ocean. While Robotnik then set about gathering the emeralds to lure all the players to his fortress that they might all die together, Sonic was transported into the ancient past of Mobius by Tikal and Pachacamac, two of the planet's race of echidnas, where he witnessed the beginning of the war between the Echidnas and the Drakon Empire, the origins of the Chaos Emeralds, and the creation of Chaos, who proved to be a Drakon prosecutor mutated by exposure to the emeralds. Returning to the present, Sonic arrived just as Chaos absorbed the remaining emeralds and became Perfect Chaos. Robotnik's suicide plan was thwarted, however, by the unexpected appearance of Super Sonic, dying due to depletion of his own chaos energy. Absorbing Chaos's energy, reverting him back to his Drakon form, Super Sonic became his old evil self again and turned on the Freedom Fighters, until Ebony used her magics to fuse Sonic and Super Sonic back together again.

The original stories in Sonic the Comic came to an end at this point with issue #184, but the comic continued until #223 with reprinted material from throughout the magazine's life.

As the central protagonist and main character of the comic, Sonic's personality differed slightly from his typical portrayals in other Sonic fiction; a flawed hero, he can act arrogant, rude and somewhat self-centred, being condescending towards Tails in particular (often referring to him as "pixel brain"). Despite his flaws, Sonic will always rescue the innocent from danger when the situation arises. After Johnny Lightfoot's death at the hands of Chaos, Sonic blames himself and disappears for a short while, returning from his self-imposed exile with a less egocentric attitude and a stronger will. Sonic's origin was first used in 1991 in a Disney comic then now put into Sonic the Comic. Sonic was once a brown hedgehog, he then one day met the scientist Dr. Kintobor who invented a machine powered by the mysterious power of the Chaos Emeralds. Dr. Kintobor also invented Sonic's trademark speed shoes to help amplify Sonic's speed. While testing Dr. Kintobor's invention, Sonic broke the sound barrier, giving him his looks and speed. The adaptation of Sonic Adventure led to Sonic's redesign to match his modern incarnation.

When Sonic is required to do some undercover work, he adopts the persona of "Bob Beaky", a heavily wrapped up bird.

Miles "Tails" Prower

Tails is Sonic's best friend as well as sidekick. Tails is commonly insulted by Sonic, who often calls him "Pixel Brain". Despite this, Tails still looks up to him. Tails was born in the Nameless Zone. Similar to Tails' backstory in the Canon games, he used to get picked on due to his twin tails. Tails eventually ran off and was found by Sonic in the Swamp Zone. This depiction of Tails does not have the genius-level intelligence of his video game counterpart, but is capable of flying the Tornado on his own, and coming up with cunning schemes to triumph over his enemies.

Knuckles is the guardian of the Master Emerald, which gives the Chaos Emeralds their power as well as the secret to the Floating Island's levitation powers. Following the adaptation of Sonic Adventure, Knuckles is also in possession of one of the Chaos Emeralds. In this media depiction, Knuckles is not too fond of Sonic's character, and is notably less gullible than his video game counterpart.

Amy first appeared in a two-part story where she was arrested by Dr. Robotnik's Trooper Badniks for the criminal offense of association with Sonic; she had been saying she was his girlfriend. While annoyed at the fact she had been lying about them being an "item", Sonic still had a duty to rescue her and did so, but to his horror realised that she was now a fugitive and would have to stay with the Freedom Fighters.

Amy's character swiftly matured as the comic went on and became one of the most valuable members of the Freedom Fighters, especially due to her expert marksmanship with her crossbow (as opposed to wielding the Piko Piko Hammer), which she created herself. The notion of a love interest in Sonic was, for the most part, underplayed and one of the comic's writers, Nigel Kitching, revealed he saw it partly as Amy just trying to annoy Sonic. Several times, Sonic would be left exasperated by either civilians assuming the two were dating, which Amy would play along with or her playing up the crush. Because of this, when trapped on the Miracle Planet with her, he faked being lost for two days.

She appeared often in strips, with a few solo stories by Lew Stringer where she saved the day without the others noticing. She constantly showed self-righteousness, pragmatism and quick thinking: in the story "Plasma" in #78, she both worked out how to defeat the villain and let Sonic believe he had as she knew that, as a symbol of hope for Mobius, "it's important that they think it's him who saves the day!". She also took a second-in-command role, taking full control when Sonic was absent or transformed into Super Sonic. When Sonic was lost in the Special Zone, she led the Freedom Fighters until he returned in #100. At a later part of the comic's life, Amy would be mostly written by Lew Stringer as a straightforward adventurer and had a long series of back-up strips teamed up with her best friend Tekno.

Nigel Kitching originally planned for Amy to be more of an irritant for Sonic, influenced by 1930s and 40s "Hollywood screwball comedies" like It's a Wonderful World, but while still being a capable fighter. However, Deborah Tate wanted the character to be of a role model for girls, as she was the only female regular character at the time, and dictated that she be more sensible and mature.

The Chaotix characters - Vector, Mighty, Espio, and Charmy - were written into Sonic the Comic as protectors of the Special Zone. The storyline had them framed without losing Sonic's trust. Along with Knuckles, this ensemble has been developed through many adventures as some of Sonic's best friends, always willing to help out.

Doctor Robotnik

Grimer

Super Sonic

Doctor Zachary

Commander Brutus

Captain Plunder

The Drakon Empire

Metallix, the Metal Sonic and the Brotherhood of Metallix

Nack the Weasel

Megatox

Nutzan Bolt

The Plax

Trogg

Lord Sidewinder

Max Gamble

Vermin the Cybernik

D.R.A.T.

Metamorphia

Marxio Brothers

Death-Trap

Colonel Percy Granite

Windy Wallis

Cam and Bert

Vichama

The Family

Percival Kane

Ryan Baggit

Spice Maidens

Ms Alpha, Mr Beta, Mr Gamma and Mr Delta

When STC started out, three of the four strips in each issue originated from games other than Sonic. After a while, they were gradually replaced by Sonic spin-offs.

Of these, "Pirate STC" and the "Megadroid" strips was the only ones not to be based on an existing video game; "Pirate STC" was based on a series of adverts for the Sega Mega Drive and Mega-CD, while the "Megadroid" strips were based on the host robot of Sonic the Comic.

Decap Attack was an adaptation of a Genesis/Mega Drive game. The strip outlasted all the other non-Sonic strips, seemingly becoming Nigel Kitching's pet project. Richard Piers Rayner co-wrote some episodes and Mike McMahon drew several.

The strip contained a very absurdist and manic sense of black humour, dealing with the daily life of Chuck, Head (the talking skull who, to Head's annoyance, gets thrown at enemies), the evil-minded Igor (who is constantly trying to kill Chuck) and the stereotypical mad scientist Professor Frank N. Stein, who is actually putting on his German accent and really comes from Cardiff. The game's adversary Max D. Cap only appeared twice, along with his accountant sidekick Rupert, who is constantly encouraging Max to be more stereotypically evil in his mannerisms. In the first story, he was chased away by the horror of Stein's newest creation, a creature cloned with half a brain ("...a Blockbusters contestant!"); in the second, he was in charge of the train to Hell ("now boarding for Hell, Damnation and Milton Keynes") that transported new damned souls.

Three comic strip series based on the Streets of Rage Genesis/Mega Drive games were published in Sonic the Comic. The strip first appeared in issue 7 of STC and was written by Mark Millar, and the last Streets of Rage story ran from STC 41-46 and was written by Nigel Kitching. All three series featured artwork by Peter Richardson.

The strip was set in a city ruled by Mr. X and his organised crime group The Syndicate, who were opposed by the video games' player characters Axel, Blaze, Max and later Skate. In the first story, Axel, Blaze and Max quit the police force and become vigilantes. Streets of Rage was darker and more violent than STC's other strips, and the stories were relatively long for the comic, being told over six parts.

