Note: there’s no sample image for this review because I didn’t want to crack the spine of my fancy new hardcover to get it. Yeah, I admitted it. There’s also the fact that I would have a very hard time sampling just one page, so this keeps me from having to choose.
Oh hey, the review is starting now! If you’ve been around this website for any length of time (or comics at all), you already know about Julia Wertz. I do this thing where I review comics for people and then drop out of reviewing their graphic novels once they get successful, on the almost certainly wrong assumption that The Comics Journal and other fancier review sites can handle it. But dammit, I can’t let this one go by without talking about it a bit, because it’s the best thing she’s done yet, and boy howdy is that ever saying something. First, if you’ve only ever read my reviews of her work and not her actual work, shame on you. Every book she’s put out that I didn’t talk about (Impossible People, Museum of Mistakes, etc.) is worth getting, and they’re all on my bookshelf. I’m ashamed to admit that I briefly hesitated on this one, because I’m a childless weirdo and this is all about Julia deciding to have a child. I thought it might not connect with me as much as her other work. Reader, I couldn’t have been more wrong. I haven’t laughed out loud (which I spell out because it’s true) this much while reading a graphic novel since maybe Hot Dog Taste Test by Lisa Hanawalt, and that one is meant to be all jokes. This is the true story of her deciding to have a child, the trouble with actually having that child, excruciating details about pregnancy and giving birth, and the differences between living with the baby through his various stages of development. Well, up until about age 4, because this is a printed book and it had to stop somewhere. If you’re like me and wonder what compels people to have children in this broken, circling the drain world, you’d better believe that she gets into it, and you’d better believe that those doubts never really go away. But there’s also a tiny human around that’s constantly doing and saying incredible things, which is a big help. Julia also gets into everything else that was happening in her life while this was going on, but she somehow manages to do it without embarrassing anybody too much or revealing too much personal information, which is a hell of a skill. Her older brother gets hit with some of his previously mentioned (in other comics/graphic novels) mental health issues again, and she manages to avoid saying most of what went on with him while confining it more to her reactions and how it affected her during the pregnancy and early years of the baby. I also hope that Josh writes a book about his experiences, because she’s somehow only scratched the surface with her stories of him. Oh, and all of this happened in the early days of the pandemic, meaning that she had to do most of it alone; even her husband couldn’t come along with her to most of her appointments. And oh, the American health care system is thoroughly covered here, and if you don’t think you’re mad enough about it yet, reading this one will somehow turn that loathing dial up another few notches. Her book is a lot more linear and coherent than this review, but I have to once again point out: this shit if funny. Consistently, uproariously, did-I-really-hurt-my-back-laughing level of funny. And when I say “this shit,” you’d better believe there’s plenty of that involved in an open discussion about a new baby. I thought that after reading this book I’d probably recommend it mostly for new or prospective parents, but no, that’s too limiting. Humans who like Julia’s work, this is her best book yet, and you need to read this. Humans who haven’t read her work… sigh. There’s still time, and this is a fine place to start. $32
Hey kids, or anybody who has started reading comics in the last few years? Are you interested in the history of mini comics, why they’re such a source of passion for so many people? Well, maybe not in numbers, but in level of interest and dedication in following certain artists? Your answer is this volume. If you have no interest in the history, away with you! This one can be for the old timers. This is a collection of the best of the “Not My Small Diary” anthology, and if you read small press comics in the 90’s and 00’s, you will recognize plenty of these names. In fact, good luck not getting lost in a Google hole or trying to figure out what so many of these people are up to these days. Notable names include (but are not limited to) Jeff Zenick, Dan Zettwoch, Patrick Dean, Raina Telgemeier, Jesse Reklaw, Carrie McNinch, Sam Spina, Roberta Gregory, Kurt Wolfgang… you know what, there are just too damned many names, and they’re all in the tags, so check that part out. If any of those names made you say “hey, I wonder what they’re up to these days” then this book is for you. These are mostly snippets of stories, but they’re all complete by themselves. Sometimes the stories follow a theme, like notable dates or moments in their lives, but really they’re all over the place. If it seems like I’m avoiding getting into specifics, that is entirely the case. If you were around for all these artists when they first started, you’re going to get lost in this instantly. If not, this is an excellent way for you to figure out what the big deal was about these people all along. I guess it’s possible that it’s the nostalgia talking and that people might not connect to these stories now, but screw that. These are tales of human weakness (and occasionally triumph), and those stories are universal and timeless. Most of the original issues of this series are out of print, so this is your best option all around. The book itself is $7.50 if you see Delaine at a convention, but if not $10 should be enough to cover the shipping, and I really can’t recommend this enough. It’s rare for any anthology not to have a weak story or two, but these are all golden.
