Do you miss Jennifer de Guzman’s always well-observed and trenchant column at now-definct Comics World News? SO DO WE! Luckily we were able to do something about it, and de Guzman’s NEW column “Life in Comics” will run the first monday of every Month in PW Comics Week henceforth. In her first column she discusses where the greatest hopes for comics lie:

Considering the present political climate, it probably is no surprise that the word hope has been on my mind a lot lately. Hope is a tricky concept because while it seems to indicate a positive outlook, it carries the underlying assumption that all is not presently as good as it could be. I’ve come to realize that this is perhaps what is behind some of the reactions to my last column at the now-closed site Comic World News, in which I asserted that more rigorous comics criticism will attract more literary-minded creators to the medium, thus setting the stage for a richer comics canon. In response, I was called to task for “complaining,” being “pessimistic” and having a “bleak” view of the state of comics.

De Guzman’s is one of several new columns that will be debuting this month in PWCW. You have signed up already, right?

SLG announces a new graphic novel about a North Pole mystery– an increasingly popular subject for comics it seems –by Ben Towle. The first chapter is available as a free download.

In May 1928, the Italian airship the Italia embarked on an ambitious and dangerous expedition to the North Pole. A celebratory radio communiqué from the international crew announced their arrival at their destination, but soon all communications ceased. Excitement turned to uncertainty, and a world-wide search effort was launched to recover the crew of the Italia, whose fate was unknown.

Ben Towle, a nominee for a Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition Eisner Award in 2004, captures the tense mood during the weeks of search in his graphic novel Midnight Sun, to be released in December 2007 from SLG Publishing. Midnight Sun follows H.R., a down-on-his luck American reporter. He’s dispatched to cover the story of the lost Italia at the top of the Earth, where the Arctic summer means there is almost perpetual daylight.

“The tone of this series may take readers familiar with my last work by surprise,” said Towle, referring to his graphic novella Farewell, Georgia, which attracted the attention of the Eisner Awards judges. “But it’s a story that’s close to my heart one that I’ve been developing and editing and re-editing since before I’d even conceived of any of my prior projects. It’s historical fiction, I suppose,” Towle added, “but heavy on the fiction.”

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