Top Shelf Productions Spring 2007 Book Reviews

Top Shelf Productions is a small press publisher specializing in graphic novels that are created by an eclectic roster of artists and writers. For those of you unfamiliar with the graphic novel format, imagine a comic book writ large - a visual story told via words and pictures, placed between the pages of a quality paperback, or sometimes even a durable hardback book. For many comic artists, the graphic novel format is preferable to the demands of a monthly publication since it allows them more room to stretch out and tell a story with greater detail and with a definite beginning and finite ending.

Celebrating their tenth anniversary this year - literally a generation in the small press world - Top Shelf Productions has had the good fortune to work with an impressive group of creators over the past decade, including talents like Alan Moore, Eddie Campbell, Jon B. Cooke, Dennis P. Eichhorn and James Kochalka. The company continues to grow and expand both its operation and the scope of the books that it publishes. The titles reviewed below scratch the surface of the entertaining reading material currently offered by Top Shelf, illustrating the company's commitment to quality and diversity.

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JEFF LEMIRE
Essex County Vol. 1: Tales From The Farm
(112pp, Top Shelf Productions)

I was unfamiliar with cartoonist Jeff Lemire before receiving this graphic novel from Top Shelf, but I have to count myself among his most ardent fans after reading Essex County Vol. 1: Tales From The Farm. The first in a proposed three-part series, this is the story of Lester, a ten-year-old boy whose mother recently died from cancer. Lester has never known his father and, with no other family, ends up going to live with his Uncle Ken on his farm in Essex County, Ontario Canada. Isolated, confused and probably more than a little angry, Lester finds a friend in Jimmy Lebeuf, the town's simple-minded gas station owner and a former pro hockey player.