Tagged comics

Unfuck Your Brain Graphic Guide: Using Science to Get Over Anxiety, Depression, Anger, Freak-outs, and Triggers

April 14, 2025

A classic made accessible for adults and teens

Your brain has a mind of its own. And sometimes, even when it’s doing its best, it can feel like it’s out to get you. If you’ve ever had a meltdown in class, suffered emotions nobody understands, or found yourself shutting down at the worst time, you know this all too well.

Thankfully, this graphic guide is here to help you understand your brain and retrain it to better respond to serious upheavals as well as everyday indignities. Sit with Dr. Faith as she explains her insights and neuroscientific nerdiness (and swearing) in the form of a nonfiction graphic novel with artwork by Gerta O. Egy. If you’re struggling with trauma, depression, anxiety, anger, grief, or addiction, or if you just want to have a more chill response to life, this guide will help you get your brain back on track so you can take on the world.

Read on for a sneak peek at Unfuck Your Brain Graphic Guide: Using Science to Get Over Anxiety, Depression, Anger, Freak-outs, and Triggers by Dr. Faith G. Harper & Gerta Oparaku Egy available for preorder from our site (shipping starts 5/27/25!) or your local bookseller (officially hitting shelves 6/24/25)!

(more…)

The Horrors of Being a Human: A Cola Pop Creemees Comic

April 11, 2025

The band experiences a wide range of emotions

Experience every emotion and endure life’s ups and downs with this series of short comics. Featuring Desmond Reed’s unique style of fluid, cartoony lines, these everyday vignettes strike a variety of emotional chords as they tell the story of the fictional band the Cola Pop Creemees.

This standalone volume follows the adventures of the wacky personalities behind the group, letting us in on their candid thoughts and outsized reactions to experiences ranging from the chaos of the grocery store to memories of heartbreak at religious summer camp to a bona fide zombie apocalypse. Their antics will make you laugh as you reflect on life’s difficult moments and emotions. As one character muses, “Am I a strong person for doing things while feeling sad, or am I a weak person for feeling sad to begin with?” Dramedy has never looked so squiggly . . . or relatable.

Perfect for fans of BoJack Horseman, this collection serves both as an entry point to the popular web comic and as a continuation of its familiar characters and scenarios. Includes “Memories,” winner of a 2022 MICE Mini-Grant.

Read on for a sneak peek at The Horrors of Being a Human: A Cola Pop Creemees Comic by Desmond Reed, available for preorder from our site (shipping starts 5/6/25!) or your local bookseller (officially hitting shelves 6/3/25)!

(more…)

Return to the Snake Pit: Daily Diary Comics 2022-2024, San Francisco–Richmond

April 08, 2025

Outsider art about punk, dogs, and aging parents

In his classic no-frills style, Ben Snakepit documents the daily events of the years 2022 to 2024. Each day since 2001, he’s drawn a three-panel comic about his day, creating a rhythm with subtle humor and genuine feeling that draws you into events both startling and mundane.

This collection starts off in San Francisco, but aging parents and a major family emergency cause Ben to move back in Richmond, VA. After 23 years away, Snakepit returns to the place where it all started. His band breaks up, he turns 50, and the world and his life change dramatically, but Ben keeps bringing us a comic—and a song—every day throughout it all. Grown-up punks, fans of outsider art and diary comics, and anyone with aging parents will get it—and once you get it, much like growing older, there’s no going back.

Read on for a sneak peek at Return to the Snake Pit: Daily Diary Comics 2022-2024, San Francisco-Richmond by Ben Snakepit, available for preorder from our site (shipping starts 5/6/25!) or your local bookseller (officially hitting shelves 6/3/25)!

(more…)

The All New Henry & Glenn Comic (is back!) (A People’s Guide to Publishing)

July 18, 2024

Ten years later, the greatest love story every told is back. Featuring an extensive interview with Tom Neely and Justin Hall, we take a deep look at “punk rock Bert and Ernie” where our anti-heroes celebrate toxic masculinity in full color for the first time. Is that Stephen King performing a pet funeral? Is that a joke about Lemmy? How many comic sight gags can you spot in 32 pages? Justin takes a deep look at how his comic students don’t know who Henry Rollins or Glenn Danzig are but can appreciate the book’s queer themes and social commentary.

Get the People’s Guide to Publishing here, and the workbook here!
Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!

How do you write a book contract for multiple authors?

October 08, 2021 — by Elly Blue

This week on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly tackle a reader question about the exciting world of contracts! Someone wrote in to ask how to handle a contract for a book with multiple authors collaborating, or an author and illustrator working together on a project like a kids’ book or a graphic novel. We walk through a few different scenarios and how you might handle them with the goal of having a clear, fair, and consistent contract. Also, we say the word “contract” a lot to desensitize you, because these helpful little documents don’t have to be as scary as most people think they are.

How Do I Publish My Graphic Novel?

