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Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown

July 27, 2017 by

Source: Gift
Paperback, 248 pgs.
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Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown begins with an introduction checklist of what makes a good cartoonist from Bill Griffith and a note from M.K. Brown. She says that there must be a spirit of “drawing without fear,” and when looking through this coffee table must-have, you can see fear plays no role in her cartoons or comics. Beginning in the 1970s, we see how Brown’s drawings (black-and-white, mostly) began and there is a bit of truth in these: that table you keep tripping over (Tripping Table) to the “Egg Solid Sandwich.” The ordinary people in her cartoons bring to life the squabbles of married couples, even those just starting out. From “housepeople” to people at work, it is clear that she has a keen sense of humor.

I love that Brown also provides some insight into what she was thinking when she created certain cartoons or comics, like listening to the Bee Gees or providing water to a thirsty grasshopper rescued from the drapes inside the house on a summer day. Even her inspirations are whimsical and funny. Imagine taking a grasshopper outside and giving it water when it fails to stand up on a succulent leaf. It takes a great deal of observation skills deduce the needs of a grasshopper, as it does to create witty cartoons about science and technology, particularly when a lot of the new stuff is hard to understand. Some of my favorites stem from those interminable waits on customer service lines.

Brown even takes some of the oldest gags and makes them sharp, like “you remind me of my mother” or those obvious questions you hear at cocktail hours, like “what do you do for a living?” Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown has a bit of everything in it for those looking for well told, humorous stories of romance to those who just love a good pun. Highly recommended for a good laugh.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

M.K. Brown grew up in Darien, Connecticut and New Brunswick, Canada. Her cartoons have been in all sorts of publications, above- and under-ground. She is naturally a bit selfish, maybe a little self-conscious, and self-centered, yet has an enlightened self-interest and a healthy curiosity about any new technology which happens to coincide with her trajectory at the time. She lives in northern California and her cartoons are about that process.

New Authors Reading Challenge 2017

Filed Under: comic, giveaway win, humor, New Authors Challenge, Read in 2017, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

Mailbox Monday #436

July 17, 2017 by

Mailbox Monday, created by Marcia at To Be Continued, formerly The Printed Page, has a permanent home at its own blog. To check out what everyone has received over the last week, visit the blog and check out the links. Leave yours too.

Also, each week, Leslie, Martha, and I will share the Books that Caught Our Eye from everyone’s weekly links.

Here’s what I received:

Stranger Than Life: Cartoons and Comics 1970-2013 by M.K. Brown, a gift.

M.K. Brown is one of the funniest cartoonists of the last four decades — or ever, take your pick — and her body of work has long been savored by aficionados but never comprehensively collected — until now. Stranger Than Life is the first retrospective of Brown’s cartoons and comics from their original appearances in the National Lampoon, Mother Jones, The New Yorker, Playboy, and other magazines and underground comics.

M.K. Brown’s comics stories satirize suburban anxiety and post-modern ennui by the sheer force of her gentle but piquant, off-kilter observations, along with her slightly pixilated but winsome characters, all of which are perfectly captured in her restless pen line and delicate jewel-tone watercolors.

In these pages: Read instructions for the use of glue, making a pair of pants, home auto repair, coping with chainsaw massacres, and jackknifing your big rig. “Another True-Life Pretty Face in the Field of Medicine” introduces Virginia Spears Ngodátu, who (with a bit of a name change) would go on to star in “Dr. Janice N!Godatu,” Brown’s series of animated shorts that appeared on The Tracy Ullman Show alongside the first incarnation of The Simpsons. Plus, enjoy aliens, old people, pilgrims, mermen, monitor lizards, tiny floating muggers and other weirdos in Brown’s side-splitting single-panel gag strips.

Prejudice Meets Pride by Rachel Anderson, purchased from Audible.

After years of pinching pennies and struggling to get through art school, Emma Makie’s hard work finally pays off with the offer of a dream job. But when tragedy strikes, she has no choice but to make a cross-country move to Colorado Springs to take temporary custody of her two nieces. She has no money, no job prospects, and no idea how to be a mother to two little girls, but she isn’t about to let that stop her. Nor is she about to accept the help of Kevin Grantham, her handsome neighbor, who seems to think she’s incapable of doing anything on her own.

Prejudice Meets Pride is the story of a guy who thinks he has it all figured out and a girl who isn’t afraid to show him that he doesn’t. It’s about learning what it means to trust, figuring out how to give and to take, and realizing that not everyone gets to pick the person they fall in love with. Sometimes, love picks them.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , , , , ,

An Age of License by Lucy Knisley

November 5, 2015 by

Source: Public Library
Paperback, 195 pgs.
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An Age of License by Lucy Knisley is another graphic memoir of a young artist who has a compulsion to draw those around her, no matter how creepy that may appear in a crowded restaurant.  These graphic memoirs are a great way to quickly get a look inside someone’s life, their fears, and their happy moments without feeling like you’re prying.  The comics provide just the right amount of distance to the narrative, and Knisley’s style is very conversational and intimate, but there are moments she keeps to herself — that’s ok too.

