Tombolo Books and the ArtsXchange present cartoonist Jason Lutes and his epic graphic novel, Berlin. Twenty years in the making, this sweeping masterpiece charts Berlin through the rise of Nazism.
St. Petersburg, FL – October 22 – St. Petersburg’s newest independent bookstore, Tombolo Books, in conjunction with the ArtsXchange in the Warehouse Arts District will host cartoonist Jason Lutes to celebrate the publication of the third and final paperback installment of Berlin (Berlin: City of Light, Drawn and Quarterly, 168 pages, $24.95), as well as the hardcover omnibus edition (Berlin, Drawn and Quarterly, 580 pages, $49.95). The art and book talk is open to the public and will be followed by a book signing.
ABOUT THE BOOK: During the past two decades, Jason Lutes has quietly created one of the masterworks of the graphic novel golden age. Berlin has more than 100,000 copies in print and is one of the high-water marks of the medium: rich in its well-researched historical detail, compassionate in its character studies, and as timely as ever in its depiction of a society slowly awakening to the stranglehold of fascism.
The city itself is the central protagonist in this historical fiction. Lavish salons, crumbling sidewalks, dusty attics, and train stations: all these places come alive in Lutes' masterful hand. Weimar Berlin was the world's metropolis, where intellectualism, creativity, and sensuous liberal values thrived, and Lutes maps its tragic, inevitable decline. Devastatingly relevant and beautifully told, Berlin is one of the great epics of the comics medium.
Jason Lutes graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with a BFA in illustration, and in 1993 he began drawing a weekly comics page called Jar of Fools for Seattle's The Stranger. Lutes lives in Vermont with his partner and two children, where he teaches comics at the Center for Cartoon Studies.
PRAISE:
“With its rich sense of time and place, nuanced portrayal of individual destinies, precisely rendered imagery, and poetic expression of themes, Jason Lutes’s Berlin is truly a masterful narrative.” --Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow
“A watershed achievement—Berlin charted new territory for the graphic novel and comics at the same time, at once a story about artists trying to make art during the rise of the Nazis in Germany, and a bildungsroman of the first order. This landmark collection returns this story to us now when we need examples of how to stay human to each other in the face of a politics that turns friends into enemies—a newly necessary book.” --Alexander Chee, The Queen of the Night
“Jason Lutes’s Berlin [offers] a history of the city in a way that’s accessible and yet mind-opening. All the benefits of a good novel are here: three-dimensional characters, a dynamic plot, and a well-drawn setting.” --Nancy Pearl, NPR
The bookstore requests that you purchase a copy from Tombolo Books if you plan on attending the event. If you own other books by Jason Lutes, you are welcome to bring them. If you cannot attend but would like a SIGNED COPY please notify the bookstore. Pre-orders are encouraged and rewarded! Purchase online at tombolobooks.com, call (727)755-9456 or email alsace@tombolobooks.com
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