On June 29, the sixth volume of "Saga" releases in trade paperback, or as it’s commonly called, tradeback. This is huge news for comic fans everywhere, but even if you’ve never read a comic in your life, you should be excited. Over the last few years, "Saga" has become one of the bestselling comic books out there, and has somehow remained under the radar from the mainstream. It’s now the bestselling book from indie comic publisher Image, best known to most for "The Walking Dead."

So what book is possibly good enough to be outselling "The Walking Dead"? Before diving into what makes "Saga" so enthralling, I want to give a warning. The book is great, but is most certainly only for mature audiences. I won’t discuss the mature content here, but the book does contain sexual content, strong language, nudity and violence. If you’re okay with all of that however, you’ll discover one of the best science fiction worlds ever built. At the heart of the story is the war between the winged members of Landfall, and the winged residents of the planet’s moon, Wreath. This war has been waging on so long that it has spread to essentially the entire galaxy, while the moon and planet have reached a, more or less, standstill. It’s in this environment that Hazel is born; she’s the daughter of the winged Alana, and the horned Marko. Needless to say, nobody is happy about this. The people tracking the runaway family down include bounty hunters, known as freelancers, the Robot Empire, and Marko’s own family and ex-fiancé. It’s a story that could have simply been generic, but the characters truly help it stand out.

One of the most intriguing is Izabel, Hazel’s babysitter. She’s your average teenage girl, with the catch that she’s a ghost and missing her bottom half. Seriously, you can see the poor thing’s intestines, yet she remains a spunky teenager nonetheless. It’s these kinds of unique takes on old tropes that make the book shine. One of the freelancers, The Will, is also extremely compelling. We see him go through tons of trauma, and he always reminds us that yes, he does have a heart. His sidekick, Lying Cat, is quite possibly the most popular character, and you even have seen him before. He’s a large, blue, hairless cat, that at first might seem kind of ugly. As the series goes on however, Lying Cat shines as being adorable because he is literally a lie detector. He never speaks, until someone lies, and then he simply says “lying.”

Not only do these characters make the book great, they keep the book grounded. For all of the space antics that happen, the book is very accessible due to the characters being relatable. No other space series is quite as easy to get into, and once you pick it up, it’s hard to put it down. The series is written by the great Brian K Vaughan, creator of Marvel’s "Runaways," and drawn by Fiona Staples. Together the two have created one of the best comics ever, and it feels nothing like other comics. There’s not a cape or mask in sight, and with superheroes everywhere in pop culture, it’s nice to see someone experimenting with the medium. You can either buy each chapter, or you can buy the aforementioned trade backs, which contain six chapters, and run between $9.99 and $14.99. With volume six just now releasing, now’s the time to jump into the best comic book series there is.