Knisley is someone many of us were in our twenties — adventurous in spite of the anxiety — beginning the lives we’ll lead into the future either alone or with a family of our own.  We explore; we get to know who we are as people; what we’re looking for; and sometimes finding things we didn’t know we wanted.  While we often find that we are jealous of our friends who find themselves, their callings, or the families they desire before we do, we still love them and hope that we’ll find those things too.

Knisley’s graphic memoirs seem to be written as she goes along, but it is clear that more thought goes on and further work takes place after her adventures are done.  These memoirs have their own conversational quality and she clearly digs deep into her experiences.  In this memoir she takes a trip to Norway for a comics convention, which turns into a whirlwind of visits in other countries throughout Europe — Germany, France, and Sweden.  She questions the direction of her life and career, she questions her inability to find stability in relationships, but most of all, she questions her perspective, which comes from a relative place of privilege compared to others.

An Age of License by Lucy Knisley is a realistic look at traveling abroad as someone who does not know a language other than English, and who is still struggling to find her place and become grounded.  It is often good to get away from the daily grind to think about life as it is and determine if that’s what you want it to be for the rest of your life, and Knisley asks and somewhat answers these questions for herself.  One point in the memoir was a bit ironic in that lovers go to Paris, engrave their names on locks, and add those locks to a bridge as a sign of undying devotion, only for those locks to be eventually torn off by authorities and thrown away.  Even those things that we find permanent may not be.

***Another shout out to Bermudaonion for pointing me in Knisley’s direction.  I’ve loved these books.***

Other reviews:

About the Author:

Beginning with an love for Archie comics and Calvin and Hobbes, Lucy Knisley (pronounced “nigh-zlee”) has always thought of cartooning as the only profession she is suited for. A New York City kid raised by a family of foodies, Lucy is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago currently pursuing an MFA at the Center for Cartoon Studies. While completing her BFA at the School of the Art Institute, she was comics editor for the award-winning student publication F News Magazine.

Lucy currently resides in New York City where she makes comics. She likes books, sewing, bicycles, food you can eat with a spoon, manatees, nice pens, costumes, baking and Oscar Wilde. She occasionally has been known to wear amazing hats.

Filed Under: borrowed copy, graphic novel, memoir, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Displacement by Lucy Knisley

October 13, 2015 by

Source: Public Library
Paperback, 161 pgs.
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Displacement by Lucy Knisley is part travelogue, part memoir, part comic, and it does an excellent job of illustrating the fears of younger generations when it comes to caring for elderly parents or grandparents.  Lucy volunteers to take her elderly grandparents on a cruise with their senior housing community, and while she loves her grandparents, she, like many grandchildren, still see them as capable and active adults, even though their health has declined.  Traveling with aging grandparents through a series of connecting flights and the boarding of a cruise ship is difficult, especially as Knisley’s grandmother is losing her memory and her grandfather has bladder control issues.  Readers are likely to giggle about some comedic moments, but what makes this book shine is the compassion, angst, and love that shines through in every page.

Knisley ponders what it means to be a good person and what her own motivations are for coming on the trip, as well as why her own family has a hard time expressing love for one another — with the closest to an “I love you” being “we’re so proud of your academic achievements.”  Although her grandparents have lost some of their memories, Knisley is lucky to have her grandfather’s memoir about his WWII experiences.  She discovers while reading this memoir in preparation for the cruise that her grandfather often threw caution to the wind, like not wearing a parachute while flying because it was uncomfortable.

Displacement by Lucy Knisley is not just about mortality and how many young people do not want to face it.  It is also about having compassion and love for your own roots, so much so that you set aside your own discomfort to make sure elderly relations enjoy their own time on vacation or just with family.  It also sheds light on the incredibly hard job it is to be a caregiver for the elderly, particularly when you’re not related to them.  Knisley gives readers a new respect for those working in nursing homes and elderly communities.

A definite contender for the year-end best list.

***Thanks to Bermudaonion for reviewing this one and calling my attention to it.***

Other reviews:

About the Author:

Beginning with an love for Archie comics and Calvin and Hobbes, Lucy Knisley (pronounced “nigh-zlee”) has always thought of cartooning as the only profession she is suited for. A New York City kid raised by a family of foodies, Lucy is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago currently pursuing an MFA at the Center for Cartoon Studies. While completing her BFA at the School of the Art Institute, she was comics editor for the award-winning student publication F News Magazine.

Lucy currently resides in New York City where she makes comics. She likes books, sewing, bicycles, food you can eat with a spoon, manatees, nice pens, costumes, baking and Oscar Wilde. She occasionally has been known to wear amazing hats.

Filed Under: borrowed copy, comic, memoir, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , ,