Cartoonists who are not Delaine depict their miserable high school years that were miserable. There's angst about popularity, getting beaten up, horrible teachers, bad hair, and more than I expected about boys' libidos. I mean, as a woman, I understand from pop culture that adolescent boys are sex-obsessed, but I didn't fully grasp that the arty nerdy guys are just as strung out as meathead future frat boys.
Last year the note on Jessa's copy of my Winter Solstice Shout Out zine asked if she was going to make a dissertation procrastination zine. On the first page of Jessa's new zine she answers me, "Yes, Jenna. Yes, I am."
You may recall that I was enthusiastic about Min's first memoir, Red Azalea and her novel Wild Ginger. I expected to like Cooked Seed twice as hard. It starts more or less where Azalea leaves off--at Min's emigration to the US. Somehow, even after the stories of Cultural Revolution privations, cruelties and humiliations in the first part, Seed is harder to take. I guess because you can blame Min's problems on her, or maybe because you have to blame some of her problems on the United States.
The intro to Taryn Hipp's "memoir novella" begins, "The first time I decided to write my story of sobriety, I was somewhere around two years sober. I put my story down on paper, copied it and shared it with strangers and friends, even my family." I love that "even my family." It's such a zinester thing to say and feel. I also love that she writes toward the end of the intro "I am a zine maker, not a book writer, and this is a perfect bound zine as much as it is a book." Heavy Hangs the Head does read like an extended-play zine, rather than like a short memoir/memoirvella, but the package is for sure a full-fledged book. Sage of Sweet Candy did a beautiful job with the production and publishing.
Joan Didion's writing is always elegant, haunting and clever, which is true, as ever in Blue Nights. Even so, this memoir about her daughter's death is no Year of Magical Thinking (Didion's memoir about losing her husband, around the same time).
Vanessa Davis is only about ten years younger than me, but reading her memoir comics and sketches I felt like a youth culture voyeur, sort of like I did when I watched the Girls pilot, featuring characters closer to twenty years my junior. Davis was 26-32 when she drew the comics collected here, so maybe my reaction isn't too far-fetched. Anyway, that's not to say that I didn't like her work, not at all! I just felt a little distant from it. Some of the issues, feelings and experiences rang true for me, but as in "I get it," rather than "I feel that."
Ramsey, whose zine List I've long been a fan of, moves from Chicago to Philadelphia and documents her first year there in one-week chunks. I've read a fair amount of daily comics, which I also like, but I appreciate how an artist giving herself a week allows her more space and the opportunity to be more selective about what she chooses to illustrate and share.
Cover image from author's website.
I've now read the material in this book three times, once as a series of blog posts, the second time in manuscript and now as a gen-u-ine book. Three times, and each time I was dazzled by Laura's honesty, insight, generosity, kindness, love, snark and beautiful writing.
The title pretty much tells you what it's about, the non-LC subject headings give you a few more clues:
Crossett, Laura--Confessions.
Pregnant women--Mental Health.
Christian biography--United States.
Pregnancy, Unplanned--United States. [Extra fun: search your favorite library catalog for "unplanned pregnanc*" and see what subject headings your results yield.]
Wayward spinsters--Iowa--Iowa City.
Intrauterine contraceptives--FAIL.
(Disclaimer: I am friends with Laura, and I helped with the subject headings.)
I was really looking forward to reading this graphic memoir of growing up in 1980s Poland. Sowa and Savoia depict lots of surprising realities--the privations of life behind the Iron Curtain, like chewing window putty for want of gum--and life-shaking historical moments, like Solidarnosc, but maybe because Sowa was so young during the time period she's telling us about, there isn't enough nuance or engagement to make her story as compelling as I wanted it to be.
If you've been paying any attention at all, you know that I'm a huge Celia Perez fan. In fact I reviewed last year's issue of The Shortest Day here, most glowingly.