In addition to Sonic the Comic, nine issues of Sonic the Poster Mag were published. This comic consisted of an A1-sized poster, on the reverse of which was printed a comic strip in A4-sized sections. The poster was folded to match the pages of the comic. Most of the stories were based around Sonic, but one was devoted to and another to Streets of Rage. Issues 1 & 2 were not strips. Issue 1 contained information on the two cartoon series (Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog and " SatAM") and the second featured game tips for Sonic Chaos.

In 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1999 Sonic Summer Specials were published. The 1995 issue consisted mainly of reprinted material from Sonic the Poster Mag, and the 1999 edition was entirely reprints. In addition, in 1996 the Knuckles Knock-Out Special was printed, containing material devoted to Sonic's "friendly rival".

Four 32-page compilation books were released by Ravette Publishing in 1994. Early Sonic stories were reprinted in Sonic the Hedgehog Beats the Badniks (issues 1-4) and Sonic the Hedgehog: Spin Attack (issues 6 & 8-10), while Shinobi: The Fear Pavilion (issues 1-6) and Streets of Rage: Bad City Fighters (issues 7-12) each collected the complete first story from their respective series.

Twenty-five copies of each book were given away as competition prizes in issues 23 ( Beats the Badniks and Spin Attack) and 24 ( Shinobi and Streets of Rage), although in each competition the winners were unable to choose which of the two books to receive as a prize.

In 1993, Virgin Publishing released four Sonic novels, written by James Wallis, Carl Sargent and Marc Gascoigne under the collective pseudonym "Martin Adams". These were based on the origin established in Stay Sonic and shared many similarities with early STC, including the origin of Robotnik and the early cast (Johnny, Porker, Sally Acorn, Joe Sushi et al.). The second title, Sonic the Hedgehog in the Fourth Dimension, involved a time-travelling Sonic being forced to ensure Kintobor became Robotnik, in order to save Mobius - several years before STC featured a similar plot element.

In its 87th issue, the British video games magazine GamesTM featured a four-page article on "Sonic The Comic," entitled "Paper With Attitude," which included observations by various people who worked on the comic such as Nigel Kitching, scans of the comic, a production sketch of Captain Plunder, and the history of STC. Amongst the points raised in the article included the following:

* Unlike a number of other comics (such as those made by Marvel) any artwork was drawn only after STC was written as a full script.

* Halfway during Robert Corona's tenure, a new licensing agency came up with new guidelines for drawing Sonic, which included the position, orientation, and the number of his spikes varying from each angle, the fact that Sonic's pupils "always had to be touching some part of the outside of his eyes," and the fact that they could never show Sonic's teeth.

* There were restrictions on the amount of violence allowed. A lynching scene in the "Knuckles" series, for instance, was redrawn to place the noose around his body rather than his neck, while in a "Sonic" story a gun was redrawn to have it fire a sucker dart. There was, however, more freedom in regards to other Sega franchises, as characterised by the "Decap Attack" series, where Kitching (in his own words) "got away with murder" and in terms of the story where the brain of the detective was physically removed to erase his memories, Kitching was "absurdly proud of this for some reason."

* The Megadroid mascot was the creation of Richard Burton.

* Nigel Kitching decided to have Robotnik overthrown in the 100th issue because he felt that the fact that Robotnik remaining dictator of Mobius despite the number of times Sonic defeated him sent out a negative message: that evil "can never actually be defeated."

* The news, game, and review sections were removed later on during the comic's run due to budgetary reasons.

* Positive comments were made about the unofficial continuation of STC, STC Online. Nigel Kitching noted that the people at STC Online "are producing rather good continuations of the STC strips." Robert Corona noted that he couldn't say "how impressed I am at the dedication and talent that goes into STC Online," feeling that it was great that "those guys refused to accept the end just because the publisher decided to pull the plug." Andy Diggle was also pleased about STC finding a new home, noting that "It's nice to see that STC actually HAS an online presence."

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Sonic the Comic was a British children's comic published by Fleetway Editions between 1993 and 2002. It was the UK's Sega comic, featuring stories about its mascot Sonic the Hedgehog and related characters, as well as comic strips based on other Sega video games, along with news, reviews, and tips for games released for Sega systems. The original price for Sonic the Comic was 95 pence, but it incrementally increased over the comic's lifespan, until the price had reached £1.50 by the final issue.

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One upon a time, a long time, ago, Grant Morrison wrote the Zoids comic book strip for British publishing spinoff Marvel UK, based on the wind-up modular toyline. Appearing as a back-up strip in the Secret Wars weekly Marvel UK title, it later took the co-lead in the Spider-Man And Zoids weekly comic book. The strip was then cancelled as the toys hadn't taken off like Transformers had. The comic told a tale of warring robots on a planet, with crash-landed humans trying to survive, and work out what was going on with the planet. We got a combination of Aliens, Transformers and Doctor Who.

But there was more. Before the cancellation, it was planned for Zoids to go solo as a series with Morrison and Steve Yeowell, and a full issue was created - but never published. Letterer Richard Starkings, with a long history at Marvel UK is treating us all in lockdown to that unpublished comic book from decades ago. It has previously been posted online - but not at this high resolution - and we only got half of the comic before. It seems now that we will be getting The Full Morrison. Why not follow along?

Grant Morrison would, of course, go on to take similar themes into Animal Man, Doom Patrol, The Invisibles, Arkam Asylum and The Filth. Whether that's the stylised journey of a hero trying to discover his purpose in the wider scale of things, hidden histories in this case literally beneath the surface, alien perspectives on reality, and the spiritual evolution of the main character through the intervention, experience and history of others, as well as the removal of individuality by the machine. Yeowell was Morrison's artistic collaborator on Zenith, Invisibles, Sebastian O and more.

Look for Richard Starkings to keep posting more of these on Twitter as we remain locked down. I wonder if Grant Morrison or Steve Yeowell would care to share their own memories or what once was - and then never saw the day?

Posted in: Comics | Tagged: grant morrison, richard starkings, steve yeowell, Zoids

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The First 6 Pages of Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell's Zoids

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One upon a time, a long time, ago, Grant Morrison wrote the Zoids comic book strip for British publishing spinoff Marvel UK, based on the wind-up modular toyline. Appearing as a back-up strip in the Secret Wars weekly Marvel UK title, it later took the co-lead in the Spider-Man And Zoids weekly comic book.

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books.

Jamie Smart is the bestselling creator of the Bunny vs Monkey and Looshkin comic books. His work regularly appears in The Phoenix comic, a weekly story comic for children. He is also the author/illustrator of the middle - grade series Flember. Jamie has illustrated comics for The Sunday Times, the Beano and the Dandy , and his comic Fish-Head Steve was the first comic to be shortlisted for the Roald Dahl Funny Prize

Photo © Charlotte Knee Photography

Author's Website: http://www.fumboo.com/

Books Authored By Jamie Smart

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books. Jamie Smart is the bestselling creator of the Bunny vs Monkey and Looshkin comic books. His work regularly appears in The Phoenix comic, a weekly story comic for children.

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"There are three doors that I may show you. You will find a different kind of power behind each one..."
Adam has found something incredible in a rubbish dump in London. A mysterious, mythical, magical animal. A TYGER.

And the tyger is in danger.

Adam and his friend Zadie are determined to help, but it isn't just the tyger's life at stake. Their whole world is on the verge of destruction. Can they learn to use their powers before it's too late?

