“One of the things great art does, though, is upend its viewers’ preconceptions about what it can and should do, and very few contemporary cartoonists cut as vividly against the grain as the Japanese artist and graphic designer Yuichi Yokoyama.” – Douglas Wolk on Yuichi Yokoyama’s Garden. 

• If you haven’t done so already, you should really read Alexander Chee’s essay “Fanboy.” He shares some thoughts on how it came to be over at his blog.

• Kate Christensen has posted the first five chapters of her upcoming novel The Astral online.

• At HTML Giant: details on Gigantic‘s issue no.3 release party.