NEAR DEATH IS FULL OF LIFE

Faerber and Guglielmini’s New Ongoing Crime Comic Debuts in September

Berkeley, CA – 14 June 2011 – Can a near death experience change a brutal killer into a better man? That's the question Jay Faerber will be answering this September with NEAR DEATH, an all-new creator-owned crime series illustrated by up-and-coming artist Simone Guglielmini.

In a departure from Faerber's work on long-running superhero titles like NOBLE CAUSES and DYNAMO 5, NEAR DEATH is a crime series fueled by regret: After getting a glimpse of his own disturbing life after death while clinically dead for two minutes, professional killer Markham vows to do whatever it takes to prevent his return to the hell he saw before he was revived. He vows to save as many lives as possible, in the hopes that he can somehow balance the scales of judgement.

“After spending most of my career working on superheroes, I'm really excited to be concentrating on my other favorite genre -- crime fiction,” Faerber explained. “NEAR DEATH features all the things I love about the genre: the grim hero with no first name and a tortured past, brutal action sequences, and characters with shifting morals and loyalties."

Gugielmini added: “I’m having a great time illustrating Jay’s story, because it’s just so engrossing. Sometimes I really get caught up in portraying the action and tension of these pages. This stuff is intense!”

Still more than two months ahead of its release date, the first issue of NEAR DEATH has already received praise from some of comics most celebrated writers:

“NEAR DEATH is a killer new crime book with a very sharp hook. Jay and Simone have pumped some much-needed new blood into the assassin genre. Get it.” – Brian K. Vaughn (Y: THE LAST MAN, Lost)

“Lean, tough and smart, NEAR DEATH grabs you from the very first scene and never lets go. As far as first issues go, this one is near perfect.” – John Layman of (CHEW)

NEAR DEATH #1 (JUL110404), a 32-page full color crime/adventure comic book for $2.99, is available to order in the July edition of Diamond Previews catalog, and will be at a comic store near you on September 21, 2011.

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Image Comics is a comic book and graphic novel publisher founded in 1992 by a collective of best-selling artists. Image has since gone on to become one of the largest comics publishers in the United States. Image currently has five partners: Robert Kirkman, Erik Larsen, Todd McFarlane, Marc Silvestri and Jim Valentino. It consists of five major houses: Todd McFarlane Productions, Top Cow Productions, Shadowline, Skybound and Image Central. Image publishes comics and graphic novels in nearly every genre, sub-genre, and style imaginable. It offers science fiction, romance, horror, crime fiction, historical fiction, humor and more by the finest artists and writers working in the medium today. For more information, visit www.imagecomics.com.