"You wait years and years for a masterpiece, and then one comes along" - Frank Cottrell-Boyce

"Tyger is next level excellent - and Dave McKean's illustrations dovetail perfectly and beautifully with the story. This book is a gem" - Malorie Blackman

"A profound, Blake-inspired novel, that's also a simple, thrilling tale of a boy and a girl and a Tyger. A triumph!" - Jacqueline Wilson

"It will still be read in a hundred years. This sublime, shimmering Blakeian fantasy - for children and adults alike - thrills, enlarges and heals the soul in equal measure. An out and out masterpiece" - Piers Torday

"Readers will fall in love with Tyger... a timeless classic" - Sita Brahmachari

"Tremendous" - The Observer

"Spectacular" - The Times Children's Books Of The Year

"Beautiful and compelling... both a riveting 9+ adventure and a fable layered with meaning" - The Guardian Children's Books Of The Year
TYGER is available from all good bookshops now!
Waterstones
Foyles (signed edition with free art print) Blackwell's Find your local independent bookshop

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"There are three doors that I may show you. You will find a different kind of power behind each one..." Adam has found something incredible in a rubbish dump in London. A mysterious, mythical, magical animal. A TYGER. And the tyger is in danger.

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The Official Website of Raina Telgemeier

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Dav Pilkey has written and illustrated numerous popular, award-winning books for children, including the Captain Underpants and Dumb Bunnies series.

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LoveReading4Kids Says

LoveReading4Kids Says
Longlisted for the UKLA Book Award 2022 ages 11-14 | June 2021 Book of the Month
Set in an unspecified time not too dissimilar to now, and in a country that strongly resembles our own, this tense, gripping graphic novel demonstrates just how quickly civilisation can fall apart. Bea lives with her dad, big sister and little brother; her mother has already had to flee their country, which is in the midst of a civil war, the forces of the state fighting the rebel Free Kingdom movement, with civilians bearing the brunt, enduring food shortages, power cuts and bomb attacks along with casual brutality from both sides. The family know they'll have to leave soon, and the book describes the events that trigger their decision to go and live as refugees. The story describes what it's like to live in a society where trust has collapsed, and where everyone is scared and desperate. But it underlines too the power of family to hold together during the most difficult times and the importance of hope. Powerful and original, it makes for thought-provoking reading, text and illustrations carrying a very strong message.

Brian Conaghan explores similar territory in his prize-winning dystopian novel The Bombs That Brought Us Together while the refugee experience is captured in A M Dassau's
Andrea Reece
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Press Reviews

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View All Editions LoveReading4Kids Says Longlisted for the UKLA Book Award 2022 ages 11-14 | June 2021 Book of the Month Set in an unspecified time not too dissimilar to now, and in a country that strongly resembles our own, this tense, gripping graphic novel demonstrates just how quickly civilisation can fall apart.

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Welcome to the website of UK-based comics writer and illustrator Neill Cameron, creator of the Mega Robo Bros graphic novel series, author of the Awesome Robot Chronicles novel series, and regular contributor to UK weekly children's comic The Phoenix.

To keep up with the latest updates from Neill, you can find him in the following places:

Check out the Neill Cameron shop on bookshop.org for all Neill's books!

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Welcome to the website of UK-based comics writer and illustrator Neill Cameron, creator of the Mega Robo Bros graphic novel series, author of the Awesome Robot Chronicles novel series, and regular contributor to UK weekly children's comic The Phoenix.

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EVIL EMPEROR PENGUIN - Laura Anderson Illustration

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The Evil Emperor Penguin BOOKS published by David Fickling Books ARE YOU READY FOR THE SHINY NEW RELAUNCH OF EVIL EMPEROR PENGUIN?! If you're not, then TOUGH. EEP is BACK in a lovely chuky new format this September! Evil Emperor Penguin:...

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books.

"Super comic-strip space adventures are out of this world! "
View All Editions
LoveReading4Kids Says

LoveReading4Kids Says
September 2021 Book of the Month
It's a space adventure, Jim, but not as we know it! Climb aboard the Star Cat, half-spaceship, half-cat, as it travels the infinite void of space. There you'll meet its well-meaning if frequently malfunctioning crew: Captain Spaceington, Science Officer PLIXX, Pilot and Robot One. They patrol the galaxy fuelled by ice-cream and ever-ready (almost anyway) to save the universe, especially from arch enemy, the four-cornered fiend Dark Rectangle. This chunky collection brings together six of these brilliant stories, first published in the Phoenix Comic, and each one is guaranteed to have you on the edge of your seat one minute, rolling on the floor laughing the next. Space adventures don't come more comic than this, and comic strip adventures don't come better than Star Cat.
Andrea Reece
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Star Cat by James Turner & Yasmin Sheikh

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books. "Super comic-strip space adventures are out of this world! " View All Editions LoveReading4Kids Says September 2021 Book of the Month It's a space adventure, Jim, but not as we know it!

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My name is Jamie (it's true).

I'm an author/illustrator and the creator of the best-selling Frostheart series, published by Puffin Books. Frostheart was one of the biggest selling debuts of 2020, and has been translated into many languages around the world, was shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award and Lancashire Fantastic Book Awards in 2020, got a starred review from Kirkus,and had the rare privelage of being the Waterstone's Book of the Month twice in a row, if you can believe such a thing. Frostheart was my first foray into writing fiction (and hopefully not my last!).

Look! I'm aboard the deck of the Frostheart!

I've also had the pleasure of illustrating books for some incredible authors including Danny Wallace (our Hamish series was shortlisted for the Laugh Out Loud Awards), Enid Blyton, Philip Ardagh, Phil Earle, Timothy Knapman, Guy Bass, Barry Hutchison and Georgia Pritchett (the Wilf the Mighty Worrier series was also shortlisted for the Laugh Out Loud award!) I started my career working with the fantasic Phoenix Comic on my comedy-adventure series Cogg and Sprokit.

The first book I ever professionally illustrated was Atomic! Vile's Vengeance by Guy Bass (published by Scholastic), way back in 2012. Ahhh...how time flies. It was super fun to work on, with whole comicbook sections dispersed amongst the text!

My clients include: Puffin Books, Viking Books, Simon & Schuster, Nosy Crow, The National Trust, Hachette Children's Book, Hodder, David Fickling Books, Quercus, Little Brown, Scholastic, Harper Collins, Macmillan, Piccadilly Press, Derwent Pencils.

I studied illustration (BA Hons) at the Arts Institute at Bournemouth and graduated in 2008, going on to win a High Commendation in the Macmillan Children's Book Award.

Like most authors and illustrators, I've loved telling stories and drawing pictures since I was old enough to hold a crayon. I often practiced my craft on the walls of my house, and whilst my parents were very supportive of my artistic ambitions, they were not too thrilled with my chosed medium in this case. I once drew a whole 100 page comic based on Star Wars when I was eight, and wrote a massive fantasy epic when I was twelve (which basically ripped off the entire plot of Final Fantasy VII).

Here's some quick yet vitally important facts you may not know about me:

I am half English, half Venezuelan.

My Spanish is rudimentry at best (much to my eternal shame). Yes, that is the ding of Duo Lingo you can hear in the background.

I have 140 pens, and only three of them work.

I have five sketchbooks which are so nice I'm too intimidated to draw one thing in them.
My hair grows at a super human speed.
My 'beard' does not.
I am a prolific sleep-walker and sleep-talker. Once, when I was asleep, I managed to pull myself up into a spooky attic without using a ladder.
I hate butter.

I love peanut butter.

I love playing video games.

I always have to watch the credits in full once I finish a game. I don't know, it's a thing.

I live in North London, UK, and it's very nice, although I'm pretty sure my home is haunted.

I hope you enjoy looking through my website!

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About - Jamie Littler - Author/Illustrator

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My name is Jamie (it's true). I'm an author/illustrator and the creator of the best-selling Frostheart series, published by Puffin Books.

