(W) Jacques Tardi, Jean-Patrick Manchette (A) Jean-Patrick Manchette Streets of Paris, Streets of Murder is the first of two volumes presenting all four crime graphic novels by Jean-Patrick Manchette and Jacques Tardi, including the never-before-collected Griffu and the out-of-print West Coast Blues. This volume also offers a 21-page uncompleted story by Manchette and Tardi as well as a single page introduction to another incomplete story, both published in English for the first time. These gritty stories are like a double shot of Scotch for any fan of unrelenting, uncompromising crime fiction.

(W/A/CA) Jacques Tardi Fog Over Tolbiac Bridge is the first of four major graphic novels adapted by Tardi from the legendary French crime writer L?o Malet's original 'Nestor Burma' novels. Tardi's stylish use of mechanical gray tones provides the book with a lovely period feel which, combined with Tardi's usual obsessive visual research, gives it a uniquely personal, authentic quality. Tardi's adaptation is a cracking good detective yarn and a milestone in comics history.

(W/A/CA) Jacques Tardi In September 1939, Ren? Tardi went to war. Less than a year later, the French army was defeated and he was a prisoner of war, like 1.6 million other French soldiers. After 4 years and 8 months in a POW camp, Ren? returned home, bitter and ashamed. Stalag IIB is Jacques Tardi's homage to his father and a testimony to the silent suffering of a generation of men. Based on Ren?'s memories, Stalag IIB - the first of two volumes - recounts brutal years of captivity under the Nazis and the POWs' attempts to reclaim moments of humanity. Ren? recalls the roll calls in sub-zero temperatures, daily acts of resistance, crushing boredom - and especially the omnipresent hunger. With four decades of cartooning and almost two dozen graphic novels behind him, Jacques Tardi masterfully recreates historical and personal details with remarkable fidelity, guided by extensive research and his father's notes. Featuring some of Tardi's most intense and meticulous drawing, punctuated by somber greys and punches of red and blue rendered beautifully by Rachel Tardi, Stalag IIB is a pers

(W/A/CA) Jacques Tardi The conclusion to a Magnum Opus from one of our greatest contemporary cartoonists. Picking up where Vol. 1 left off, the second volume of Stalag IIB begins when captured French soldier Ren. Tardi finally gets a taste of freedom, as prisoners and German officers alike are forced to evacuate the POW camp he has languished in for the past four years. Thus begins the long, grueling journey eastward, where Tardi and his fellow POWs must evade the pursuing Russian Army, stave off their gnawing hunger, and contend with the increasingly illtempered and vicious German soldiers accompanying them. Throughout this harrowing odyssey, the only thing that keeps him going is the hope that he'll one day return home to France, where his wife Henriette patiently awaits him. Featuring meticulous line work punctuated by stunning splashes of color, Jacques Tardi's grim yet heartening biographical portrait of his father's life as a soldier during WWII is a personal and artistic triumph.

(W/A) Jacques Tardi In the final volume of this intergenerational memoir, a powerful tribute to a lost generation of WWII POWs, the author's father, French soldier Rene, comes home. After five agonizing years as a prisoner of war and five months on a grueling march homeward, Rene Tardi, the legendary cartoonist's father, is awarded fifteen days of military leave. Rene struggles to rebuild his health, reconnect with his family, and imagine his future. With limited job opportunities, Rene re-enlists as a soldier, despite his disgust. After the birth of his son, Jacques, Rene receives new orders: return to Germany and help rebuild the country that imprisoned him. The story takes an autobiographical turn as the focus shifts to Jacques' recreated childhood memories and an exploration of the traumatic effects of war that ripple through the generations.

(W) Jacques Tardi, Jean-Patrick Manchette (A/CA) Jacques Tardi After the teeth-rattling one-two punch of West Coast Blues and Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot, Jacques Tardi makes a third appointment with ace crime writer Jean- Patrick Manchette for his wildest adaptation yet. A tale of mendacity and heroism, Run Like Crazy... is full of moments of pitch-black humor with a strong current of socio-political satire beneath its bleak surface. It's a ride to hell, but a devilishly fun one.

(W) Tardi Fantagraphics presents two experimental, early works by the French cartooning legend Tardi. These comics, created in the mid-'70s, provide a fascinating preview of the masterworks of his prolific career. While they are not narratively linked, an eerie sense of foreboding suffuses stories in this collection: they both depict sex and brutal violence and condemn the horrors of war. The True Story of the Unknown Soldier follows a pulp novelist turned soldier who, driven to delirium amidst the trenches of WWI, becomes tormented by visions of his own seedy creations. This stream-of-consciousness tale visualizes the tortured psyche of its protagonist through dazzling dreamscapes and surreal scenarios. In The National Razor, a soldier returns from war a shattered man. Drowning himself in drink, he wanders the streets of Paris without purpose; in this numb stupor, he finds himself caught up in strange situations, lashes out in unexpectedly violent ways, and ultimately meets with a bloody end. At once a visceral depiction of the trauma wrought by war and a powerful denunciation of