A gentle suggestion for Alex before I start the review: a character guide or brief synopsis tucked away somewhere on the inside front cover would be a good idea going forward. That’s true for roughly every ongoing series where the issues come out several months (or years) apart, and I was able to keep it all straight this time, but if this turns into a homespun behemoth, it’ll be helpful. So what’s this comic all about? It’s a series of stories about various people who live in a small town, with several of them bouncing off each other. Things start off on the inside front cover with a brief check-in with Sherman, who has a new lady in his life. Obviously I’m going to be referring to some things that happened in the last issue, so if you haven’t read it, prepare to be occasionally confused! From there we see how Stanley and Luann are dealing both with them having the house to themselves for the first time in decades (their son grew up and moved out) and the closure of the plant that previously employed Stanley. Next we see how Suze (Sherman’s new lady) is doing, which is quite well, thanks! From there we go to the heart of the book, which is the story of Don in his later years, dealing with his children, going about his days and how suddenly grief could still creep up on him. I’m leaving this as vague as possible because it was occasionally gutting and I’d rather not spoil some of Alex’s best emotional writing that I’ve seen. Next we get a grim story from the early years of Andy, the helplessness of his mother in the face of abuse and indifference from the authorities, and what he’s doing now. Finally we end up with another look at Sherman and how he handles Wally showing up at his job. Oh, and I forgot about this: there’s one more story on the back inside cover, written up like a newspaper story that covers the closure of the plant and the reactions of some of the former workers. You know, maybe Alex just didn’t have the space to put in a synopsis at the start of this comic, as this sucker was packed with stories. A book like this could get maudlin in a hurry, and it does at times, but as a whole Alex does an excellent job of modulating the tone of the book so that things never get too high or low for long. This is not a man where I’m comfortable saying that something is his best work (he has way too many good comics out there to be sure), but when it’s all said and done it might end up being just that. $8
