Ugh, my apologies for the lousy scan of the sample image, I tried it a few times and it just couldn’t be made clear with my scanner. But if you’re looking for sample images, L.’s website is chock full of them, so maybe go there? This is a behemoth of a collection of the first nine issue of L.’s Wheatpaste comic (I’ve seen it as one word everywhere I’ve looked, so that’s what I’m sticking with), and it feels like the kind of thing that I should really sit with and contemplate for a few days, but guess what? There’s an election this week (as of February 2025, we still have those in America, although y’all should keep checking back about that), meaning I’m swamped at my job, meaning that I can either write this review now or in a week or so. So you’re getting my nonsense ramblings, fresh off of reading the book! In other words, if you’d prefer to back away slowly and check out L.’s website instead, I will hold no grudges. Like I said, this book covers her first nine issues, and judging from her website she’s up to #16 as of this writing, so another volume will most likely be coming along sooner or later. Which is good news, because I have many questions. This starts off with a page of the important characters and brief bios, which was helpful, but it didn’t take long before there were more important characters than there were bios. Each issue mostly followed either one main character or a series of characters (sometimes for one issue, sometimes for a few), and figuring out how all of these people tie together is still sometimes a bit of a mystery. In the first issue we get a sad and injured god taking a heroic and fatal stand, in the second and third issues we have Soe (who has a lot of trouble just keeping track of her own reality) trying to make a connection amidst all of her chaos, the fourth starts a storyline with Groob in space, and there’s no way I’m going to make any sense of this if I try describing it in a linear fashion like this. Look, the important thing to realize is that this is an alien, futuristic society, and damned near every page has something completely alien in the background that gets your attention. Not, “huh, that looks weird I guess” level of alien, more of a “I’m instantly curious about the entire backstory for that creature” level of alien. If you’ve read my reviews over the years at all you know that’s my preference; convince me that you’ve thoroughly thought through this alien world/future and you’re already 90% of the way to winning me over. There’s so much strange in here that I hardly know where to begin. Soe falling through the ice even though she knows it’s going to happen, Groob hooking up with that alien, the thin mints, the cloned clone and his son, poor doomed Jeff, the “cats” under the trailer, OT 15 and his simple desire to be able to smile; the more I think about this book, the more layered it becomes. She also includes a foreward, afterward and several knitting patterns, with fascinating information in each of them, and that comes from somebody who doesn’t knit. When I Googled L. I noticed her name pop up on the Cartoon Crossroads Columbus page, so here’s hoping that refers to current events and she’ll show up there this year. This book is a freaking journey, and I’d highly recommend that you all take it too. $20 (ish, don’t make me try to convert currency)
Posted by Kevin 
