Pantheon Books is reprinting Craig Thompson’s first graphic novel Goodbye Chunky Rice. The Pantheon website states the release date as May, 2006, and the price is 12.95$. Considering that Pantheon is a proper book publisher ( the earlier graphic novel releases, such as Persepolis 1and 2, David B’s Epileptic and Art Spiegelman’s In the Shadow of No Towers have all been available at regular bookstores in India), I think there is a fair chance that I might be able to buy Goodbye Chunky Rice pretty soon. Need to talk to the folks at Bookworm and Blossom, hmmm. Oh, and Jessica Abel’s La Perdida is also being brought out by Pantheon. We wants!

As a friend pointed out to me recently, Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie’s Lost Girls, which Moore describes as “literary pornography” ( he refuses to call it erotica) is complete after 16 years of developement. The story is about three classic characters from literature, Dorothy from The Wizardof Oz, Wendy from Peter Pan and Alice from Alice In Wonderland, who, in the year 1914, meet at a chateau and talk about their erotic adventures. Top Shelf Productions is bringing out a 3-volume hardcover edition, on sale from June 2006 for 75$, as well as a signed and numbered edition of 500 copies, available for a mere 150$. *Sigh*. According to the website, “this will be the most expensive book Top Shelf has ever published, with the first printing costing us almost $200K. Why so expensive? Because Lost Girls will be published as three, 112-page, super-deluxe, oversized (9″ x 12″) clothbound hardcover volumes, each wrapped in a beautiful dust jacket, with all three volumes sealed and shrink-wrapped in a gorgeous slipcase. “Much as I would like to buy the lot, I realised that it would be completely impossible to bring it into India – Customs would no doubt be ready with their permanent black markers to protect me from obscenity. Did I ever tell you about my copy of Heavy Metal magazine that had certain pages blackened by our moral guardians?

I am a little hesitant about getting the 2-disc King Kong DVD that’s available right now, because there might be a seperate collectors’ release in the future. With a figurine and all.

Meg Cabot’s seventh Princess Diaries title is out, and is priced at 376 Rs, goddamnit!!! Now I just need to wait until it lands up in the Bargain section of Odyssey at half-price. But, but, what am I saying?? I want to read that book SO BAD, I am pretty sure I am buying it at full price before the month is out. It’s called Seventh Heaven, by the way, keeping in tune with the number-themed earlier books. (Book 3 was Third-time Lucky, Book 4 was Mia Goes Forth, and so on).

Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead is one series that is so completely true to the Zombie genre – I have been following it since issue 1, scanned, of course, and when I look to buying it off eBay, the prices make me faint. Apparently the early issues had very low print-runs, so there have been instances of the first two issues selling for 113$, and the first printing of the first issue for 81$ – you get the drift. So what I found is that if I want to buy The Walking Dead, the best thing would be to go, like a true completist, for a slipcased hardcover edition. This collects the first 24 issues of the series, and costs a mere 100$. Another such selling-for-real-high-prices-on-eBay series is Invincible, also by Robert Kirkman, and they have got hardcover collections for this series up on Amazon too.The second collection hasn’t been released yet, though. Heh.

For the record, I would also buy this, but I already have the original comics. Hmm, yeah, that was my oh-look-I-am-so-cool line for the day.

* * *

So this friend of mine reads this post just now, and comes up on GTalk.

Anon Friend: you are not really going to buy chunky Rice right?
Beatzo: :D
I am actually of the opinion that someday, this management guru will come to me and say “dude, i owe my craig thompson love to you, so I bought you a signed copy of Goodbye Chunky Rice as a token of my gratitude.”
Anon Friend: (bitter laughter)
Strong doubts about me becoming a management guru. and secondly i will NEVER ever buy you gifts man.
i mean you are the sort of guy who would totally deflate a potential gifter: “Thanks. but I already have the Ultimate goodbye chunky Rice, signed, numbered, with Craig Thompson’s semen enclosed and packed in Alan moore’s beard shavings. Of course, i can try to sell this on ebay…”

Oh phoo. I need an image makeover, and fast.