adrian tomine

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32 Stories: The Complete Optic Nerve Mini-Comics Box Set.  Adrian Tomine (Writer/Artist).  Comic Books/Graphic Novels.

I’m a huge fan of Adrian Tomine’s later works – Summer Blonde, Shortcomings, every New Yorker cover he does – but I largely missed out on his early Optic Nerve mini-comics, so I was delighted to see Drawn & Quarterly release this gorgeous box set of his original mini-comics (Optic Nerve #1 – # 7).

I dug into them this past week, and it was such a great experience, I doubt I can accurately explain how much I enjoyed it.  Reading them seemed somehow both progressive and also like a total throwback to when comics used to really genuinely make me happy.  It’s also great, as I’ve discussed before in relation to reading Alison Bechdel’sDykes To Watch Out For collected , to be able to see the evolution of a writer/artist in one sitting like that.  Tomine’s drawing, inking, lettering, his very style evolves before your eyes and it’s a wonderful thing to behold – to see an evolution captured like that.  Not that issue #7 is better than issue #1 – just different.  There was a real rawness and almost sloppiness to the early issues that I loved.  But it was amazing to see Tomine’s drawing slowly evolve more into the style that I’m familiar with today.

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As I said there’s a real gritty and honest style to Tomine’s early work and when I realized that the first four issues of Optic Nerve were self-published by Tomine before he even graduated from high school I almost fell out of my chair.  Even with the rawness of it, this is an incredible accomplishment and really underscores the talent Tomine possesses.

Some of my favorite stories in this collection are: Back Break in #2; Rodney in #3; Adrian Quits His Job in #3; All Choked Up in #4; Haircut in #5; Mike The Mod in #5; My Appearance On The Jane Pratt Show in #6; Leather Jacket in #6; Allergic in #6; Smoke in #6 (#6 was my favorite issue); and Happy Anniversary in #7.

Adrian Tomine

I also really enjoyed the additions to the Box Set in the form of another book with an introduction and some special features including a handful of unpublished sketches and strips.  The best of this to me was Tomine’s discussion in ‘A Note on this Edition’ of another writer/artist having gotten a copy of his high school yearbook years ago and posting his high school picture on a heavily trafficked web forum.  Tomine talks honestly and frankly about how he felt about this (badly), how he dealt with it (badly) and how he feels about it today (not so badly – and to prove it that same high school photo is the cover of the introduction book).  But it really gives you some perspective – that no matter how talented and amazing we are (I will never in my life come remotely close to touching the badass-ness that is Adrian Tomine) we are all vulnerable and sometimes vain…but that ‘this too shall pass’ is something that really is true, and if we can remember it and laugh it off, we’d all be better off.

4.0 Stars.

Best Books READ of 2007 (fiction)

It turns out that 5 of my 10 best books of 2007 were in fact published in 2007, and an additional 2 were paperbacks which were released in 2007…so this list has more validity than I expected. Yay for me!…

You can also read Part One and Part Two if you’re feeling left out.

10. Lady Into Fox, By David Garnett. Originally published in 1922, Reprinted by McSweeney’s in 2004.

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I’m hesitant to write complicated reviews of each of these books, since I’ve already done that in review format over the year, so I’m just going to link to them here and add a sentence or two if I feel so moved…okay? Great. So Lady Into Fox really surprised the hell out of me. It’s never a book I would have expected to make a top for the year list for me, but I really ended up loving this bizarre story of love and loss…it’s a great creative metaphor for a lot of other things in life. Read more about Lady Into Fox here.

09. Water For Elephants, By Sara Gruen. Published in 2006 (the softcover – which I read – 2007).

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Water For Elephants surprised me as well, if only because I don’t consider myself a NY Times Bestseller reader in general, but this book was really beautiful and well conceived. I finished it quickly, which is always a great compliment. Read more about Water For Elephants here.

08. Midnight At the Dragon Cafe, By Judy Fong Bates. Published in 2004 (the softcover – which I read – 2005).

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I adored China Dog, Bates book of short fiction, and didn’t figure Midnight At The Dragon Cafe could live up, but I loved this as well. Bates has a brilliant way of turning a story on its ear, just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, read more about Dragon Cafe here.

07. Astonishing X-Men #1 – #22, By Joss Whedon & John Cassaday. Published in issues 2006 – 2007.

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I can’t say enough good things about this collection, and my only complaint is that it’s ending soon. The last issue of this arc is due to come out soon, and it will signal the end of the Whedon/Cassaday team up. I’m very sad about it, although maybe it means Planetary will someday get finished? One can only hope. Read more here.