Do you like your comics funny? Do you like some or most of the creators I listed in the tags section (right below this post, in big letters, you can’t miss them)? Then this one should be an easy call for you. There, now that I’ve made that case, I’ll go about my afternoon… wait, you want something of substance? Egh, fine. Laurent Barnett does the “Me Likes You” comics (which you should already be reading on a regular basis), and she was one of the editors, so there, that’s substantive. Strips in here include Noah Van Sciver’s fever dreams (both with and without music), funny jokes that aren’t really jokes by Bort, Martha Keavney’s tales of a pet human, Nikki Burch showing us that saying “that’s what she said” too many times will end up with you getting what you deserve, Anne Emond’s cat style, Sam Spina’s ridiculously awesome sex comic, a couple of pages of single panel jokes by Sam Henderson (which should be worth the price of admission right there), Grant Snider’s fears and feats (he had four pages of strips and I don’t want to ruin any of them), KC Green’s depressed fish, Jane Mai’s dream of male lingerie, Nathan Bulmer’s tale of ninja tricks, Julia Wertz’ attempt to get serious and Ian Anderson’s tale of a bear that’s just trying to fit in. But wait, there’s more! And you can discover it for yourself if you buy this. Unless you just have an unnatural hatred for all anthologies, which I guess I could almost understand, but it makes no sense to hate the good ones too, and this is one of the good ones. Hell, just pick three of the names of people who contributed to this, go to their websites and see what there is to see. If you don’t laugh once then I release you from your duty to buy this, but seriously, good luck with that. $10
Sometimes as a thought experiment I try to imagine a comics creator I thoroughly enjoy (like (spoiler alert!) Julia) and what complaints other people who don’t like her may have. With Julia, I have to confess to drawing an utter blank. Do people not like her because she’s too prolific? Because her comics seem to be effortlessly funny from panel to panel in a way that damned near everybody else could only dream of? Because she’s open and frank about damned near every aspect of her life but manages to do it in a way that makes it impossible not to sympathize with her? Or maybe nobody has a problem with her, which would be the way the world should work, so I’ll shut down this thought exercise right now. Anyway, if by some chance you haven’t read her work before now, or were intimidated by the fact that you missed a few issues of “Fart Party” and didn’t want to jump on in the middle, this is a new, self-contained work, and it’s the best thing she’s ever done. That I’ve seen, anyway, and I haven’t seen everything. But this one is so good that I still don’t even know where to start praising it. The intro is probably the place to start, as she describes how she’s had this idea for a comic for years (how she learned that she had lupus) but that nobody was willing to publish it. This kind of thing drives me crazy, but I don’t control the publishing houses of the world, so I’ll let it go. Then she mentions that the title is an inside joke but that she loves the idea of somebody picking this up at a bookstore, thinking it’s the “next big thing” because of that title and being very shocked and offended at the content, and it’s impossible not to appreciate that. And I haven’t even gotten to the comics! This is broken up into three short stories, and they serve the purpose of basically telling the story of her life so far. And if you’re annoyed that you miss a month or two here and there, she’s even nice enough to mention which volume of the collected “Fart Party” you would have to read to plug in those holes. The first story tells the story of the various jobs she’s held over the years, from selling rocks to a neighbor as a small child all the way up to her present career making comics. She has held a ton of shitty jobs over the years, which obviously sucked at the time, but at least it left her loaded with great stories. And just in case I didn’t already respect her as much as was humanly possible, she also tells the story of how her comic almost got picked up for a tv series but that she killed it because she was essentially selling her life’s story with no input needed from her, and she wanted to be sure that if it ever did get made into a series that she would have a chance to make sure it was done right. It’s not easy to turn down a pile of money for the sake of your artistic integrity, but she did it. The next section deals with her learning that she has lupus, all of the various health problems associated with it and how lupus led directly to her discovering comics and eventually making her own. I don’t think most humans could make lupus this funny, but Julia is more than up to the challenge. Finally there’s a section on her love of libraries over the years, from the book sales to the smell of a really old book to finding lots of graphic novels. This last one is the shortest of the bunch, but it’s heartfelt as all hell and will make you want to go back to the library right away if you haven’t been to one for awhile. You’ll notice that I don’t go into much detail at all, which is odd for a 200+ page book that probably took me over three hours to read. That’s mostly because everybody who already knows her work probably read as far as “new, self-contained work” before they stopped and ordered a copy for themselves, and the rest of you should know as little as possible about this woman before reading this, because it’s all laid out here. I don’t think there’s a single funnier human working in comics today, and you all know that I read a LOT of comics. So buy a copy of this, why don’t you? I’m not big on guarantees, what with individual tastes being different all over, but if you buy a copy of this and somehow hate it I’ll buy it off you (this offer is valid until somebody decides to be a smart ass and buy 50 copies). That way I could pass a copy along to somebody who would appreciate it, WHICH IS EVERYBODY ELSE. Enjoy! $15
