French Comics in New York

Pratt
un ete indien
corto maltese
mu
en siberie
les ethiopiques
toujours un peu plus loin
ann de la jungle
fable de Venise
les celtiques

These are all Corto Maltese books except Un Ete Indien, which is a collab between Hugo Pratt and Milo Manara about early American settlers, and Ann de la Jungle, which I think is an old newspaper strip by Pratt. I haven't read Ann de la Jungle, Un Ete Indien is okay but not great, but if you know French all the Corto Maltese titles are definitely worth getting, because Corto Maltese is basically one of the 10 best comics ever made.

Enki Bilal - la trilogie Nikopol

This one is also essential reading: a political, dystopian sci-fi story with lots of weird and cool stuff like old Egyptian gods and "chess-boxing". Plus Bilal is a great artist.

Rosinski/Dufaux - la complainte des landes perdues
Sioban
Blackmore
Dame Gerfaut
Kyle of Klanach

This one is a sword-and-sorcery type of Celtic fantasy comic: the story is okay but not that original, but the art is quite pretty.

David B.
l'ascension du haut mal (vls 1->3)

This one has been released in English as Epileptic, it's very good.

Blain
le reducteur de vitesse
Isaac le pirate - vols 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Don't know about the first title, but Isaac le Pirate is one of the best new French comics I've read (the series is still ongoing). It's about a 18th century Parisian painter who's hired by a bunch of pirates who want to travel to the South Pole to document their journey. That's only the first part of the story though, it goes to rather unexpected directions.

915 is absolutely ridiculous; I might give him 150.
then again, i don't even speak french.

forks-, yeah, I know. Well, it says it's in SOHO, so...
tuomas, thanks for the insights. Besides Moebius I am very ignorant of french comics...

sempe is my favourite cartoonist ever. seriously. and all that trondheim stuff looks pretty good, too.

that asterix book is awful though.

Charyn / Boucq - bouche du diable

ooh thats the one with the deformed kid in kgb school. love that one.

I sent him a 150 offer. I don't know if I actually WANT a massive pile of French comics, but it might motivate me to learn a new language. probably not.

Actually went to dude's place to negotiate; nice collection of books, but he seriously wasn't interested in any bargaining. Ah well.

hey forks, at least you tried:) I never have the guts to bargain seriously.

Hey all, this might not be the right thread for this, but I'm curious what French (or other Euro-comics in translation) people have been reading and would recommend? It seems like the marketing for European comics is way behind that of, say, Japanese comics and a lot of gems get published and just sort of exist. I'm particularly curious beyond the more well known stuff, e.g., Tin Tin, Asterix, Tardi, David B., etc.

BD still lags behind manga and probably will forever since there's not a sub-culture of US ppl obsessed with French culture the way there is for Japan (tho there IS a sub-culture of Japanese ppl who are, so I'm guessing BD fans in Japan are better served, lol) but I do think there's been some strides made since the 00's. That being said I'm fuzzy on the details because my wife is French so now I usually just grab the originals when we go to visit family.

The Great Outdoors by Catherine Meurisse seems to have been translated. It's a Charlie Hebdo writer's memories of her childhood growing up in the countryside, the daughter of "back to the country" boomers. Lots of it resonated with me, having gone through a similar childhood elsewhere. Very sweet and funny, not at all what you'd expect from a Hebdo writer.

The archives series for Italian master Crepax is interesting - I mean you have to accept it's basically porn and the plots mostly only of social history interest, but dude was an artist and a half, if you focus on the drawings it really becomes a kind of psychedelic experience.

I should say that despite having direct access to French stuff my guides to this are still the folks at the online Comics Journal, so I'm unlikely to come up with recs they haven't mentioned.

ILC favourite Dungeon is one of the best comics ever - hearty recommend. Can it be as good as I remember though?

Infinity 8, from one of the same writers, Lewis Trondheim, has been fun but the further volumes have diminishing returns (for reasons that will be very apparent when you know the plot).

I was really impressed with Maggie Garrison, another Trondheim joint, that’s a two-and-done thriller series set in southeast England with a really memorable hero.

Big fan of Leo’s nonsense sci fi series Aldebaran, which also goes off the rails a bit

Kerascoët‘s Miss Don’t Touch Me is fun but doesn’t really live up to its promise - notice a trend here? - it the first volume is still worth reading. Satania, by the same artist, is impressive but Not My Thing.

These are quite mainstream answers I guess, but it’s all got! The lack of female BD writers kinda sucks

Which is to say, I’d love some recommendations in that arena...

These are great suggestions, though unfortunately the library doesn't seem to have most of these books. I might have to try another library. I might buy The Great Outdoors by Cahterine Meurisse.

Re Leo/Aldebaran - I had bought a volume of this (I think actually from reading ILC), but it seems like it was halfway through the story. Is there a good place to start here?

NYRB Graphic Novels has a few comics by French women artists. I haven't read them yet, but they look great.

PRETENDING IS LYING
by Dominique Goblet, translated from the French by Sophie Yanow

MITCHUM
by Blutch, translated from the French by Matt Madden

THE TENDERNESS OF STONES
by Marion Fayolle, translated from the French by Geoffrey Brock

There's multiple volumes with different titles: Aldebaran, Betelgeuse, Antares and Return to Aldebaran (i think), each of which are a few volumes each. There's a side series too, The Survivors. The first two sets, Aldebaran and Betelgeuse iirc, are the best, and then it's the usual comics game of "well, it's not as good as it used to be, but i want to see what happens".

I think quite a few of the titles frequently pop up as sales on Comixology.

I'd probably rec Maggie Garrison the most out of the ones I mentioned.

Thanks for the recommendations!

The lack of female BD writers kinda sucks

Think this must be a function of what's been translated because anecdotally I think the current BD scene has more prominent women than the US comics scene (comparsions with Japan more difficult due to boy's comics and girl's comics still being an official thing there). Penelope Bagieu is probably the biggest BD breakout star of recent years (I've not read her).

speaking of Dungeon, 5 of the volumes (Twilight 2-3-4, Monsters 5-6) are on sale here for 2.99 each (plus also a Lil Santa by Trondheim, and a bunch of other stuff by other people too) https://www.nbmpub.com/home/sale.html

First issue of my Spirou subscription arrived!

A lot of it is done in a style that reminds me of, like, Phineas & Ferb and other modernish animation, which I'm not a fan of. There's also an official liscensed minions comic strip!

Good stuff from old hands, though: Émile Bravo is doing a Spirou Elseworlds where he's in occupied Belgium, the chapter in this issue sees him arrested by the Gestapo (!), done in a beautiful classic ligne claire style. Joann Sfar is doing some totally deranged thing that'll prob take me many chapters to start to understand: in this one a rock alien is dueting with Carla Bruni on Sarkozy's yacht, then tells her he must leave, opens up a vortex and lands in the White House, where François Hollande is waiting for him. Hollande then explains to the rock alien that Trump isn't in because after US presidents leave office they live in ratty motels, with panels showing Trump, Obama and Clinton in this situation. It then cuts to the attack on the Capitol.

Those Bravo Spirou books are all really good

I read the first when I was in a phase of trying to follow along with the Spirou Par... series, didn't know he'd kept at them!