His minivan is his chariot and his mower is his weapon. Enter the whimsical world of the Suburban Luchador, suburbia's favorite underdog, father, husband... hero. He's the man who's making minivans, mowing and mortgages sexy again. In Suburban Luchador: Tales from the Burb Side, author Philip Rivera turns his ordinary family, marriage and teaching scenarios into offbeat and humorous slice-of-life adventures. For every mild-mannered, undiscovered underdog who thought they were the only ones who envision daily life as a music video or an epic movie scene, this is a heart-warming and humorous look at the wondrous, valiant and touching moments in our everyday lives.

His minivan is his chariot. His mower is his weapon. Enter the whimsical world of suburbia's favorite underdog. Meet the average Joe who's a father to three, a husband to one... a hero to all. When he's not fighting crime in his fighter-jet-cloaked-as-a-minivan, he teaches high school and patrols the 'hood for story material. In Suburban Luchador: The Cul-de-sac Chronicles, an ordinary guy conjures up extraordinary tales about his family, marriage, and teacher job. He's the man who's making mortgages, meatloaf, and the middle-class sexy again. This is the anthem of those who envision mowing and mopping as legendary movie scenes. These comically self-deprecating short stories will inspire you to take a fresh look at the wondrous, valiant and touching moments in everyday life. Dive into Suburban Luchador: The Cul-de-sac Chronicles and ride shotgun on a domestic road trip of epic proportions. Previously published under the title Suburban Luchador: Memoirs from Suburbia "Philip Rivera is a suburban dad who finds adventure in typical daily activities. I was fully cracking up while reading this book!" ☆☆☆☆☆ "Every single line had me either laughing uncontrollably or tugging at my heart... or both!" ☆☆☆☆☆ "Philip has a gift for the imagination and seeing the ordinary as an extraordinary adventure." ☆☆☆☆☆

Though the field of comic book studies has burgeoned in recent years, Latino characters and creators have received little attention. Putting the spotlight on this vibrant segment, Your Brain on Latino Comics illuminates the world of superheroes Firebird, Vibe, and the new Blue Beetle while also examining the effects on readers who are challenged to envision such worlds. Exploring mainstream companies such as Marvel and DC as well as rising stars from other segments of the industry, Frederick Aldama provides a new reading of race, ethnicity, and the relatively new storytelling medium of comics themselves. Overview chapters cover the evolution of Latino influences in comics, innovations, and representations of women, demonstrating Latino transcendence of many mainstream techniques. The author then probes the rich and complex ways in which such artists affect the cognitive and emotional responses of readers as they imagine past, present, and future worlds. Twenty-one interviews with Latino comic book and comic strip authors and artists, including Laura Molina, Frank Espinosa, and Rafael Navarro, complete the study, yielding captivating commentary on the current state of the trade, cultural perceptions, and the intentions of creative individuals who shape their readers in powerful ways.

The son of writer and satirist Bruce Jay Friedman, Kipp Friedman, wrote a memoir about growing up and getting into hi-jinx on both coasts with his brothers Drew and Josh Friedman (both famous in their own right): with appearances by mobster Joe Gallo, Groucho Marx, and others. Whether shooting pool with the mobster Crazy Joey Gallo, attending a dinner party hosted by an aged but remarkably spry Groucho Marx, or simply playing doctor with a classmate in the former estate of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Kipp Friedman led a colorful childhood. The youngest son of celebrated writer and satirist Bruce Jay Friedman, Kipp looks back fondly on the amusing and sometimes confusing events and encounters that helped shape his early life in this moving tribute to growing up among a family of creative artists―swept up in the whirlwind of the New York arts scene of the 1960s and ’70s. Follow Kipp’s exploits as bystander and willing participant as he joins older brothers Josh (writer and musician) and Drew (renowned cartoonist and illustrator) as three musketeers on a youthful quest to discover the scariest low-budget horror movies along 42nd Street and Times Square. Delight in their search for classic comic books, monster magazines (and the occasional “nudie” magazine) at their beloved, dingy “Back-Issue Store” in midtown Manhattan. Encounter his family’s bizarre Cold War-like relationship with their new neighbors in an updated suburban Jewish version of the Hatfields vs. the McCoys. Witness their Marx Brothers-like antics while on an all-expenses-paid junket at the Beverly Hills Hotel courtesy of CBS. The stage shifts from New York City to the Caribbean to the suburbs of Long Island, and from the South of France to Broadway and Hollywood as Kipp retraces his family’s defining moments―with the backdrop of his father’s meteoric rise from editor of men’s adventure magazines to successful novelist, playwright, and screenwriter. Through it all, Kipp paints a loving portrait of a childhood and family life that is both magical and yet familiar and real. Barracuda in the Attic is truly a family affair, written by Kipp, with a cover illustration by Drew Friedman, an introduction by paterfamilias Bruce Jay Friedman, and an afterword by Josh Friedman, and is copiously illustrated with photos of the family and their literati friends and hangers-on.