Where to even begin? It’s cheating for me to just say that this is fantastic and leave it at that, right? Crap. This covers the time between the summer of 2007 and the end of 2008, as Julia decided to move to New York after all the things keeping her in San Francisco fell away at once. Parts of it seem to be taken from her “Fart Party” comic and maybe another mini or two, but I’m far too lazy to go back and check which parts. Most of it seemed new to me, and I do try to keep an eye on this sort of thing. The book even almost has an uplifting ending, although I’m sure Julia would hate to hear that, as she seems to more or less give up the drinking and get on with a few more “adult” responsibilities. In the meantime we get to see her drunken year and a half in all its glory. There’s the random nature of her move (hilariously explained as her natural propensity to always take the difficult path), how bums seem to gravitate to her and how she can’t seem to hold a job. There’s her oddly happy home life and the fact that she gets along with her whole family, even though an older brother has had some trouble unrelated to her. Yes, drinking at the movies does take place, and it seems to take place fairly often. Do they serve liquor at the movies or does she smuggle it in? The world may never know; I know some places are smart enough to serve liquor with their movies. Other highlights (out of about 190 pages, so I’m cutting this list extremely short) include her odd ability to quiet a baby, the various ways she gets fired from her jobs and her utter lack of sadness about any of them, her hobo-like appearance and the fact that she only uses three outfits, her childlike eating habits, being ignored by obnoxious assholes who hit on everyone else, and, of course, drunken shenanigans. I read a chunk of comics on her website that seem to indicate some serious maturing going on in some ways, but her stuff is still hilarious as ever, so no worries there. Something about a tv adaptation of “Fart Party” was mentioned in this, but I haven’t seen anything about it since, which would be a shame. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I don’t see a way that it wouldn’t fall apart on television (unless maybe it was an IFC and she had a serious hand in the creative aspect), but it would have made for some excellent comics. There also don’t seem to be any minis in her store, which is odd, but all her books are available and you get special bonus goodies for ordering them from her. If you’ve avoided her comics so far because maybe you don’t like unconnected but fantastically funny comics, this one has a more or less coherent storyline, so your excuses are over. Buy it and be happy. $15
I love the comics where the toughest part of the review is to figure out which page would be funniest as a sample. Julia’s work always has plenty of possibilities, so I just went with the first page. That way when you buy it nothing in the middle is spoiled! That’s not usually an issue in Fart Party, but things are more or less linear this time around, as Julia leaves San Francisco, lives with her Mom for a few months, almost moves to Portland and ends up in New York. One or two of the strips are even downright melancholy. Other subjects in here include stress, creative ways to open a wine bottle (actually, I probably should have sampled that page. Dammit!), drunken phoning, nature, comics, a shooting, a found kitten, and turd blossom. She’s set up a pretty strict standard of funny to live up to with each issue, and so far she hasn’t even come close to missing the cut. Oh, and the first four issues are out in a collected edition from Atomic Books, so I believe this makes the whole Fart Party “saga” in print. Huzzah!
$3
It took about three panels of this issue for me to briefly wonder if Julia has lost her edge a bit, if she’d been hanging out with too many comic bigwigs and that she’d maybe gotten a bit melancholy. Then the punch line of that strip (spoiler alert! It involves that cover) knocked that nonsense right out of me. There is a sadder theme in here in general, as she deals with losing a long term boyfriend and a crappy job, but there’s still plenty of funny to be found. As always, talking about these things in too much detail has a tendency to make them unfunny, so I’ll only say that subjects in here include a candy cane turd, advice from Keith Knight, not getting hit on by creeps, being written up in the Onion, a week on the wagon, and embarrassing moments from her past. There’s one thing about these issues that I have to wonder though: why are some of the strips neat and gorgeous while some of them look like they took her about 15 minutes? Again, as I mentioned in the last review, I’m not here for the art, and it’s not like any of the sloppy ones are any less funny because they don’t look quite as good as some of the others. I just wonder what’s going on there. $3