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Mark's Top Pick for Younger Readers (6+)

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Mark's Top Pick for Younger Readers (6+)

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Lucy's recommendation (Older Teen/Adult) - Tillie Walden

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Lucy's recommendation (Older Teen/Adult) - Tillie Walden

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This link takes you to On a Sunbeam which can be read online for free

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Get recommended reads, deals, and more from Hachette

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Imogen Russell Williams, The Guardian

A gleefully energetic graphic novel for five-years-olds and above... Acid blasts of colour and surreal dialogue are sure to prompt ear-to-ear grins.

Joe Gordon, Down the Tubes

An absolutely joyous delight to read, for kids and for adults who still know how to speak to their inner child, it will entertain them, make them laugh, and as a bonus it weaves in lessons about friendship and compassion and dealing with emotions too. I'm highly recommending this to anyone with young readers looking for their next comics fix.

SUNSHINE in book form. It's FUN, frolics, adventure, kindness, friendship, enchantment and emotional intelligence all propelled towards you at high speed in bright, bold GORGEOUS graphic novel format!

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books.

Jamie Smart is the bestselling creator of the Bunny vs Monkey and Looshkin comic books. His work regularly appears in The Phoenix comic, a weekly story comic for children. He is also the author/illustrator of the middle - grade series Flember. Jamie has illustrated comics for The Sunday Times, the Beano and the Dandy , and his comic Fish-Head Steve was the first comic to be shortlisted for the Roald Dahl Funny Prize

Photo © Charlotte Knee Photography

Author's Website: http://www.fumboo.com/

Books Authored By Jamie Smart

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books. Jamie Smart is the bestselling creator of the Bunny vs Monkey and Looshkin comic books. His work regularly appears in The Phoenix comic, a weekly story comic for children.

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The Official Website of Raina Telgemeier

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Dav Pilkey has written and illustrated numerous popular, award-winning books for children, including the Captain Underpants and Dumb Bunnies series.

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O ptic Nerve 14 brings Adrian Tomine's multifaceted, expressive cartooning to a new peak with two stories and a bonus autobiographical strip. "Killing and Dying" is about a father's struggles to be supportive: it centers on parenthood, mortality, and stand-up comedy.

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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GARFIELD COMPLETE WORKS TP VOL 02 1980-1981

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Neil's Top Pick - Larry Marder's Beanworld

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Neil's Top Pick - Larry Marder's Beanworld

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Read 5 reviews from the world’s largest community for readers. undefined

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Contributions by Bart Beaty, Jenny Blenk, Ben Bolling, Peter E. Carlson, Johnathan Flowers, Antero Garcia, Dale Jacobs, Ebony Flowers Kalir, James Kelley, Susan E. Kirtley, Frederik Byrn Køhlert, John…

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Chapter 1. Introducing Visual Language

SECTION 1: STRUCTURE OF VISUAL LANGUAGE

Chapter 2. The Visual Lexicon, Part 1: Visual morphology

Chapter 3. The Visual Lexicon, Part 2: Panels and Constructions

Chapter 4. Visual Language Grammar: Narrative Structure

Chapter 5. Navigation of External Compositional Structure

Chapter 6. Cognition of Visual Language

SECTION 2: VISUAL LANGUAGE ACROSS THE WORLD

Chapter 7. American Visual Language

Chapter 8. Japanese Visual Language

Chapter 9. Central Australian Visual Language

Chapter 10. The Principle of Equivalence

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Chapter 1. Introducing Visual Language SECTION 1: STRUCTURE OF VISUAL LANGUAGE Chapter 2. The Visual Lexicon, Part 1: Visual morphology Chapter 3. The Visual Lexicon, Part 2: Panels and Constructions Chapter 4. Visual Language Grammar: Narrative Structure Chapter 5. Navigation of External Compositional Structure Chapter 6.

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**Nominated for the 2021 Eisner Award for Best Academic/Scholarly Work**
Drawings and sequential images are so pervasive in contemporary society that we may take their understanding for granted. But how transparent are they really, and how universally are they understood?

Combining recent advances from linguistics, cognitive science, and clinical psychology, this book argues that visual narratives involve greater complexity and require a lot more decoding than widely thought. Although increasingly used beyond the sphere of entertainment as materials in humanitarian, educational, and experimental contexts, Neil Cohn demonstrates that their universal comprehension cannot be assumed. Instead, understanding a visual language requires a fluency that is contingent on exposure and practice with a graphic system. Bringing together a rich but scattered literature on how people comprehend, and learn to comprehend, a sequence of images, this book coalesces research from a diverse range of fields into a broader interdisciplinary view of visual narrative to ask: Who Understands Comics?

1. An Assumption of Universality
2. Comprehending Visual Narratives
3. Cross-cultural Diversity of Visual Languages
4. Cross-cultural Comprehension of Visual Languages
5. Development of Visual Narrative Comprehension
6. Variation Between Fluent Comprehenders
7. Visual Narrative Comprehension in Clinical Populations
8. Graphic Narratives and Filmed Narratives
9. Visual Language Fluency
References
Index

Published

12 Nov 2020

Format

Paperback

Edition

1st

Extent

256

ISBN

9781350156043

Imprint

Bloomsbury Academic

Illustrations

40 bw illus

Dimensions

234 x 156 mm

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing

Cohn's approach to the book permits a complete, enriching and captivating overview of the issues discussed.

Visual Communication

Who Understands Comics? provides a comprehensive and remarkably accessible account of contemporary theoretical perspectives and behavioral and neuroscience research on visual narratives. ... the promise of this volume is that it will inspire more research, certainly in the next generation of scholars. Cohn has mastered the ability to convey complex information in a straightforward and compelling manner, ... It is a must read for anyone conducting research on visual narratives, interested in doing so, or simply waning to learn about a fascinating topic of research within cognitive science.

The Journal of Pragmatics

Cohn's book takes many significant steps towards untangling a host of potentially conflicting ideas about how communication in the medium of comics works, for whom it works, where and when. These results, and the sheer breadth of literature that Cohn draws on to demonstrate his points, should consequently make the book required reading not only in the more specific 'application' areas that Cohn opens up for discussion but also for the field of visual communication as a whole.

Studies in Comics

From an empirical point of view and a comics studies perspective open to corpus-based and experimental analyses, the documented work can hardly be surpassed in systematicity and innovation, while at the same time standing on firm theoretical and methodological grounds in long-established disciplines.

Projections: The Journal for Movies and Mind

Building on a wealth of data, Cohn bolsters his claim that understanding sequential images is analogous to learning a language. Impressively complementing theoretical expertise and literature reviews with his own experimental research, Who Understands Comics? provides astute insights into visual interpretation cross-culturally, developmentally, and neurologically - thereby moreover benefiting cognition studies.

Charles Forceville, Associate Professor in Media Studies, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands

McCloud helped us understand the comics form, but Cohn delves even deeper, synthesizing diverse theories and empirical research data to explore the factors (culture, neurodiversity, etc.) that determine how readers engage with, comprehend, and react to comics.

Randy Duncan, Director of the Center for Comics Studies, Henderson State University, USA

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Nominated for the 2021 Eisner Award for Best Academic/Scholarly Work** Drawings and sequential images are so pervasive in contemporary society that we may take their understanding for granted. But how transparent are they really, and how universally are they understood?

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President

A risk-taker with an unerring instinct for success, Todd McFarlane has made a multi-million dollar empire using those skills and along the way he and his companies have received nearly a hundred national and international awards, including two Emmys, a Grammy, and MTV Music Awards for his producer/director roles.

McFarlane became a true comic book superstar for his record setting work on Marvel Comics' Spider-Man franchise, where he co-created the anti-hero Venom. The Sony Pictures' Venom film starring Tom Hardy set an all-time record for largest film opening in October and was #1 at the box office its first two weeks of release.