Thirteen-year-old Boli and his friends are deep in the middle of a game of marbles. An older boy named Mosca has won the prized Devil's Fire marble. His pals are jealous and want to win it away from him. This is Izayoc, the place of tears, a small pueblo in a tiny valley west of Mexico City where nothing much happens. It's a typical hot Sunday morning except that on the way to church someone discovers the severed head of Enrique Quintanilla propped on the ledge of one of the cement planters in the plaza and everything changes. Not apocalyptic changes, like phalanxes of men riding on horses with stingers for tails, but subtle ones: poor neighbors turning up with brand-new SUVs, pimpled teens with fancy girls hanging off them. Boli's parents leave for Toluca and don't arrive at their destination. No one will talk about it. A washed out masked wrestler turns up one day, a man only interested in finding his next meal. Boli hopes to inspire the luchador to set out with him to find his parents. Phillippe Diederich was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Mexico City and Miami. His parents were forced out of Haiti by the dictatorship of Papa Doc Duvalier in 1963. As a photojournalist, Diederich has traveled extensively through Mexico and witnessed the terrible tragedies of the Drug Wars.

"FBI Special Agent Nina Guerrera escaped a serial killer's trap at sixteen. Years later, when she's jumped in a Virginia park, a video of the attack goes viral. Legions of new fans are not the only ones impressed with her fighting skills. The man who abducted her eleven years ago is watching. Determined to reclaim his lost prize, he commits a grisly murder designed to pull her into the investigation--but his games are just beginning"--

Incredibly Strange Wrestling was the bastard offspring of post-punk garage rock and masked Mexican lucha libre. Fielding a cast of crazed characters with names like El Homo Loco, Mucho Sasquatcho and El Pollo Diablo, the show lives up to its name. Christians fought lions and Bigfoots mauled hapless hippies in some of the most surreal bouts ever staged. With a stage name swiped from a comic book kung-fu master, Calhoun broke into ISW as an untrained grappler and rapidly rose through the ranks. In this memoir he reveals the story of ISW with all the organised mayhem it deserves.

A Best Book of the Year at The Atlantic Los Angeles Times Bestseller "[An] absorbing and revealing book. . . . nestling in the fruitful terrain between memoir and criticism." —Geoff Dyer, author of Out of Sheer Rage Blending memoir and cultural criticism, Matthew Specktor explores family legacy, the lives of artists, and a city that embodies both dreams and disillusionment. In 2006, Matthew Specktor moved into a crumbling Los Angeles apartment opposite the one in which F. Scott Fitzgerald spent the last moments of his life. Fitz had been Specktor’s first literary idol, someone whose own passage through Hollywood had, allegedly, broken him. Freshly divorced, professionally flailing, and reeling from his mother’s cancer diagnosis, Specktor was feeling unmoored. But rather than giving in or “cracking up,” he embarked on an obsessive journey to make sense of the mythologies of “success” and “failure” that haunt the artist’s life and the American imagination. Part memoir, part cultural history, part portrait of place, Always Crashing in the Same Car explores Hollywood through a certain kind of collapse. It’s a vibrant and intimate inspection of failure told through the lives of iconic, if under-sung, artists—Carole Eastman, Eleanor Perry, Warren Zevon, Tuesday Weld, and Hal Ashby, among others—and the author’s own family history. Through this constellation of Hollywood figures, he unearths a fascinating alternate history of the city that raised him and explores the ways in which curtailed ambition, insufficiency, and loss shape all our lives. At once deeply personal and broadly erudite, it is a story of an art form (the movies), a city (Los Angeles), and one person’s attempt to create meaning out of both. Above all, Specktor creates a moving search for optimism alongside the inevitability of failure and reveals the still-resonant power of art to help us navigate the beautiful ruins that await us all.

' "Did you see the big fight this weekend'" The question used to be about boxing matches, when the giants of the fight world were Mike Tyson and Roy Jones. Now fans are leaving the sweet science in droves for the combat sport of the future: mixed martial arts (MMA). MMA has drawn millions on cable and network television, as well as out-performed professional wrestling and boxing on pay-per-view. Fans are attracted to the sport, but unlike boxing (where strategy and technique are limited to using both your left and right hands), an MMA fight can be surprisingly complicated. The MMA Encyclopedia puts the fighters, the facts, and the fundamentals of the world's fastest growing sport at your fingertips as the definitive reference guide to mixed martial arts. The encyclopedia will break the MMA language barrier for those who don't know a wristlock from a wristwatch, while at the same time offering perspective and analysis that will entertain the hardcore fan who already has the basics down pat. With three appendices that detail the results of every MMA'fight in history, this the ultimate reference book for the ultimate sport.