06. St. Lucy’s Home For Girl’s Raised By Wolves, By Karen Russel. Published in 2006 (the softcover – which I read – 2007).

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This was a great and really creative collection. The title really beautifully summarized what I should expect and it totally delivered. Read more about St. Lucy’s Home For Girls Raised By Wolves here.

05. Shortcomings, By Adrian Tomine. Published in collected hardcover format, in 2007.

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I’m a huge Tomine fan and Shortcomings is just a beautiful beautiful work. Read more here.

04. One Hundred And Forty-Five Stories In A Small Box, By Dave Eggers, Sarah Manguso, and Deb Olin Unferth. Published in 2007.

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I knew this was going to be great, with the creative format and the brilliant ideas that McSweeney’s is always swinging around, but I was unprepared for how much I was going to love both Eggers and Manguso’s books. Manguso’s collection stands out particularly as wildly creative and heartbreaking, although Eggers has my favorite piece overall. Read more here.

03. Famous Father’s Other Stories, By Pia Z. Ehrhardt. Published in 2007.

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Ehrhardt was a new author for me and I was incredibly impressed. A wonderful collection. Read more about Famous Fathers & Other Stories here.

02. The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao, By Junot Diaz. Published in 2007.

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I freaking LOVED this book. It blew me away, and was an excellent way to end the year. I had been anxiously awaiting Diaz’s follow up novel (like everyone else) after I was shocked by his wonderful first book Drown, a collection of short stories. This far surpasses Drown in so many ways. I don’t care how long I have to wait for the next one, so long as it is as good. Read more about The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao here.

01. The Road, By Cormac McCarthy. Published in 2006.

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What can I say? You don’t win the Pulitzer for writing a mediocre book. I haven’t ready any of McCarthy’s other works, and I’m very intrigued as I love his style, but I suspect he won’t ever be able to hit closer to home for me than he did with this book. Reading The Road was a singular experience that I will always cherish, and sadly, probably never duplicate…but I’ll spend my life trying. Read more about The Road here.

Honorable Mentions: You Are A Little Bit Happier Than I Am – Tao Lin (Poetry); Tell Me Why – Clare Jacobsen (Non-Fiction); Superbad – Ben Greenman (Short Fiction); No One Belongs Here More Than You – Miranda July (Short Fiction); Transparency – Frances Hwang (Short Fiction); and The Walking Dead – Robert Kirkman & Charlie Adlard (Graphic Fiction/Comic Book Series).

Worst Book Of The Year: I’m not going to say. I know that’s a cop out, but it’s easier than explaining why it is the worst book I read this year. And words like “bitter” would surely be tossed around in the comments section and y’know what? I don’t need that. :0

#37.  Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine.  Graphic Novel/Collected Works.  4.5 Stars.

Adrian Tomine is, depending on the day, my second or third favorite artist, and regardless of the day probably my second favorite storyteller in the comics format (Jeffrey Brown remains number one…he may never be surpassed…we’ll see).  Tomine (i finally learned, pronounced “To-mean”, after years of Adam and I arguing about the pronunciation) is an insanely talented artist.  He also has a very natural way with writing conversation, and he paces a story more beautifully than almost anyone out there in the field. 

I read Shortcomings, published by Drawn & Quarterly yesterday after buying it at Jim Hanley’s this weekend.  I have read much of it before, and it’s a bit of a cheat to count it as a book considering it doesn’t take long to read,  but I felt compelled to include it because it is so deserving considering it’s quality of being included.  I am also desperate as I should be at about book number 41 or 42…and I’m obviously not there, so forgive me a bit.  Shortcomings follows the story of Ben and Miko (and also Ben’s friend the delightful Alice) as Ben and Miko’s relationship follows a harrowing course.  My favorite thing about Shortcomings, other than Tomine’s absolutely stunning artwork and panel layouts (his inking is insane!) is the realistic feeling of this story.  It’s not all happy and it doesn’t tie up nicely, it’s messy, as relationships are.  And there is hurt and drama, but without any real over the top drama, which is more how life usually is I think.  This book is the kind of quality across the board (writing, art, pacing, production values, etc.) that I wish all comics/graphic novels could be, and rarely are these days.  If you like comics, or are interested in trying some out, I highly recommend Tomine’s Shortcomings. 

You may also want to check out Tomine’s Summer Blonde, 32 Stories, and Sleepwalk are all brilliant, and any one of them is a worthwhile purchase and read.

4.5 Stars

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Look at this panel…I mean are you kidding me?  GORGEOUS.

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Such amazing work and detail, yet it remains fluid and natural, not tight. 

I tried to post an image of the cover…but it’s not working.  :(