This year, McFarlane has announced an ensemble of award-winning talent for his upcoming Spawn movie: Casting Academy Award and Golden Globe winner Jamie Foxx (Ray, Django Unchained) to play Spawn and Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner (Hurt Locker, The Town, Wind River) to play police detective "Twitch" Williams.

This new Spawn film will be a gritty, R-rated re-imagining of the character and marks McFarlane's feature film directorial debut. Academy Award nominee Jason Blum and his BlumhouseProductions, the force behind recent hits Get Out, Split and Halloween, are attached to produce.

McFarlane also co-founded in 1992-and serves as current President of-Image Comics. Image has been the third largest comic publisher in North America the past 26 years (behind Marvel and DC Comics). In 1994, McFarlane founded the international award-winning McFarlane Toys-now one of North America's top action figure manufacturers, boasting over 150 licenses (including the recently announced Fortnite license) during that time.

Artistically, McFarlane's impact visually on the look of Spider-Man (while working at Marvel in the 1990s) can still be seen today. And a single page of McFarlane's original art from an issue of Amazing Spider-Man sold for a record-smashing $657,250. Then his first issue for Image Comics, called Spawn, sold an unprecedented 1.7 million copies for an independent comic. Since its debut, Spawn has continued to be a fan favorite title around the world. Spawn is published in 12 languages and sold in 37 countries. The comic became an Emmy Award-Winning animated series on HBO and a New Line Cinema feature film.

McFarlane founded the international award-winning McFarlane Toys-now one of North America's top action figure manufacturers. A whirlwind of expansion in McFarlane's companies followed: more comics, action figures, and award-winning entertainment projects which boast over 150 licenses. McFarlane Toys is known for making the best toys of the world's pop-culture obsessions including the newly launched Fortnite and roleplay line.

Related News

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President A risk-taker with an unerring instinct for success, Todd McFarlane has made a multi-million dollar empire using those skills and along the way he and his companies have received nearly a hundred national and international awards, including two Emmys, a Grammy, and MTV Music Awards for...

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GARFIELD COMPLETE WORKS TP VOL 02 1980-1981

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Perfect for Ager 9+

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FREE UK delivery for schools on orders containing at least one paid item.

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FREE UK delivery for schools on orders containing at least one paid item.

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For Age 7+

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Eisner Award Winning cartoonist and teacher. Creator of the Mr. Wolf's Class graphic novel series from Graphix (Scholastic)

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Perfect for Age 6+

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Imogen Russell Williams, The Guardian

A gleefully energetic graphic novel for five-years-olds and above... Acid blasts of colour and surreal dialogue are sure to prompt ear-to-ear grins.

Joe Gordon, Down the Tubes

An absolutely joyous delight to read, for kids and for adults who still know how to speak to their inner child, it will entertain them, make them laugh, and as a bonus it weaves in lessons about friendship and compassion and dealing with emotions too. I'm highly recommending this to anyone with young readers looking for their next comics fix.

SUNSHINE in book form. It's FUN, frolics, adventure, kindness, friendship, enchantment and emotional intelligence all propelled towards you at high speed in bright, bold GORGEOUS graphic novel format!

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FREE UK delivery on all orders!

Thanks to an unfortunately tasty-looking radioactive garden slug, eleven-year-old Murdo McLeod is now the world's worst superhero. His two powers are pretty unique: the first is sliding up walls. Quite slowly. The second is secreting slippery slime from his skin. (Yes, just as disgusting as it sounds.)

In a Scotland full of awesome superheroes, Slugboy has a lot to prove. No one wants help fighting bad guys from someone with a horrible habit of (quite literally) messing things up. He's so underrated, in fact, that when an evil mastermind devises a plan to capture all the other superheroes, Slugboy isn't even on his list.

Now, Slugboy has to use his not-so-super and oh-so-gross abilities to free the other superheroes and save the world. Let's hope he doesn't slip up.

Reviews

'Annotated with occasional cartoon words, ominious interludes, and bottom trumps bio pages with awesome or evil ratiings, this is bound to amuse and draw in fans of comic book characters. By the end you'll be rooting for Slugboy.'
-- School Librarian Association

'This was a funny book which was immediately appealing because of its cover. I liked the Scottish element; you don't find many stories set in Scotland, so that was pretty cool! The book was easy to read and I think other teenagers would enjoy it too.'
-- Teen Titles

Author

Mark A. Smith was born in Dundee, where he works as a primary school teacher. He lives in Fife and spends most of his spare time reading comics and writing stories. He is highly competitive but has yet to find a sport he's actually good...

read more >

Illustrator

Darren Gate is the 2016 winner of the Kelpies Design and Illustration Prize. He is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Glasgow.

read more >

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Slugboy Saves the World - DiscoverKelpies

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FREE UK delivery on all orders! Thanks to an unfortunately tasty-looking radioactive garden slug, eleven-year-old Murdo McLeod is now the world's worst superhero. His two powers are pretty unique: the first is sliding up walls. Quite slowly. The second is secreting slippery slime from his skin. (Yes, just as disgusting as it sounds.)

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Steve Ditko, who has died aged 90, was the artist who brought Spider-Man and Doctor Strange to life, one of the three crucial creators of the Marvel explosion that redefined comic books in the 1960s. The trio - Ditko, the writer Stan Lee and the artist Jack Kirby - created and refined the iconic characters who moved from featuring in 12-cent comics to dominating film screens in productions costing hundreds of millions of dollars.

Like Kirby's, Ditko's work was stylised, but where Kirby's square-jawed characters' power exploded through the panels, Ditko's characters stretched through them, their faces almost cartoonishly expressive. He was the perfect artist to combine the grace of Spider-Man with the nerdish insecurity of his alter ego, the teenager Peter Parker.

Spider-Man was Lee's idea and he first gave it to Kirby to develop. Unhappy with the result, he passed it on to Ditko, who came up with the costume, powers and back-story. He was an immediate hit when he debuted in Amazing Fantasy 15 in 1962. Marvel stories were all produced in much the same manner. The writer, in the early days almost always Lee, provided the artist with a plot line, sometimes just an idea, which the artist turned into a story. Lee then added dialogue to the finished panel art.

A 1965 issue of The Amazing Spider-Man, illustrated by Steve Ditko. Photograph: Marvel

Shortly into the Spider-Man series, Ditko would receive additional credit as "plotter", and eventually Lee was willing to cede "co-creator" status to Ditko, including in the credits of the Spider-Man films. There are reports of Ditko having received royalties from the films, but if so the amounts were not large.

Doctor Strange came along the following year. Ditko's conception of Stephen Strange, the surgeon whose hands are crippled in a car crash, and who, seeking a cure, becomes "the Master of the Mystic Arts", led to a character whose greatest battles were fought on a spiritual plane while his human body reposed back in our world. Villains were mind-bending, such as the Dread Dormammu, whose head and hands were flames, or Eternity, whose silhouette figure encompassed all universes, and who starred in an unprecedented 17-issue story arc that culminated with Strange and Dormammu joining forces. The Marvel audience was expanding, and the hippy young of the 60s reading Doctor Strange felt Ditko must be one of them.

In reality, Ditko was anything but. He was born in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, where his father Stephen was a master carpenter at a steel mill and his mother Anna was a homemaker. His father loved newspaper comic strips, and Ditko's early influences were Prince Valiant, Batman and Will Eisner's The Spirit. After leaving school in 1945, Ditko enlisted in the army, where he served in occupied Germany, drawing comics for the army paper.

In 1950 he used the GI bill to enrol in the Cartoonists and Illustrators School (now the School of Visual Arts) in New York, where he studied under Jerry Robinson. Robinson had drawn Plastic-Man, whose flexible motion is apparent in Ditko's drawing. Robinson also created Batman's most famous villain The Joker, whose exaggerations are pure Ditko.

