Dan Clowes SPECIAL Bonus Round!

'Ghost World: The Special Edition'

While we're on the subject of Dan Clowes, I highly suggest picking up (or at least checking out) the recently released 'Ghost World: the Special Edition'. This new edition expands upon the original graphic novel (worth reading/owning in and of itself) from 80 pages into a 288-page, behind-the-scenes tour through the making of both the classic book and the subsequent Terry Zwigoff film-adaptation!

For those not familiar w/ either the book or the the film, 'Ghost World' is the story of Becky and Enid, two teenaged girls and best friends facing the common prospect of not only growing up, but growing apart from each other. Clowes paints a tender picture of this intellectually precocious, sexually adventurous (despite a mutual lack of experience), and formative period in their lives, filtered through a light blue hue echoing a world lit by the cathode rays of a television...the perfect metaphor for their post-nuclear existence.

This insanely lavish version features a new introduction and several pages of new strips by Clowes, as well as over 200 pages of extras including: the Oscar-nominated screenplay by Clowes and Zwigoff, dozens of pages of never-before-collected ephemera, including unused concept drawings, notes, movie posters, foreign edition covers, merchandise, artwork created for the movie by Clowes, Sophie Crumb and the cast, and much more, all of it annotated by Clowes himself! Damn.

Originally released in 1997 as a limited hardcover edition of 2,500 copies that sold out almost instantly, 'Ghost World' has subsequently gone through 14 softcover printings, selling in excess of 150,000 copies in the United States, becoming one of the best-selling and most revered graphic novels of all-time. Despite that success, the original, first printing was the only hardcover edition of the book ever published...until now.

So, be you fan of the book, the film or both...or someone familiar w/ neither who enjoys both great art and great stortytelling...for a meager $40, this book is worth adding to your collection. Seriously, you'll be a little cooler just for touching it...hipster osmosis...look it up.