IDW Publishing; $29.99
For comics historians, creators, and those who simply love the art form of the comic strip, there’s no excuse needed to look at George Herriman’s Krazy Kat. There’s always room for another book on the subject or collection of the strips. The latest installment of The Library of American Comics’s LOAC Essentials series reminds of this, and that the Krazy Kat dailies are often overshadowed by Herriman’s Sunday pages.
This new book collects the dailies from 1934 and presents them in one-strip-per-page format and in the process we all win. These superb examples of Herriman’s imagination and his characters make for a great read, and they also could serve as an excellent introduction to readers not yet familiar with this wonderful strip.
A key component in the LOAC volumes remains the essays, and in this case biographer Michael Tisserand delivers insight into Herriman’s life that ranges from the triumphant to the deeply sad. It gives great context to the work presented in this edition.
The LOAC Essentials volumes have been superb since the series kicked off, and this one lives up to their standard of excellence.
–J.C. Vaughn