Would you believe there’s not a single fart joke in here? Three cheers for that, although there are plenty of poop jokes in here. None of that makes the slightest bit of difference though, for one simple reason: this comic is funny. Seriously, consistently, laugh-out-loud (to drag out the tired cliche) funny. Will-I-get-in-trouble-if-I-sample-every-page funny. It’s mostly just online because Julia’s too poor to print too many of these things, which is a damned shame, and a good reason for you to go that website up there and order comics. What, you want to read about the actual comic first? OK. In here are strips about career options, being small, how to get a boyfriend, drinking, first swear word, Squitches, Jesus camp, insomnia, and babies vs. abortions. And that’s just the first half of the book. She seems to have completely avoided the strip trap of doing every one with the same damned number of panels and set-up, these range from three panels to the whole page. And did I mention that it’s hilarious? I really was laughing pretty much all the way through, which is a rare and welcome thing. Sure, this is the sampler and maybe all of her other comics suck, but looking at some of the examples on the website I really doubt that this is true. She’s also trying to save up money to go to James Sturm’s Center for Cartoon Studies, but screw that. So she could maybe learn to refine her drawing skills, but so what? She already knows how to tell a good story, what more do you need to know? $2
The Day I Killed Jesus/The Legend of Rebob Mountain
Hey look, a flip book! Just wanted to point that out in case anybody got confused by the two covers. This is another step away from the Fart Party comics and, considering that I loved that stuff, it’s odd that I’d be so happy about it. She’s branching out as an artist in a big way, even if the “i before e” rule is still a bit hazy. First up, because that title is irresistible, is The Day I Killed Jesus. Whatever you’re thinking from that title, you’re almost certainly wrong. This is a story of Julia being babysat by a very lazy and inattentive sitter when she was 6. Early in the week she had managed to steal a bottle of aspirin, and once she was unsupervised she decided to host a tea party with Smurf, Rainbow Brite and Jesus, as he was the “unseen guest at every meal”. Well, she filled their cups with aspirin and only later read the warning label on the bottle. Her genuine terror is adorable and perfectly plausible, as why wouldn’t it be possible to kill an imaginary Jesus in such a fashion? The other piece is a serious short story, which is something of a departure from her usual work. She grew up near Rebob Mountain, and local legend had it that the flying monkeys from Wizard of Oz lived on top of the mountain, swooping down occasionally to kidnap pets and small children. Naturally this was a cause of great concern to the children, who kept a close eye on all ten (!) outdoor cats and their other various pets. Eventually one of their friends started getting skinnier, lost all his hair and eventually “went to a better place”, which took things to a whole new level for the kids. “Heartbreaking” is not a word I thought I’d ever use to describe one of her comics, but this one is close. She even has an afterword about how the top of the mountain still isn’t on Google maps, so it’s still a mystery. Julia mentions a collection of her short stories coming out in 2011, and if she keeps up this level of quality up until then it’ll be something to see. No price, but two stories = $3 to me for no good reason.
Curse this brain of mine, it’s almost totally worthless at this point. There I was at Chicago Comics, with most if not all of the Fart Party comics just sitting there, waiting for me to buy them. This sorry brain, knowing how much I enjoyed past Fart Party issues, informed me that I must have had at least the first few issues, so I settled for getting #5-7. Alas, all I had was that sampler reviewed above. So many left behind… As you can probably tell by now, this is quickly becoming one of my favorite comics, after reading all of two of them now. This issue is a “travel” comic, which can be a dicey proposition unless you’re Julia Wertz. She doesn’t linger on any of the obnoxious, boring things that can sometimes mar a good travel comic and sticks pretty much to her format of a few panels followed by an ending involving the funny. Maybe the art’s a little choppier than in her past work, as pieces of this were done on trains and I’m sure on various couches, but who reads this for the artwork anyway? Anything that makes me laugh this often could be 100% stick figures and I’d still be telling everybody to buy it. There are also comics from various people Julia met along her travels and even a few pictures in case you were wondering what some of the people shown in here actually look like. Seriously, anybody who’s not reading this series is only hurting themselves. $3
Hey, this isn’t a fart party! It’s OK, I believe Julia is allowed to branch out a bit if she wants. This is an intensive study of brains, Julia’s in particular. It starts with a hilarious two page summary of brains throughout history and why humanity had such a long chunk of time when no scientific study was possible (hint: it involves the bible). My favorite quote out of many good ones: “Around the late 1890’s, fancy tools like the microscope were developed, making brain studies much more sophisticated than just cutting that shit open and poking around the mess.” Then we get to the regular comic, which opens with Dr. Watson (who is apparently a tiny, tiny man) and Sherlock Holmes hoping to study Julia’s brain. Sadly, the brain has left the building (and I absolutely love the fact that Julia’s cartoon head, when popped open, makes a “boing” noise), so the two detectives have to figure out Julia’s life from her apartment and belongings. They conclude that Julia’s brain has helped and hurt her plenty over the years, but I’m done describing the contents here as any more will just cheat you out of this pile of comic goodness. I like the new direction, even though it’s not a whole lot different from the fart party stuff. I also may be one of the few who hopes she takes one of her fake future subjects listed at the back of the book and makes it into a comic. “Why On Earth Did You Ever Think That’d Be A Good Idea?” has all kinds of potential. No price listed, but I’m guessing $2.50 just for the hell of it.
Posted by Kevin 
