In the first of two stories that comprise Visual Crime, Rotart Sulli, a painter who illustrates crime fiction, gets a peculiar requirement along with an assignment: he is to stay at Hotel Ace in room 611 until his illustration is finished. In the book's second story, Sulli is once again hired to illustrate a crime story; and once again, he's told to place the finished work "in your back window - it will be seen." Visual Crime also collects a dozen short stories occupying a single page, all illustrated by "Sulli's" Hopperesque paintings, which alternate with Moriarty's rough-hewn, proletarian pen-and-ink panels. It's a portrait of the artist working alone in a mysterious and uncertain world, creating stunning images that transcend the melodramatic stories they illustrate.

• TPB
  1/25/2022