FORBES -- <i>Bad Weekend </i>paints an acid-etched
portrait of fandom, comics professionals and Comic-Con itself - one that rings
true to anyone with connections to the industry and culture. As comics and comic
art have grown in prominence, and the latter has become a very big-money
business indeed, it's important to keep it real when it comes to the shady
dealings and complicated legacies that form the roots of the industry. It's also
entertaining as hell. After more than a dozen years of the award-winning
comics-noir series, Brubaker and Phillips know how to blend their art and
storytelling styles into a polished page-turner. <i>Bad Weekend </i>from Image
Comics will be available in comics shops on Wednesday, July 10 and available in
bookstores on Tuesday, July 16. and makes a fine summer read for anyone who's
heading to Comic-Con next week, or wishes they were.<br /><br /><br />

LIBRARY JOURNAL (STARRED) --
Aging cartoonist Hal Crane is
renowned for his body of work and infamous for his bad behavior, so when he's
selected to receive a lifetime achievement award at a large comics convention,
the organizers hire Jacob, Crane's estranged former assistant, to keep him out
of trouble. The task proves impossible, as Crane quickly embarks upon a ruthless
quest to reclaim original artwork he's convinced was stolen from him. As he
observes his former mentor encountering shady art dealers, indulging old
grudges, enduring disrespectful fans, and enlisting the assistance of career
criminals, Jacob can't help but wonder how an artist who once possessed such
passion and vision managed to sink so low. Is the comic book industries' history
of forcing creators into unfair work-for-hire contracts and then discarding them
once sales decline to blame, or were Crane's own demons his undoing? More
important, can Crane be redeemed, or will helping him drag Jacob down into the
same mire of resentment and rage?<br />VERDICT With
this Eisner Award-winning volume, expanding stories first serialized in the
“Criminal” series, the incomparable team of Brubaker and Phillips
(<i>My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies; The Fade Out</i>) once again prove
themselves among the best creators of crime fiction in any
genre.<br /><br /><br />

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY -- The lauded crime comics team of
Brubaker and Phillips (My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies) take a meta approach
with a hard-boiled mystery set at a comics convention. Cartoonist Hal Crane, "a
collection of bad habits and worse moods," is traveling to an event clearly
based on the San Diego Comic-Con to receive a lifetime achievement award, and
his former art assistant Jacob, now a detective, is hired to escort him. The two
are quickly embroiled in a mystery involving stolen art, murder, and decades of
industry feuds. Set in 1997, when the comics speculation boom of the '90s was
going bust and comic books were at a sales peak but a creative nadir, the
period's perfect for a tale rife with creative frustration, seedy backroom
deals, and betrayal. It helps that the creators know the behind-the-scenes
workings of the comic convention inside and out, which lends verisimilitude, as
does the semifictional comics history they tell, a blend of reality, gossip (did
an inker really get work by procuring sex workers for his editors?), and pure
imagination. Phillips's art looks heavily photo-referenced, but poses and
layouts that would be stiff in a lesser artist's hands fly by as realistic,
while still loose and lively, in his practiced lines. Brubaker proves again
that, as in the words of legendary creator Jack Kirby, "Comics will break your
heart," as he digs under the colorful surface of his setting and touches on
injustices within the industry. <br /><br /><br />