Birthday Books

Comics

I love love love comics -- the funny ones and the ones that mess with my head, not that those categories are mutually exclusive. My husband knows that I count on a comic fix a couple of times a year (my birthday is conveniently located five months after Christmas, so there's never more than about half a year until the next important book-giving occasion on any given day), and plans accordingly. This year, he really outdid himself.

In no particular order, then, I received:

Bill Amend's latest FoxTrot cartoon collection, Orlando Bloom has Ruined Everything. I love FoxTrot anyway, but this was particularly well-timed since I've recently acquired a good friend who refers to Bloom as her second husband. (She's currently married to her first, and is attempting to negotiate some kind of deal whereby she can have Bloom as a simultaneous second spouse rather than a sequential one. Further bulletins as events warrant.) If you love the Lord of the Rings movie for all the wrong reasons, or know someone who does, or just enjoy laughing so hard that you stop even trying to drink that cup of coffee while you read the book for fear of spit-take damage, the six strips devoted to purist nerd boy Jason Fox and his Bloom-infatuated older sister Paige would make the book worth buying even if you're stupid enough not to enjoy the rest of it. ("You read 'Return of the King,' Jason -- does Tolkien mention Orlando Bloom a lot?" I will never stop loving that line.)

Nighthogs, a collection of Stephan Pastis' Pearls Before Swine strip. PBSw isn't nearly as well-known and appreciated as it ought to be. I base this statement on solid anecdotal evidence, since whenever I mention it I am greeted with blank faces in spite of the fact that this strip is a brilliant combination of spare lines and unsparing social satire. Pastis claims that his comic is so visually simple because he really doesn't know how to draw, but he's just trying to make you feel sorry for him. Pay no attention. But buy his books, because they're good and because otherwise he might end up one of those corner "Spare change?" guys or, worse, go back to being a lawyer.

No Collar, No Service is the latest volume of "Pooch Café" cartoons. I have been pretty much unable to live without PC since my husband, who up until that evening had been enjoying the strip via computer comic service all by himself and without feeling any need to share, showed me one. In it, the two main character dogs are looking longingly up at a beehive, thinking that they'd love to have some honey, but they don't want it enough to risk getting stung. Now, if that hive were full of peanut butter, boy, they'd be up there like a shot. "Yeah, or ham!" one of them adds. To which the other dog says witheringly, "Okay, now you're just being ridiculous." This slew me then and continues to do so now. I admit that having the dialogue without benefit of art isn't quite the full experience, but still, right about now you ought to be feeling an irresistible urge to go buy this collection, along with PC's self-titled debut album. If not, do it anyway. There are some things you should just take my word for, and this is about five of them.

I have been enjoying the "Lucky Cow" comic strip since my husband threw it into the mix of the comics I get in the (e)mail every day. Now, at last, there's an actual physical book collection of them -- Lucky Cow, by Mark Pett. Lucky Cow is a franchise fast-food burger place, staffed by (among others) a vegetarian, a sweet-tempered village idiot type, and the sullen teenage daughter of the owner. Fun stuff, but if you're in the habit of reading while you eat (as I am), don't haul this one out on burger night. It's a little like watching "Supersize Me" while settling down to enjoy a nice big order of McNuggets.

When it comes to writing fiction, we've all figured out that there are no new story ideas, only the old ones told well or recommended by Oprah. Comics still have not only the room but the need to experiment and diversify. "Get Fuzzy," for instance, is technically a talking animal strip, but it is so insanely original that only someone who'd been doing some truly pioneering work in the field of what can qualify as a mind-altering substance if you shove it directly up your nose would think of comparing it to "Garfield." And so with Rob Harrell's innovative comic "Big Top," of which there is finally a collection available. It is, as the title implies, a strip about a circus, but if you're now prompted to run away screaming at the thought of underwhelmingly cute clowns prancing about and speaking words of adorable wisdom, c'mon back. It's safe. I've said before that for humor to work, it has to create a universe of its own that bears enough of a resemblance to our current one to be plausible, but different enough to be appealing, and funny enough for the outsider to want to just crawl in and stay a while. Harrell does this perfectly. His talking animals talk, but they're still animals. In one strip, Pete, an eleven-year-old who's the main human character in the strip, asks Kingston the lion what to bring as a gift on a date. "Dead antelope," Kingston replies with what must be a reminiscent smile. "Works every time." There's a panel of pause, in which Pete looks pained and Kingston clearly realizes that this advice isn't as helpful as he'd intended it to be. "Or candy," he adds at last.

Lela Lee has a very strange, truly alternative, extremely-wrong-in-just-the-right-way comic called Angry Little Girls. It's exactly what it sounds like. Well, not quite. Not all the little girls in the comic are angry, and not all the kids are girls (just most of them). This comic is a tiny, tiny bit like early Peanuts on acid -- children with distinct personalities having bizarre conversations and refusing to be predictable or conventionally cute. Granted, no Peanuts strip ever had quite this many bad words. A typical (if comparatively tame in the language respect) panel reads: "There was once a little Asian girl. Because she was small and relatively cute, people thought she'd politely do as they wished." Beneath is a drawing of the girl and a little boy. The boy asks, "Can I borrow 20 bucks again?" The girl answers "Hell no!" Gives you enough to go on. Very funny, very rereadable.

Speaking of early Peanuts, the "Complete Peanuts" series recently released their latest collection. This one is all the comics from 1955 to '56. I firmly believe that Schulz' work is like wine -- some years are better than others, but in general old is good. All of the books in this series are must-haves for anyone who sees no contradiction between taking comic art seriously and laughing your bootie off. Matt Groening (rhymes with complaining -- hey, he said it) wrote the introduction to this latest collection, so it's doubly worth having. (I realize it's nerdy, but yes, I do read introductions. And when I don't, I feel vaguely guilty all the rest of the day. Yes, I am sicko. Get me help.)

My husband turned me on to "Usagi Yojimbo" almost twenty years ago, which makes me feel really old. Usagi is a character in a comic based in feudal Japan; his name means "rabbit bodyguard," which is a perfectly accurate description of who and what he is. All the characters in this comic are anthropomorphized animals. There is, however, nothing cutesy about Usagi's universe. He is a masterless samurai who wanders the country looking for work. He makes both friends and enemies along the way, and his ideas of honor and duty are sometimes disquieting, even distasteful, to modern western readers. But the story is compelling and the writing maintains a fine balance between serious, straightforward storytelling and wry, even goofy humor (Godzilla makes an occasional guest appearance, as do the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). I received the latest book-form collection of comics this year -- volume 18, Travels With Jotaro. Naturally it was much too short, plus it ended on a cliffhanger, so I'm really miffed. I'll just have to reread my back issues and mutter to myself until the next collection comes along.

If you get as addicted to Usagi as I have, you may need to buy The Art of Usagi Yojimbo. This book gives a glimpse of what goes into creating the beautifully drawn, meticulously researched work. Stan Sakai is an extremely modest, soft-spoken, matter-of-fact artist, so this glimpse into his creative process is deeply appreciated, especially since he never uses pretentious phrases like "creative process." This book is lovingly assembled from the highest-quality materials, at a far higher level of craftsmanship than your usual coffee table volume. It's also the only comic book I received this last birthday that I haven't yet finished, so if you'll excuse me, I've got some reading to do.

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