Robinson was committed to getting work for his students, and Ditko soon joined the (Joe) Simon and Kirby studio, primarily assisting Mort Meskin. His first story appeared in an obscure comic called Daring Love in 1954, at which point he started working for Charlton Comics, published in Derby, Connecticut, about 90 miles from New York, and in 1956 with Atlas, the precursor of Marvel run by Martin Goodman. Atlas comics were collections of strange mystery tales; Ditko's expressive figures and Lee's clever writing were soon giving their stories pride of place.

The final page of The Amazing Spider-Man 33, 1966 Photograph: Marvel

With the Marvel renaissance in full flower in 1966, Ditko produced one of the great sequences in comic art, for Spider-Man 33, The Final Chapter. With Spider-Man buried under heavy machinery and unable to save his Aunt May, Ditko's panels grow smaller; then, as his will to live drives him, they grow larger again until the final full-page drawing in which he sets himself free.

But at his creative peak, Ditko abruptly left Marvel. The reasons may have included a creative battle over a storyline in which Lee wanted The Green Goblin to turn out to be Parker's best friend's father, while Ditko wanted him to be a random character; Lee's instincts proved correct. That highlighted Lee and Ditko's polar opposites of character, described by the comics writer Neil Gaiman as "swinging Stan and the impossibly uptight Ditko". The liberal Lee was quick to spot trends and jump on them, while Ditko was already a libertarian follower of Ayn Rand's Objectivism.

Ditko moved back to Charlton, where page rates were low but he was given more freedom. He revived older characters including the Blue Beetle, who had first appeared in the late 30s, and Captain Atom, which he and Charlton's main scripter Joe Gill introduced in 1960. In 1967 Ditko created The Question, a newsman, Vic Sage, who dons a spray-on faceless mask and fights ruthlessly against crime, driven by the tenets of Objectivism. An even more extreme version of the character, called Mr A, convinced of a black and white world of good and evil, appeared in Witzend, the artist Wally Wood's self-published magazine.

These characters were the inspiration for Rorschach in Alan Moore's Watchmen; Moore's character takes Ditko's to their logical conclusion. Moore says he asked Ditko if he had seen Rorschach, to which Ditko replied: "Oh yes, he's like Mr A, only insane."

Doctor Strange's greatest battles were fought on a spiritual plane while his human body reposed back in our world. Illustration: Marvel

Ditko worked with the writer Archie Goodwin on stories for the black-and-white magazines Creepy and Eerie, which captured the flavour of classic EC comics. In 1968 he moved to Marvel's great rival DC. His two major creations were Ditko at his obsessive peak: Hawk and Dove featured two "heroes" whose philosophies reflected the antiwar movement, with Ditko's sympathies lying obviously with Hawk, while The Creeper, with his garish costume and hysterical laughter (a nod to The Joker, perhaps) might have been the weirdest superhero ever.

This marked the end of Ditko's greatest mainstream success. In 1975 Goodman tried to start a new version of Atlas, for which Ditko and Goodwin created The Destructor, with Wood inking Ditko's pencils, but it was short-lived. For the next two decades he worked for almost everyone in the business, including new independent publishers such as Pacific and Eclipse, but his most notable creation was probably the light-hearted Squirrel Girl, written by Will Murray, for Marvel in 1992.

Retiring from the industry in 1998, Ditko teamed up with Robin Snyder to publish new work and collections of his older material in small press editions. He also contributed essays to Snyder's fanzine The Comics. Ditko was famously reclusive. In 2007, Jonathan Ross attempted to track him down for the TV documentary In Search of Steve Ditko for BBC Four. It climaxed with Ross and Gaiman getting 25 minutes, off camera, with Ditko in his office. But Ross would not tell his TV audience what they discussed. "If you don't like that, tough," he said.

Ditko was found dead in his flat in New York on 29 June, having suffered a heart attack at some time in the previous two days.

Stephen John Ditko, artist, born 2 November 1927; died c29 June 2018

This article was amended on 10 July 2018. Squirrel Girl was created for Marvel rather than DC.

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Steve Ditko, who has died aged 90, was the artist who brought Spider-Man and Doctor Strange to life, one of the three crucial creators of the Marvel explosion that redefined comic books in the 1960s.

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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We collect information from you when you register on our site or place an order. When ordering or registering on our site, as appropriate, you may be asked to enter your: name, e-mail address or mailing address.

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X LIVES OF WOLVERINE X DEATHS OF WOLVERINE TP

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Beano | Quizzes, Games, Jokes and Comic Fun for Kids

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Take the best quizzes, play free online games, find hilarious jokes and pranks. The official home of funny stuff for kids, Beano comic, Dennis and Gnasher.

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Emma by Kaoru Mori  - Rebecca's Top Pick

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Emma by Kaoru Mori  - Rebecca's Top Pick

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This is for older teen and adult readers (16+)

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Emma, Vol. 1 ebook by Kaoru Mori - Rakuten Kobo

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Read "Emma, Vol. 1" by Kaoru Mori available from Rakuten Kobo. Calling upon his former governess, William Jones, gentleman, is startled when his knock is answered by an uncommonly bea...

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Age 10 +

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Buy from our bookstore and 25% of the cover price will be given to a school of your choice to buy more books.
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LoveReading4Kids Says

LoveReading4Kids Says

For fans of Click and Brave, this touching coming-of-age middle grade graphic novel debut follows an autistic girl who finds friendship where she least expects it and learns to express her true self in a world where everyone defines her by her differences.
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Speak Up! (ISBN: 9780063081192) For fans of Click and Brave, this touching coming-of-age middle grade graphic novel debut follows an autistic girl who finds friendship where she least expects it and learns to express her true self in a world where everyone...

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Cosplay is a wonderful activity for all levels of craftsmanship from buying all of your costume from a shop to hand making every item and all combinations in between, then transforming yourself into that character.

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London Comic Con Spring - Olympia London 4-5 March 23

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Cosplay is a wonderful activity for all levels of craftsmanship from buying all of your costume from a shop to hand making every item and all combinations in between, then transforming yourself into that character.

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Thought Bubble is the Yorkshire Comic Art Festival! A week long celebration of comics, illustration and more spread across the whole of Yorkshire, finishing in a huge two day comic convention in Harrogate. We use our festival week to promote the power of comics! We believe they can inspire, educate and bring people together like no other medium, so whether you're a long-time fan of comic art or have never picked up a graphic novel before, you'll find something for you.

Thought Bubble is not for profit with our chosen charity being Barnardo's!

Want to find out more?

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Thought Bubble is the Yorkshire Comic Art Festival! A week long celebration of comics, illustration and more spread across the whole of Yorkshire, finishing in a huge two day comic convention in Harrogate. We use our festival week to promote the power of comics!

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Online comics for children

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Hiveworks Comics is a webcomic and graphic novel publisher. Formed with creators and readers in mind, all comics are free to read with pages posted every day.

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Contains comics for all age ranges

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I'm the Queen in This Life

The Etruscan Kingdom is stained with blood when the king's illegitimate son Cesare conspires with his fiancée Ariadne to usurp the throne from his half-brother Alfonso. Despite Ariadne's devotion to the new king, her faith is shattered when she is betrayed by him and eventually murdered by her own sister, who wishes to be queen. To her surprise, Ariadne finds herself sent back in time to her 17-year-old self. As she navigates the perils and opportunities of palace intrigue, Ariadne must make the most of her guile and grit to ensure that her tragic future does not repeat itself.

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WEBTOON is home to thousands of stories across 23 genres including romance, comedy, action, fantasy, and horror. Read comics, webcomics, manga, and manhwa online or download the WEBTOON app.

