Action, sex, betrayal and baseball pepper the new installment of Petrified Girlfriend. You can catch up on the series here and here. In this volume small-town boy Steve Ayrton attempts to integrate with, or at least understand, New York’s natives. He lets his girlfriend, Izzy Boradwaigh, languish in her petrified form under a growing pile of dirty laundry. In the dark woods of her mind and pinned to the ground by a giant heron, Izzy struggles with guilt and self-doubt brought on by memories of their early relationship.

Take a look inside using the thumbnails below.

Baby Pat accepts a broken tooth with a sunny disposition and a new, wild yarn fabricated for each person who asks how he hurt himself. Only a ruthless oral surgeon can extract the mundane truth from our hero. Frantic action in technicolor hues tips a hat to classic animated shorts in this flipbook-sized mini. The Grown-Up Babies have been obsessively branding themselves and getting into minor trouble in shorts appearing in the Caboose tabloid comic anthology and Barrett’s own Oak & Linden issue # 2.

You can read the full comic here. Or just check out the sample spreads below.

“Barrett takes a standard autobio trope (a story about a medical problem) and spins it into an exaggerated series of gags. In terms of images, the panel where one sees a huge penis juxtaposed against Barrett’s cute drawing style was especially funny, as was the naturalistically-drawn close-up of the rot & gore in his mouth.”

–Rob Clough | High-Low || September 28 2011

“The art is a pleasing blend of classic cartoons with a smidge here and there of some of the great underground artists, but all very clearly his own style. Baby Pat’s beatific face as he gets ready to tell his story to the mail carrier, or how his posture changes between approaching the dentist’s office and seeing the dentist, and really the entire encounter with the dentist, were all things of beauty.”
–Kevin Bramer | Optical Sloth || April 5 2012

A couple of cantankerous, naked, little sprites duke it out in a slapstick battle of ideologies. Envy bubbles into shoving as they eat flowers and debate the purpose of life on a secluded forest floor. The strip also appears in color at Top Shelf 2.0.

More deep woods adventure follows with the second chapter of the forthcoming Petrified Girlfriend graphic novel. “The Forest Priemeval” finds protagonist Izzy Broadwaigh (who previously froze into a total state of petrification) waking up in a beautiful but ominous Acadia. There’s also a recap of chapter one to keep any newcomers up-to-date on the story.

Take a peek inside using the thumbnails below.

[Pat Barrett uses] thick brush strokes and lush imagery to tell his stories. If [“Hicough & Belch”] showed off his chops in building a story around a conversation, then [“The Forest Primeval”] illustrates how well he can tell a story with visuals alone.

–Rob Clough | High-Low || July 18 2011

Collecting three short stories and interspersed with one-page diary comics, it features the full Captain Walton. Take a peek inside using the thumbnails below.

“This is a stylish mini, from the gold on red cover to the cream-colored paper to Barrett’s thick and distinctive line…Barrett’s got great chops.”

— Rob Clough | The Comics Journal || October 16 2010
 

Pronounced like “nympho” and “phenomena,” it’s a ’70s movie musical about a hermaphroditic alien and the farmboy she loves. The comic book anthology is about how the underground cult rock sensation has effected people through the decades. Take a peek inside using the thumbnails below.

“Of the many anthologies to emerge from the Center for Cartoon Studies, Nymphonomena has emerged as one of the best, with only the highly ambitious third volume of Sundays anthology surpassing it.  No anthology surpasses Nymphonomena for sheer audacity and dedication to its theme, however… Nymphonomena‘s concept, cohesiveness, design and overall execution & care make this a truly fascinating collaboration.”

— Rob Clough | The Comics Journal || September 13 2010
 

SOLD OUT! You can read all the comics from this premier issue online by clicking the thumbnails below.