Don’t worry, I’m keeping track of all these titles that get online without the benefit of a decent scan and plan on fixing that when I do get a new scanner. Until then, sorry about the fuzzy lifts from other sites. Other than that, what you have here is a new Hutch Owen book, which is great for people like me who mostly didn’t read the online strip, at least not in any organized fashion. And this blurb from the cover (from The Comic’s Journal) says everything I think about the character in a much less rambling, much more coherent way than I ever could:”Owen is the consummate outsider…His call to individual liberty and self-fulfillment is the foundation of the comic’s philosophy…” So, why keep going with my review? No reason,really. This book has two hefty stories (Aristotle and Public Relations) as well as short pieces (some sketchbook strips (or at least that’s what they look like), the story from the 9/11 benefit book, Consumer Confidence Level, The Executive Hour and one strip without Hutch Owen, except for a cameo. Why do I keep having this horrible mental image of Hutch on all sorts of t-shirts and mugs in ten years as some kind of “rebel” advertising blitz? I think Tom Hart’s just about the last person in the world who would let something like that happen, but I can’t get the thought out of my mind. You know, I just read some of Tom’s daily strips in a hopeless effort to try and give this review some cohesion and I think I like those more than this collection. Go figure. I do like this collection quite a bit though, there are lessons in here to be learned (or at least reminded of) for almost everybody in this country. Contact info is up there, you can find this for $10 if you look but the cover price is $14.95…