June 24, 2021 — by Elly Blue

Today on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly answer a reader question. The reader has an idea and a draft outline of a graphic novel; what are their next steps in pursuing publication? We offer some advice, a few cautions, and encouragement for getting into the comics side of the publishing industry.

What’s a Book Good For Anyway? Our Spring Season on Kickstarter

December 19, 2016 — by Elly Blue

It’s been a while (okay, over a week now) since our last Kickstarter project ended… and we’ve just launched another this morning, for Microcosm’s Spring season.

This project is a little different. Instead of promoting just one book, we’ve decided to give you six at once—six very different books that span our interests and eras.

The norm in publishing is to put out multiple books each season (of which, in this industry, there are three–Spring and Fall are the main ones, and then there’s a small Winter season right after the xmas holidaze). Usually the publisher picks one book from each season and puts all their resources behind it, gambling on making it a blockbuster. We’ve never done this, mostly because we haven’t had the money to gamble on promoting books in the traditional ways. Instead, we spread our best efforts equally around all the books and hope they all win.

So this project represents our (cough) brand, our business model, and a strong sampling of the topics, styles, interests, authors, and books that we care about deeply.

Sandor Ellix Katz’z Basic Fermentation is the blockbuster here… it’s a substantial new edition of the cute little zine-turned-book, Wild Fermentation, that has been winning hearts for years. We also have new editions of Cristy C. Road’s underground classic Indestructible and Dan Méndez Moore’s gripping comics journalism account of Six Days in Cincinnati. we’re putting a spine on Raleigh Briggs’s friendly, hand-written Fix Your Clothes, and we finally gave Kelli Refer’s Pedal, Stretch, Breathe an ISBN. And we have a brand-new book in the mix, too: The Prodigal Rogerson represents J. Hunter Bennett’s meticulous and spirited research into the mysterious disappearance (and reappearance) of the Circle Jerk’s original bassist and songwriter.

Like any good books, these ones are good for entertainment… and so much more. Fixing your clothes, your gut health with fermented food, your wounded sense of community and political rightness… books can provide all that and more, and that’s what gets us up in the morning and keeps us going day after day.

Read more about them over at Kickstarter, where you’ll also have a chance to get to live chat with some of the authors and the people who make Microcosm go!

Check it out, and consider backing it to get some good books to last you through winter.

Rockstars Eating: An Interview with Automne Zingg

October 25, 2016 — by Elly Blue

Automne Zingg

Ever since Automne Zingg sent us her zine called “Comfort Eating with Nick Cave,” the world has seemed like a friendlier, funnier place. So we schemed to do more work with her, culminating with a book of the same name that came out last month, along with its companion, Defensive Eating with Morrissey. And now you too can delight in some of her work. But these books are just the thin end of the wedge. We talked with Automne about her art (some of which involves rock stars eating, and some of which doesn’t). Read, watch, and listen on!

Lacey Spacecake

You have a great intro in each book about its origin story. What’s the short version of the story of how these two works went from idea to zines to books.
The short version is basically me dealing with poverty and heartbreak through art. I couldn’t afford to eat and drawing these pictures of my idols comfort eating amused me and served as an almost type of therapy. Turning them into zines to sell made it so I could afford the luxuries of eating. Having those zines turn into cookbooks was the thanks of you dearies at Microcosm as well as Joshua Ploeg. It’s one of the few artistic projects of mine that went somewhere and actually had a happy ending. Usually my creations die in obscurity or my ideas go unnoticed. This has been a great change of pace.

Rockstars Eating by Automne Zingg

The response to these books has been tremendous! Have you had any particularly funny, touching, hostile, or weird encounters as a result of the books (or zines)?
Hahha. For the most part, I have been really floored by the support. There have been a few Morrissey fans not so amused by it but I expected as much. Honestly, I was really worried about the timing of the Nick Cave one since these were made before he lost his son and I didn’t want anybody to get the wrong idea. Fortunately most people get that this all came from a humorous place of love.

Old Manzig by Automne Zingg

You do a lot of music and video art. What are your other projects? What are you working on right now that you’re most excited about?

Lacey Spacecake Video Stills

Right now I have a one woman band called Lacey Spacecake where I write and record all the songs, play the instruments, sing, and make the videos.

I’m also in a band called Bat Fancy. Unfortunately none of the members live in the same state so we are temporarily on a hiatus but here is a spooooooky Halloween video I made for us.

I’m also doing the art for my friend’s documentary about The Cure’s fans. She’s been working on the thing for 16 years.

Other than that, I do a lot of comedy videos and have a day in music segment (From Day To Zingg) every Tuesday for my buddy Kurt’s WFMU show. It’s never scripted and I usually say a lot of nonsense ranging from accusing Meatloaf of the assassination of JFK to telling people that if you play Chicago’s “If You Leave Me Now” backwards, it’s actually Peter Cetera’s recipe for grits.

But you can find most of my art, musings, videos, words, and projects on my website.