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Age 13 +

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Suitable for age 7+

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POKEMON GRAPHIC COLLECTION SC VOL 01 BATTLE WITH THE ULTRA BEAST

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Shubeik Lubeik  (Your Wish is my Command'- Deena Mohamed

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Meher's Top Pick: Your Wish is my Command

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Meher's Top Pick: Your Wish is my Command

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A brilliantly original debut graphic novel that imagines a fantastical alternate Cairo where wishes really do come true. Shubeik Lubeik -a fairy tale rhyme that means "your wish is my command" in Arabic-is the story of three people who are navigating a world where wishes are literally for sale. Available January 10th, 2023 from Pantheon Books.

Three wishes that are sold at an unassuming kiosk in Cairo link Aziza, Nour, and Shokry, changing their perspectives as well as their lives. Aziza learned early that life can be hard, but when she loses her husband and manages to procure a wish, she finds herself fighting bureaucracy and inequality for the right to have-and make-that wish. Nour is a privileged college student who secretly struggles with depression and must decide whether or not to use their wish to try to "fix" this depression, and then figure out how to do it. And, finally, Shokry must grapple with his religious convictions as he decides how to help a friend who doesn't want to use their wish.

Although their stories are fantastical-featuring talking donkeys, dragons, and cars that can magically avoid traffic-each of these people grapples with the very real challenge of trying to make their most deeply held desires come true.

"[A] masterpiece . . . While Mohamed's narratives are memorably entertaining and particularly insightful-exploring haves versus have-nots struggles, gender inequity, police brutality-even more astounding is her fluid, sweeping art . . . Mohamed's stupendously dynamic visuals will prove addictive, moving all too swiftly toward a rewarding, resonating end."
-Booklist (starred)
"The book is exceptionally imaginative while also being wonderfully grounded in touching human relationships, existential quandaries, and familiar geopolitical and socio-economic dynamics. Mohamed's art balances perfectly between cartoon and realism, powerfully conveying emotions, and her strong, clean lines gorgeously depict everything from an anguished face to an ornate bottle . . . Mohamed has a great sense of humor, which comes out in footnotes and casual asides throughout. Immensely enjoyable."
"Brilliantly original . . . Richly detailed . . . Mohamed's bold, expressive illustrations split the difference between cartoon and realism, with brightly colored details . . . These characters' struggles and successes are equally heartbreaking and uplifting, creating a wholly satisfying reading experience. Our wish is Mohamed's command."
-BookPage (starred)

"Splendid . . . Lithe, brushy black-and-white art is broken with color pages of infographic-style interludes. . . This grand fairy tale announces Mohamed as a promising new voice amid a renaissance of contemporary Middle Eastern cartoonists."
-Publishers Weekly

"Mohamed builds a rich and harrowing world -and finds every place a fascinating story might be hiding."
-Mattie Lubchansky, editor of The Nib

"Shubeik Lubeik is easily the most subversive book I've read in decades! Deena Mohamed has much to say about the human condition, but she does so with effortless grace. Superb cartooning, and brimming with intelligence both emotional and intellectual -all while maintaining an incredible sense of humor -Shubeik Lubeik embodies the holy grail of comix-making that few graphic novels have ever managed to achieve. A wonderous accomplishment and important addition to the culture."
-Ganzeer, author/artist of The Solar Grid

"A powder keg of human emotions and desires, cleverly delivered by its fantastical premise. Shubeik Lubeik investigates human nature with unflinching grace, carefully thought out worldbuilding, and characters so moving that they have found a permanent place in my heart. This book makes me believe that I too could buy a wish from the corner store."
-Rhea Ewing, author of Fine: A Comic About Gender

"An astonishing first book by an immensely talented young artist and writer. The settings and stories cover decades of a history that is fantastical but feels familiar. Every page moves boldly with action and energy, even as the characters wrestle with internal and deeply moral conflicts. Deena Mohamed is one to watch." Thi Bui, author of The Best We Could Do

"In Shubeik Lubeik, Deena Mohamed plays a dangerous game that revives monsters and angels from our secret wishes and dreams. A masterpiece and one of the most iconic graphic novels of North Africa, where the innocence of the past meets the nightmares of the present."
- Ahmed Naji, author of Rotten Evidence

Product Details

Hardcover | $35.00
Published by Pantheon
Jan 10, 2023 | 528 Pages | 7-1/4 x 10-1/4
ISBN 9781524748418

The UK Edition of the English translation of Shubeik Lubeik is under the title "Your Wish is My Command" and published by Granta Books, also available starting January 10th, 2023.

Shubeik Lubeik in Arabic

Shubeik Lubeik was originally released as a trilogy of graphic novels in Arabic, published by Dar el Mahrousa in 2018, 2019 and 2021 respectively. The English translation is the collected volume of all three books, with some additional material.

For more information on the Arabic graphic novels and where to purchase them, please check out the below links.

Translations

Currently, rights to Shubeik Lubeik have been sold in French, Italian and Farsi. Further details to come!

frequently asked questions about purchasing shubeik lubeik

Who translated the English version of Shubeik Lubeik?

It's translated by the author, Deena Mohamed (me).

Does the English version of Shubeik Lubeik contain all 3 Arabic parts?

Yes, the English translation is the collection of the Arabic trilogy.

Is the English translation different from the Arabic?

The story of English version is the same as the Arabic, but it has some additional pages and material.

Will the English translation of Shubeik Lubeik be available in Egypt?

Unfortunately, I don't know. It may be available from bookstores that import English books, like Diwan, but you may also have to request it (it will also probably be very expensive!)

Is there a difference between the UK and US versions of Shubeik Lubeik?

The only difference is that the UK version has a different title ("Your Wish is My Command") and a different, noticeably off-center cover. There is no difference in the interiors.

In "Shubeik Lubeik," the Egyptian comic artist Deena Mohamed draws on the Arabic fairy-tale canon to create a satire of the global extraction economy.

Egyptian graphic novelist Deena Mohamed talks about her debut urban-fantasy trilogy Shubeik Lubeik ("Your Wish is My Command"). A product of playful self-translation, it's coming to English as a single volume. It will be unbottled by Pantheon (US) and Granta (UK) on January 10, 2023.

In 2013, when she was 18 years old, Deena Mohamed, an Egyptian illustrator and writer, created a webcomic that went viral. Qahera features a Muslim superhero who can detect misogyny, racism, and Islamophobia with her super-hearing powers. In January, Pantheon will publish Mohamed's debut graphic novel, Shubeik Lubeik (Arabic for "your wish is my command"), the first title in a gorgeously drawn fantasy trilogy set in a Cairo, where wishes are for sale at the corner kiosk. [continue reading]

Our lives pivot around our dreams, which often tantalize just out of reach. What would you do if you knew your deepest desires hung in the dregs of a vial sold at your local kiosk? The author of the Shubeik Lubeik trilogy spun this premise into a fantastical, highly nuanced tale. [continue reading]

Four women comic book artists from the Arab World, Tunisian Nadia Khiari, Lebanese Lena Merhej, Moroccan Zainab Fasiki and Egyptian Deena Mohamed open the doors of their studios and tell us about their experiences and their struggles. Ten years after the beginning of the Arab Spring how can they express themselves in the medium as Arab women?

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A brilliantly original debut graphic novel that imagines a fantastical alternate Cairo where wishes really do come true. Shubeik Lubeik -a fairy tale rhyme that means "your wish is my command" in Arabic-is the story of three people who are navigating a world where wishes are literally for sale.

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Taking inspiration from Riz Ahmed's 2017 speech in the House of Commons on diversity on screen, the Riz Test is five criteria to measure how Muslims are portrayed on Film and TV.
The Test:
If the film/show stars at least one character who is identifiably Muslim (by ethnicity, language or clothing) - is the character...

