The Blonde Woman by Aidan Koch

$20, 50 pages, full color, published by the artist with a grant from the Xeric foundation

Well, this is a special book. Koch's work keeps pushing hard against the perceived notions of what comic art can offer. The imagery in this book is both challenging and pleasing---Koch's drawing bursts with innovative leaps but with also a firm attention to a particular kind of craft. I like this book a lot because it represents a complicated artist being allowed to explore a personal realm of imagery without any compromises---here we have a story, but also posed bodies, swaths of color, hands, shaded faces, and more.