Graphic Novels

Jeff Smith, best known as the creator of the enormously popular fantasy epic "Bone," stretches his cartooning skills, themes, and his storytelling abilities in his new series, "Rasl. " The first of a projected three-volume series, "The Drift" begins with the hero stealing a Picasso in a world very similar to Earth. This is not only a different world, it's a different dimension as well, and Rasl begins to wonder about things when he finds "Blonde on Blonde" on a jukebox recorded by Robert Zimmerman (as opposed to Bob Dylan)

ARE YOU MY MOTHER?: A Comic Drama By Alison Bechdel Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 290 pp., $22 Three bracing new graphic novels confront the distorting effects of physical and emotional boundaries inside families, peer groups, and a divided city. Each delineates the stunting effects of separateness with power, insight, and varying shades of dark humor. Alison Bechdel's memoir "Are You My Mother?" borrows its title from P. D. Eastman's classic children's book of the same name about an abandoned baby bird who goes in search of its mother.

Inquiries into history and outsider status spark a striking sampling of recent graphic literature. Nick Abadzis's homage to the first dog in space is largely traditional in its blend of image and word. Similarly, Ann Marie Fleming's reconstruction of the story of her great-grandfather, Rutu Modan's edgy walk along the personal-political border, and Adrian Tomine's finely drawn analysis of young, overintellectualized love hew to lesser and greater degrees of relative conventionality.

Kids 10 and older The Adventures of Tintin (107 min., PG) The intrepid boy reporter from the series of graphic novels makes it to the screen, courtesy of Steven Spielberg. Some of the nonstop action sequences involve gunplay, and a long flashback shows old battleships ablaze and firing cannons. A pickpocket plies his trade very successfully. The athletic Tintin and his dog, Snowy (the true star of the movie), take all kinds of acrobatic risks, unscathed. Their friend Captain Haddock is definitely an alcoholic.

From the intimately personal to the overtly political, this batch of graphic novels from the past six months embraces memoir and manifesto, flag-waving salute and fantasy fable. A grab bag of good reads. My favorite is Brecht Evens’s “The Wrong Place,” an exhilaratingly sensual book about jealousy and desire among a group of hip, young urban adults and the leader of the pack, Robbie, a very elusive life of the party. Evens is a Flemish watercolorist who populates his pages with distinctive characters such as the mercurial, magnetic Robbie; his stand-in host, Gary, a Hendrix fan; and Waldo, a schlub...

We've seen graphic novels that combine elements of memoir and journalism. But we haven't seen one that leaves the predictable behind to create something startlingly original. Open your mind to "The Museum of Lost Wonder" (Weiser , 159 pp., $49.95), by Jeff Hoke , by day the senior exhibit designer at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California. His pun-rich writing and mystical art conflate history, philosophy , and psychology for those intrepid enough to join his quest for the transcendent.

ARE YOU MY MOTHER?: A Comic Drama By Alison Bechdel Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 290 pp., $22 Three bracing new graphic novels confront the distorting effects of physical and emotional boundaries inside families, peer groups, and a divided city. Each delineates the stunting effects of separateness with power, insight, and varying shades of dark humor. Alison Bechdel's memoir "Are You My Mother?" borrows its title from P. D. Eastman's classic children's book of the same name about an abandoned baby bird who goes in search of its mother.

Could you read 50 books in a single year? The New Bedford Public Library is challenging adults to do just that in its 50 Book Challenge, which runs through Dec. 10, 2011. Registration starts today for participants, who must keep a record showing that they have read at least 50 books during that time. The books do not have to be from the library itself and can include fiction, nonfiction, audio and e-books, graphic novels, and even cookbooks. Those who complete the challenge will receive a reward and be entered into a drawing for larger prizes.

We may know Tarzan, Rin Tin Tin, Nancy, Donald Duck, and Spider-Man but how about Hotel Africa, a South Korean comic book described as part "Baghdad Café" and part "Cinema Paradisio" or Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, Justin Green's 1972 autobiographical comic cited as an influence by no less a master than Art Spiegelman. "1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die" (Rizzoli) emphasizes comic books, graphic novels, and manga from recent decades though the earliest entry dates to 1867.

Like fiction that is all text, graphic novels tackle all sorts of issues, treating even the most serious in a fresh, unconventional way. Now that they've gained legitimacy through features in major newspapers and magazines, these marriages of pictures and words are striking ever deeper, spanning the political and the personal in unexpectedly resonant ways. With the country engaged in the presidential campaign, it's time to check out a few of the more political graphic novels. More personal expressions continue to tumble from the imaginations of these gifted, distinctive...

