salon has an article today on alan moore. the accompanying illustration is pretty great, too.
so the regulator is in the midst of a 20% off sale (for members) and even though i have been diligently using my library card, i really felt the need to shop at least a little. and i had a few things on hold there . . .
one of the things i had on hold was robert coover's stepmother, which turned out to be a mcsweeney's book. that totally explains its vaguely silly, dark perspective on fairy tales. it's one of those turning-fairy-tales-on-their-head books, only not really; the illustrations are stunning--stark and entrancing. it's only 89 pages so it doesn't count toward my 100 books, but i definitely recommend picking it up just for fun.
i also picked up the latest issue of bitch magazine. i'm not sure why i keep buying this, as i'm consistently underwhelmed with its content (has it gone downhill? i loved it in college. or have i outgrown it in some capacity?). i guess i'm tired of its overtly political/academic bent. the interview w/ diane dimassa (who drew the hothead paisan comics) was pretty great, but the one w/ em and lo was pretty bland (so disappointing--i adore them!). i did like the article on male "homosociality" and the very favorable camera obscura review (they called them "subversive," hee!) but otherwise was pretty much bored during the course of my reading.
i think i just prefer bust's take on female-friendly articles--they're a lot more fun! and it's not like they don't have a feminist agenda, but they don't need to overly politicize everything--it's definitely aimed more at the feminists of my generation, who generally aren't so angry (which doesn't mean we're not activists!) and are maybe more creative. i never see much on diy stuff in bitch.
hee, and another book i got was this hilarious book called "english as she is spoke," an english phrasebook originally written in 1855 by a portuguese man who didn't actually know english. needless to say, it's really entertaining for word nerds like me.
Have you looked at/read McSweeney's #13? Edited by Chris Ware, all comics, very good.
ReplyDeleteyes, i have (and i really should have posted my comments here--i bought it before this blog existed).
ReplyDeletei thought it was a great overview of the current comics scene--my only beef was that half the stuff in it wasn't new and was stuff i already own! it was sort of touted as new stuff from all my favorites but it wasn't. :(
but if either of my two readers here really liked any of the stuff in #13, let me know--chances are good i have the book it came from, or something equally compelling by the same author, and i'm happy to lend it out.
i totally adored the layout though--and my favorite thing in the whole book was the tiny minicomic tucked in the back cover. adorable!