What’s next? We hope you’ll draw more rock icons eating…
Definitely more zines and definitely more rockstars consuming things. Currently I’m working on an “Adult Activity Book” with things like “YO MAMMA JOKES WITH JARVIS COCKER” and “HANGOVER CURES WITH THE CURE.” I’m also doing an illustrated guide to these bizarre weather reports I used to write in LA. What else? I’m trying to get a public access show in Queens where I play the part of a sad bear that asks artists and musicians really existential questions. It’s called “I CAN’T BEAR THIS.” I’m still looking for the perfect bear costume. There are worse problems to have.

Violator

(P.S. You can also watch an election video Automne made for Kickstarter right here! You too may find yourself supporting David Boowie and the Ghost Formerly Known as Prince on the 2016 ballot.)

Ultimate Bernie by Automne Zingg

Merry Krampus by Automne Zingg

Book Review: Henry & Glenn Forever & Ever

September 11, 2016 — by Elly Blue

We ask all of our interns to choose a book and review it for our blog. Usually, when tasked with this assignment, they head downstairs to the warehouse and deliberate for a half hour. Sometimes it takes them a few days to choose. Not Dylan. He immediately knew. Here’s his review, and an appropriately tough selfie with the book:

Tom Neely’s Henry & Glenn Forever & Ever is hilarious. The idea of taking two icons from the hardcore punk scene (which, at its height in the mid-80s, was taken over by macho assholes who made the scene about faux masculinity) and creating a fictional gay romance between them is just genius.

The thing I appreciated most about the book, however, is its constant references and jokes about not just The Misfits and Black Flag but about heavy metal and punk music in general. This is also, unfortunately, what limits the audience of the book, since your average reader probably doesn’t know who the hell King Diamond or Ian MacKaye are, but for people who do understand these references, they make reading this book all the more enjoyable.

I myself lost it when aliens brought zombies to life and announced that their prime directive was to “exterminate the whole fucking place,” as well as every time I noticed all the random 138s scattered about.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone with reasonable knowledge about punk and metal music and culture.
—Dylan Siegler

Dumpster Diving for Zines: An interview with Jesse Reklaw

April 28, 2016 — by Elly Blue

jesse reklaw author photo

LOVF book cover

the artist at work

One of our oldest, cutest, funniest books is Applicant. Originally a zine that made the transition to bookdom after it sold gazillions of copies to guffawing survivors of the academic industrial complex. Creator Jesse Reklaw found a pile of old applications in the trash behind a major university, complete with photos of the applicants. He paired these photos with choice, typed comments made by the evaluating committee. And ohhh it was painful. The only other thing I’ve seen quite like it is the sadly now-defunct “Nice Guys of OK Cupid” blog. But in this case, we relate to the derided applicants and are angry at the smug, faceless judges that once, long ago determined their fates.

Reklaw, who has a new book coming out soon, answered some questions over email many years after the fact.

1. Applicant is one of our earliest books, and it still holds up painfully, hilariously well. Did any of the applicants pictured ever contact you? Do you get guilty emails from interviewers wanting to confess their application commentary sins?
Man, I wish I’d get guilty, confessional emails! How do I arrange that? I have earnestly tried not to connect with anyone pictured in Applicant; because I am afraid of getting sued. In fact, I recycled all the original files and deleted the names of the people from my computer (maybe also because I know I am a born stalker, and I did not want the temptation around). I do know a woman who got her Ph.D. in neuroscience from one of the future professors pictured in that book; she said he was a good guy. But still.

2. You’ve done a bunch of different kinds of books… mostly comics. Do you have a favorite genre or type or style or topic?
Yes, comics is my main thing. Applicant was kind of a fluke for me, inspired by my interest in zine culture. I actually made the whole thing in the summer of 1998, after I dropped out of grad school. In some ways I think of Applicant as my Meta Masters Thesis: my critique of grad school culture and what was for me a better alternative (dumpster diving). I have always preferred personal, raw, independent voices in publishing. So regarding comics, I’ve read a lot of autobio, graphic novel memoirs, and diary comics. Lynda Barry and John Porcellino are two of my heroes. I also like well-crafted comics fiction, usually on the oddball side.

3. What have you read or seen recently that inspired you the most?
I realized a couple years ago that I have failed to read very much fiction by women, so this year I’m trying to correct that. I’ve been quite inspired by Virginia Woolf. I try to keep up with comics (“graphic novels”) too. Three recent favorites that come to mind are Beautiful Darkness by Kerascoët, By This Shall You Know Him by Jesse Jacobs, and Arsène Schrauwen by Olivier Schrauwen.

4. What are you working on right now that you’re most excited about?
I just finished making a travel diary / sketchbook / graphic novel called LOVF, that will be released from Fantagraphics Books in July this year. This book evolved from a notebook I had with me during a manic phase, and it’s dripping with intricate, intense, and confusing drawings. After I got better (?), I added a narrative so it kind of tells the story of my “vision quest” as a homeless crazy man. I’m excited and terrified to go on tour to promote this book.

Find Applicant here!