Ice Haven by Daniel Clowes

Dan Clowes is one the of greatest living cartoonists. (He's also an excellent screenwriter, having co-written Ghost World and the forthcoming Art School Confidential, both based on stories appearing in his comic book, Eight Ball.)

Clowes' latest full-length book, Ice Haven, tells the story of a senseless murder, told in the form of newspaper style comic strip vignettes. Several stories are interwoven throughout the main story, which takes place in a deceptively staid small town called Ice Haven. Clowe's melancholy color palette is terrific here, bringing to mind the faded dreams of a town that had hoped to become a sort of winter paradise, but instead ended up as a place where people's dreams freeze and die. This book is Clowes at his best. Link