Best comics and graphics books of 2008

It's the "Best Of" season, and several lists of graphics and comic books have popped up in the last week. On Sunday (12/7), the New York Times Book Review weighed in with its picks. Reviewer Douglas Wolk chose eleven notables, including Jason Lute's "BERLIN: City of Smoke", the second volume in his Berlin trilogy set in Weimar Germany (sample below).

Drawn! has a list in two parts that features a couple of books that I've enjoyed recently, Lynda Barry's "What It Is" and Richard Thompson's "Cul de Sac".

Comic Book Galaxy declares Jaime Hernandez's the "Education of Hopey Glass" the best graphic novel of the year and picks standouts in nine other categories.

No one mentions the recently released collection of Bill Mauldin's collected cartoons, "Willie & Joe: The WWII Years" or the terrific biography of Mauldin, "Bill Mauldin: A Life Up Front ", written by Todd DePastino and published earlier this year. I also recommend Pat Oliphant's collection of cartoons covering the Bush years, "Leadership".

For New Englanders looking for local flavor, there is Peter Wallace's "Cartoon Boston", a collection of the best of his Harry Fig cartoons, published weekly in the Sunday Globe.

Comics Reporter has an exchange between Tom Spurgeon and Steven Grant on the the 2008 comics landscape and the criteria for making up annual lists.

Happy holiday reading.