LITGRAPHIC: The World of the Graphic Novel At: Fitchburg Art Museum, 25 Merriam Parkway, Fitchburg, through Jan. 1. 978-345-4207, www.fitchburgartmuseum.org FITCHBURG - Isn't it time the National Book Awards created a category for graphic novels? Twenty-five years ago, after all, Art Spiegelman published "Maus: A Survivor's Tale," a wrenching story of his father's experience as a Polish Jew before, during, and after the Holocaust. A second volume of "Maus" came out in 1991, and the next year won a Pulitzer Prize.

We may know Tarzan, Rin Tin Tin, Nancy, Donald Duck, and Spider-Man but how about Hotel Africa, a South Korean comic book described as part "Baghdad Café" and part "Cinema Paradisio" or Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, Justin Green's 1972 autobiographical comic cited as an influence by no less a master than Art Spiegelman. "1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die" (Rizzoli) emphasizes comic books, graphic novels, and manga from recent decades though the earliest entry dates to 1867.

From the intimately personal to the overtly political, this batch of graphic novels from the past six months embraces memoir and manifesto, flag-waving salute and fantasy fable. A grab bag of good reads. My favorite is Brecht Evens’s “The Wrong Place,” an exhilaratingly sensual book about jealousy and desire among a group of hip, young urban adults and the leader of the pack, Robbie, a very elusive life of the party. Evens is a Flemish watercolorist who populates his pages with distinctive characters such as the mercurial, magnetic Robbie; his stand-in host, Gary, a Hendrix fan; and...

Could you read 50 books in a single year? The New Bedford Public Library is challenging adults to do just that in its 50 Book Challenge, which runs through Dec. 10, 2011. Registration starts today for participants, who must keep a record showing that they have read at least 50 books during that time. The books do not have to be from the library itself and can include fiction, nonfiction, audio and e-books, graphic novels, and even cookbooks. Those who complete the challenge will receive a reward and be entered into a drawing for larger prizes.

The graphic novel has grown in popularity in recent years, owing in part to the influence of Hollywood movies based on them and our growing predilection for visual storytelling. The graphic novels that have really grabbed the public imagination have tended to be biographies and autobiographies. Art Spiegelman’s “Maus,’’ a study of the life of Spiegelman’s father in German concentration camps published in two volumes, lifted the graphic novel form out of the cultural gutter almost single-handedly by winning a Pulitzer Prize in 1992.

NAKED CITY: The Death and Life of Authentic Urban Places By Sharon Zukin Oxford University, 312 pp. $27.95 Playing off Jane Jacobs’s groundbreaking “Death and Life of Great American Cities,” sociologist Sharon Zukin traces the evolution of New York in the decades since the battle between Jacobs and Robert Moses left Moses, the creator and destroyer of cityscapes, in disrepute while elevating Jacobs to the pantheon of...

NAKED CITY: The Death and Life of Authentic Urban Places By Sharon Zukin Oxford University, 312 pp. $27.95 Playing off Jane Jacobs’s groundbreaking “Death and Life of Great American Cities,” sociologist Sharon Zukin traces the evolution of New York in the decades since the battle between Jacobs and Robert Moses left Moses, the creator and destroyer of cityscapes, in disrepute while elevating Jacobs to the pantheon of...

Kids 10 and older The Adventures of Tintin (107 min., PG) The intrepid boy reporter from the series of graphic novels makes it to the screen, courtesy of Steven Spielberg. Some of the nonstop action sequences involve gunplay, and a long flashback shows old battleships ablaze and firing cannons. A pickpocket plies his trade very successfully. The athletic Tintin and his dog, Snowy (the true star of the movie), take all kinds of acrobatic risks, unscathed. Their friend Captain Haddock is definitely an alcoholic.

David Mazzucchelli’s stunning opus is of the magnum, embracing kind, and in that sense serves as an appropriate lead-in to a sweeping roundup of Grafix Americana, including the diverse anthology “Syncopated,’’ the despairing, nurturing “A.D.,’’ and “Cla$$war,’’ a striking variation on the superhero genre. Mazzucchelli’s wildly imaginative work spotlights Asterios Polyp, a “paper architect’’ who teaches in upstate New York but keeps an apartment in Manhattan.