Another hat in the ring: Publishers Weekly (subscription required) reports that children's book publisher Roaring Brook Press plans to launch a comics and graphic novel imprint aimed at children and teen-agers. Mark Siegal, a former senior designer at Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, has been hired to run the imprint, which will release 12 to 15 books a year beginning in 2006.
 
Here's Roaring Brook publisher Simon Boughton: "Bookstores are paying attention. This generation of teens loves visual storytelling of all kinds, and the sensibility of comics artists like Chris Ware and Dan Clowes seems to speak directly to teenagers' concerns."