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Photo by Christopher Butcher

Want to try reading comics? Don’t know where to start? Want to try something different?

Wednesday is New Comics Day! Each week, The Comics Observer spotlights up to three brand new releases worthy of your consideration. All of these have been carefully selected as best bets for someone who has never read comic books, graphic novels or manga before. They each highlight the variety and creativity being produced today. These are also great for those that haven’t read comics in awhile or regular readers looking to try something new.

While we can’t guarantee you’ll like what we’ve picked, we truly believe there’s a comic for everyone. If you like the images and descriptions below, click the links to see previews and learn more about them. You can often buy straight from the publishers or creators. If not, head over to your local comic book store, check out online retailers like Things From Another World and Amazon, or download a copy at comiXology, or the comics and graphic novels sections of the Kindle Store or NOOK store. Let us know what you think in the comments below or on Facebook.

For a full list of this week’s new releases, see comiXology, ComicList.com and PREVIEWSworld.

(Please note these aren’t reviews. Recommendations are based on pre-release buzz, previews, and The Comics Observer‘s patented crystal ball. Product descriptions provided by publisher.)

Fanny and Romeo by Yves Pelletier and Pascal Girard

Fanny and Romeo
Written by Yves Pelletier
Illustrated by Pascal Girard
Published by Conundrum Press
Genre: Comedy
Ages: 12+
$20.00

It’s him or the cat in this charming collaboration between first time author (and renown Quebec comic actor) Yves Pelletier and the established artist Pascal Girard (winner of the Doug Wright Award for Bigfoot).

The story concerns a young couple, Fanny wants to have children, and Fabien doesn’t feel ready. Then a cat called Romeo comes into their lives. She falls in love, but he’s allergic. Fanny becomes more and more attached to the cat, to the point where she actually rents a separate apartment for it. But it turns out her Romeo has actually been two-timing her.

A perfect blend of Pelletier’s writing with Girard’s beautiful watercolors, this story will warm the hearts of cat lovers and people lovers alike!

Barrage by Kouhei Horikoshi

Barrage Volume 1
Written and illustrated by Kouhei Horikoshi
Published by VIZ Media
Genre: Action/Adventure, Science Fiction, Comedy
Ages: 12+
192 pages
$9.99

Spunky slum kid Astro gets the chance of a lifetime to end the chaos ripping apart his home planet when the playboy prince switches places with him. Now Astro has become Prince Barrage, a boy charged with the duty of restoring peace to the planet…and given an all-powerful magical spear to do it!

In order to save the planet, Astro will have to battle terrifying aliens while learning how to fight from his even more frightening guardian, the exacting knight Tiamat. Does a kid like Astro have what it takes to become the real prince and save the planet?

Messages in a Bottle by B. Krigstein

Messages in a Bottle: Comic Book Stories by B. Krigstein
Written and illustrated by Bernard Krigstein
Edited by Greg Sadowski
Published by Fantagraphics Books
Genre: Anthology
Ages: 16+
272 pages
$35.00

Working in comic books for just over a decade in the 1940s and ’50s, Bernard Krigstein applied all the craft, intelligence, and ambition of a burgeoning “serious” artist, achieving results that remain stunning to this day. While his legend rests mostly on his landmark narratives created for EC Comics, dozens of stories for lesser publishers equally showcase his singular draftsmanship and radical reinterpretation of the comics page.

Harvey and Eisner Award-winning Krigstein biographer Greg Sadowski has assembled the very best of the artist’s work, starting with his earliest creative rumblings, through his glory days at EC, to his final daring experiments for Stan Lee’s Atlas Comics — running through nearly every genre popular at the time, be it horror, science fiction, war, western, or romance.

This edition reprints the out-of-print 2004 hardcover B. Krigstein Comics, with a number of stories re-tooled and improved in terms of reproduction, and several new stories added. Legendary EC colorist Marie Severin, in her last major assignment before her retirement, recolored 20 stories for this edition. The remainder has been taken from printed comics, digitally restored with subtlety and restraint. Original art pages, photostats from Krigstein’s personal archives, and an extensive set of historical and editorial notes by Sadowski round out this compelling volume.

Honorable mentions for new editions of two favorites:

Last Day in Vietnam by Will Eisner

Last Day in Vietnam: A Memory
Written and illustrated by Will Eisner
Published by Dark Horse Comics
Genre: War, Memoir
Ages: 16+
80 pages
$17.99

Joe the Barbarian by Grant Morrison and Sean Murphy

Joe the Barbarian
Written by Grant Morrison
Illustrated by Sean Murphy
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics
Genre: Fantasy
Ages: 16+
224 pages
$19.99

Joe is an imaginative young kid of 11 who happens to suffer from type 1 diabetes. He can’t fit in at school. He’s the victim of bullies. His dad died overseas in the Iraq war. Without supervision and insulin, he can easily slip into a delirious, disassociative state that presages coma and death.

One fateful day, his condition causes him to believe he has entered a vivid fantasy world in which he is the lost savior — a fantastic land based on the layout and contents of his home. His desperate attempts to make it out of his bedroom and down the mountainous stairs, to find food, switch the lights on and answer the phone to his mother, transform into an incredible, epic adventure through a bizarre landscape of submarine pirate dwarves, evil Hell Hounds, Lightning Lords and besieged castles; a landscape which allows him to work out his own and his family’s problems.

But is his quest really just an insulin-deprived delirium — from which he can die if he doesn’t take his meds — or something much bigger?