• I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned it, what with it being one of my absolute favorites for the past half-decade, but Stand Still, Stay Silent has returned from inter-chapter (and in this case, inter-adventure) hiatus. The gang are exactly where we saw them last — locked in quarantine aboard a freighter, returning from the Silent World with their lives and some intelligence, but not as much loot as was hoped.

  The dead are still dead, the trolls are still trolls, and it’ll be interesting to see how Minna Sundberg motivates any of them to want to head away from the confines of home again. They’re all still haunted by the loss of Tuuri, but perhaps Lalli most of all. Emil’s been forced to grow the hell up some, and might see the value in staying somewhere that isn’t trying to kill him or drive him insane at all times. Maybe he’ll take up Finnish so he and Lalli can finally converse.

  Mikkel is tough to read; I get the feeling that he’d go back with others out of a sense of obligation, but not otherwise. Sigrun has been a hell-raiser, but losing somebody under her command like that gave her a real pause. And Reynir just wanted to see the world outside of his sheep meadow; he had no idea that it would be the Silent World. He’s ready to take up the crook again and never leave the paddock … except for those mage stirring’s he’s feeling. Kitty just wants scritches, and I wonder who’ll she’ll choose to go with.

  It’s as good as it ever was, and while I can’t see the road ahead, I’m sure that Sundberg knows what she’s doing. Updates Moon’s day, Tyr’s day, Thor’s day, and Freja’s Day, with gorgeous full-color pages.

• Kerstin La Cross’s Bashers, an autobio telling of a particularly challenging (in more than just the physical sense) hike on the Pacific Crest Trail, started in June, ran for a chunk of summer, then hit hiatus (appropriately, La Cross was out hiking for a bit, then had to catch up on her work). It’s been back for a bit less than a month (keeping in mind that it updates Saturdays and Sundays, so you haven’t missed that much) and the tension is ramping up on Day Two of the adventure.

  We know from the prologue that things come to a head on Day Three, and at that point she and her husband will be far enough out on the trail that displeasure with one’s partner can’t be avoided by going to another room. You’ll have to get to the pickup point together, if only because food and shelter have to be shared. I can’t imagine getting into a spousal argument (the worst kind) and then not being able to clear off and cool down until days later. I said it when Bashers started, this is a brave thing that La Cross is doing, sharing this history. Give it a read.

• So there’s this guy, Rob Rogers. He was the editorial cartoonist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for 25 years (picking up a Pulitzer nomination along the way), and then one day he wasn’t. Like editorial cartoonists are supposed to do, he took aim at politics, and these days that means the screamy idiot who is inexplicably occupying the White House. Turns out the publisher and editor of the Post-Gazette are major trumpaloompas, and fired Rogers for doing his job too well. He’s since been replaced by somebody willing to meet the publisher’s sensibilities¹.

  Rogers, however, kept ownership of his cartoons when he left, which is why he’s able to print a new collection, which was announced today by publisher IDW. Enemy Of The People: A Cartoonists’ Journey. While the press release I received lacks certain details other media indicate it’s due out 11 December at a US$25 price point. Order it now to get under Reality Show Mussolini’s skin.

Spam of the day:

Give Yourself a Makeover with a New Hairdo | Hair Extensions

I may not be handsome in the Jon Hamm mode, but one thing I got? Lustrous hair. Drunk women in bars want to get their hands all over it.

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¹ Not sure where you’d find somebody of sufficient deference this side of Ben Garrison or Michael Ramirez, but he managed to. No links because those guys suck. Really, Garrison’s a white supremacy propagandist, and Ramirez is just this side of Kelly when it comes to hackiness.