1. Talking about, the victim of, or the perpetrator of terrorism?

2. Presented as irrationally angry?

3. Presented as superstitious, culturally backwards or anti-modern?

4. Presented as a threat to a Western way of life?

5. If the character is male, is he presented as misogynistic? or if female, is she presented as oppressed by her male counterparts?

If the answer for any of the above is Yes, then the Film/ TV Show fails the test.

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Measuring the portrayal of Muslims on Film and TV THE RIZ TEST Learn More

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A comic for adult readers

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This YA comic follows 14-year-old Aiza, who trains to become a knight for a war-torn empire while hiding her true background as a girl from conquered lands.

Born a second-class citizen, Aiza has always dreamt of becoming a Knight. It's the highest military honor in the once-great Bayt-Sajji Empire, and as a member of the Ornu people, her only path to full citizenship.

Now, ravaged by famine, Bayt-Sajji finds itself on the brink of war once again. This means Aiza can finally enlist to the competitive Squire training program.

The camp is nothing like she imagined. Hiding her Ornu status in order to blend in, Aiza must navigate friendships, rivalries, and rigorous training under the merciless General Hende. As the pressure mounts, Aiza realizes that the "greater good" Bayt-Sajji's military promises might not include her, and that the recruits might be in more danger than she ever imagined.

Color assistance by Lynette Wong
Flat Colors by Mara Jayne Carpenter

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This YA comic follows 14-year-old Aiza, who trains to become a knight for a war-torn empire while hiding her true background as a girl from conquered lands. Born a second-class citizen, Aiza has always dreamt of becoming a Knight.

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Web comic for adult readers

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Qahera is a bilingual English/Arabic webcomic started in 2013 starring a female, visibly Muslim, Egyptian superheroine that tackles light and generally non-controversial social issues, such as Islamophobia and misogyny. The comic initially began as a joke posted on Tumblr and has since been featured on multiple local and international outlets, such as the BBC, Foreign Policy and the Washington Post and is on the cover of two books by the Harvard Press. It also won the award for Best Digital Comic Series in the first edition of the Cairo Comix Festival (2015.)

You can read the webcomic in its entirety for free on its website.

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Qahera is a bilingual English/Arabic webcomic started in 2013 starring a female, visibly Muslim, Egyptian superheroine that tackles light and generally non-controversial social issues, such as Islamophobia and misogyny.

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Lucas' Top Pick 🌟 The Girl from the Otherside

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Lucas' Top Pick 🌟 The Girl from the Otherside

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Connect with Lucas

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Tweets by lucasjmaxwell

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Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA)

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Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA)

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Japanese Manga, Anime, and Culture for the School and Teen Librarian Crowd

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fyredrake.net ~ anime : manga : illustrations : comics ~ by sonia leong

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2022 EVENT SCHEDULE:
DEVON COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 5-6 FEB
WALES COMIC CON TELFORD TAKEOVER, 2-3 APR
COMIC CON WORLD BLACKPOOL, 7-8 MAY
PLYMOUTH COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 14 MAY
LONDON MCM COMIC CON, 27-29 MAY
COMICS SALOPIA, SHREWSBURY, 25-26 JUN
MACC-POW MACCLESFIELD, 2-3 JUL
LONDON FILM AND COMIC CON, 8-10 JUL
BEACHSIDE COMIC CON CLEETHORPES, 23-24 JUL
CORNWALL COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 30-31 JUL
INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF GLASS, 27 AUG
NORCON, NORWICH, 25-26 SEPT
LONDON MCM COMIC CON, TBC OCT
KENT COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 6 NOV
WALES COMIC CON TELFORD TAKEOVER, 3-4 DEC

If you would like to link to my website, you can use a text link or any of these banners! Thanks!

~

images/website copyright © Sonia Leong 2003-2022 unless otherwise stated

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fyredrake.net ~ anime : manga : illustrations : comics ~ by sonia leong

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2022 EVENT SCHEDULE: DEVON COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 5-6 FEB WALES COMIC CON TELFORD TAKEOVER, 2-3 APR COMIC CON WORLD BLACKPOOL, 7-8 MAY PLYMOUTH COMIC CON GAMING FESTIVAL, 14 MAY LONDON MCM COMIC CON, 27-29 MAY COMICS SALOPIA, SHREWSBURY, 25-26 JUN MACC-POW MACCLESFIELD, 2-3 JUL LONDON FILM AND COMIC CON,

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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LIGHTFALL GN VOL 01 THE GIRL AND THE GALDURIAN

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LIGHTFALL GN VOL 01 THE GIRL AND THE GALDURIAN

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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When is a summer vacation not really a summer vacation?

Sunny Lewin has been packed off to Florida to live with her grandfather for the summer. At first she thought Florida might be fun -- it is the home of Disney World, after all. But the place where Gramps lives is no amusement park. It's full of . . . old people. Really old people.

Luckily, Sunny isn't the only kid around. She meets Buzz, a boy who is completely obsessed with comic books, and soon they're having adventures of their own: facing off against golfball-eating alligators, runaway cats, and mysteriously disappearing neighbors. But the question remains -- why is Sunny down in Florida in the first place? The answer lies in a family secret that won't be secret to Sunny much longer. . .

Genre: Children's Fiction

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When is a summer vacation not really a summer vacation? Sunny Lewin has been packed off to Florida to live with her grandfather for the summer. At first she thought Florida might be fun -- it is the home of Disney World, after all. But the place where Gramps lives is no amusement park.

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Illustrated throughout, this heartfelt story contains so much: a family coping with bereavement, the alienation of moving somewhere new, and what i...

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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I SURVIVED THE SINKING OF THE TITANIC HC

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I SURVIVED THE SINKING OF THE TITANIC HC

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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The Official Website of Raina Telgemeier

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Written and Illustrated by Alice Oseman

Published by Hodder Children's Books

Paperback

LGBTQIA+ Friendly

Charlie and Nick are at the same school, but they've never met ... until one day when they're made to sit together. They quickly become friends, and soon Charlie is falling hard for Nick, even though he doesn't think he has a chance.

But love works in surprising ways, and Nick is more interested in Charlie than either of them realised.

Heartstopper is about love, friendship, loyalty and mental illness. It encompasses all the small stories of Nick and Charlie's lives that together make up something larger, which speaks to all of us.

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Written and Illustrated by Alice Oseman Published by Hodder Children's Books Paperback LGBTQIA+ Friendly Charlie and Nick are at the same school, but they've never met ... until one day when they're made to sit together. They quickly become friends, and soon Charlie is falling hard for Nick, even though he doesn't think he has a chance.

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Chunky by Yehudi Mercado

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Space Dumplings by Craig Thomson

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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Witch Boy by Molly Ostertag

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The online store and blog for London UK comic shop Gosh! Comics

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﻿When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock.
﻿﻿After finally adjusting to life on a family farm with two brand new step-sisters, a young girl faces an even bigger challenge - figuring out where she fits in at her first year in middle school. This middle grade graphic novel explores family, friendship, and change!

Jen is just getting used to her life on Peapod Farm with her new stepsisters, Andy and Reese. But when the school year starts, there are even more changes in store for her. Jen has to navigate new friends and new challenges--but at least she'll have Andy with her, right? As she starts the sixth grade, she finds that her stepsister seems way more interested in crushes and boys than hanging out with her, while Jen wants to know when the world decided boys and girls couldn't be just friends anymore.

Jen's story continues in the standout sequel to Stepping Stones that captures everything awesome (and scary) about growing up.

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﻿When purchasing multiple items at once, please note that we will ship the order in full when all items are in stock. ﻿﻿After finally adjusting to life on a family farm with two brand new step-sisters, a young girl faces an even bigger challenge - figuring out where she fits in at her first year in middle school.