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Tag: Humour

Hark! A Vagrant

by Dan
Graphica / August 08, 2011

One of the books I'm most excited about this fall is Hark! A Vagrant by Canadian cartoonist Kate Beaton. The book collects comics from Kate's Hark! A Vagrant website, adds new commentary and some new strips. I honestly, CANNOT WAIT! 

Hark! A Vagrant takes a irreverent, absurdist romp through literature, history and comics making fun of such luminaries as Nikola Tesla, the Bronte sisters, Napoleon, Nancy Drew, and Batman. It is therefore, awesome. 

If you haven't read Hark! A Vagrant, stop whatever you're doing and go read it right now. Go directly! Do not pass Go!

Fans already familiar with Kate's work, however, might want to check out her recent interview with comics website Newsarama:

 

I like to explore a topic, and it’s random every time – it’s waking up and going “I want to make a comic out of this.” It’s what I’ve been reading, it’s what I’m interested in, I’m always making little notes and doodling things. A strip might be based on one panel, one image that comes to mind, and building a strip around it.

Right now, I’m reading Jane Eyre, so maybe I’ll make some strips on that for the book, and maybe the website too. 

And, for readers with creative leanings themselves, Kate also talked about the business of being a cartoonist on Rena Tom's blog recently. Her advice for newbies? Get an accountant:

I waited WAY too long. Way. Too. Long. Also, if you are in the position where you are working freelance, don’t be afraid to find other freelance buddies to talk to about hourly rates, billing and other potentially frustrating aspects of running a business. Sharing is caring.

Hark! A Vagrant is published in September and Kate will promoting the book in both Toronto and Vancouver this fall. Details to come, I promise! 

You can pre-order the book from your local indie, Chapters-Indigo, or Amazon, now. 

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F in Exams

by Siobhan
May 04, 2011

Happy Teacher Appreciation week!

Yes, that's right, it's time to give your teachers the props they deserve. After all, they did they teach to you how to read and write. They probably also taught you how to tie your shoes, how to sit still and listen for more than 30 seconds at a time, and how to hit a volleyball with your hands instead of your face. Not to mention how to craft an essay, how to locate Tanzania on a map and how find the roots of quadratic equations....

And let's face it, teachers have to put up with a lot. Facing a full classroom day in and day out is no easy job. And then there's all the homework and tests to mark...

I'm a big fan of a new book published by Chronicle this Spring called F in Exams: The Very Best Totally Wrong Test Answers. I know a lot of teachers, from elementary teachers to university profs, and this book rings true with all of them.

F in Exams gathers the most hilarious and inventive test answers provided by students who, faced with a question they have no hope of getting right, decide to have a little fun instead.

You just need to read a few pages from the book to get it... and giggle. Or groan. And after reading this, please remember to go thank your teachers for everything they do — and everything they deal with!

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Easter Books to Usher in Spring

by Siobhan
Animals & Nature + Art & Photography + Humour / April 20, 2011

Growing up in Northern Ontario, I always thought the image of Easter you see on TV was a bit off... I mean, how could you possibly have an Easter egg hunt outdoors when the ground is still blanketed in snow — or worse, slush? (Wearing poufy pastel dresses, no less.)

And then I moved to Vancouver... and now I get it (except for the pastel dresses; I think I may be a bit old for that now). While some (most?) of the country is still bracing for snow, it's feeling quite Spring-like and Easter-y here in Vancouver. The cherry blossoms are out and it's bright and sunny outside. There are daffodils poking up all over the place. Sorry, rest-of-Canada, but it's true.

But there's hope yet. In the spirit of Easter, here are a few books to usher in Springtime, no matter how cold, wet or snowy it may be outside. Just curl up with a book that's full of Springtime goodness, and use your imagination... Chocolate eggs also help.

 

Chicken and Egg is one of my personal favourites from Chronicle's Spring list. In it, food writer Janice Cole shares her adventures of deciding to take on raising chickens in her backyard. This book is not only lovely to look at (thanks to the crack design team at Chronicle), it's also topical, as allowing "urban poultry" seems to be an issue that's been raised in several Canadian cities in the past couple of years, and also downright delicious... Did I mention that the book also includes 125 recipes for delicious chicken and egg dishes?

Read a guest post by the author on the Chronicle blog.

Read the spread on Chicken and Egg in a recent issue of HELLO magazine (PDF).

 

Another gorgeous book with a Springtime feel is Nests: Fifty Nests and the Birds that Built Them. This book featuresamazing photography drawn from the collections of the California Academy of Sciences, the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at UC Berkeley, and the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology. Close-up photos of nests are accompanied by short portraits of the birds that constructed them. The variety and detail is fascinating. Here are a few spreads from the book... (Click on the images below to see them larger.)

 

And for something that's just plain fun(ny), check out One Chick to Another. Full of quips and funny one-liners paired with cute photos of, you guessed it, chicks.

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Scenes From an Impending Marriage

by Dan
Graphica / February 17, 2011

Adrian Tomine's latest book, Scenes from an Impending Marriage, started life as a small personal gift for guests at his wedding. But what began as an illustrated card soon grew into a collection of short comics strips about the absurd process of getting married.

Now a fully-fledged comic book, Scenes from an Impending Marriage sweet-naturedly skewers (in a funny, all too relatable way) the modern marriage process, including hiring a DJ, location scouting, trips to the salon, suit fittings, dance lessons, registering for gifts and managing familial demands.

Adrian AND his wife Sarah Brennan talked about the book, and the process of getting married, with NPR's All Things Considered earlier this week:

Tomine says that he also has an easy time drawing himself.

"It helps that I have some fairly typical comic book shorthand qualities like big glasses and a beard and a funny posture," he says. "Even if the technical likeness isn't there, if you throw in some of those things, it's enough to communicate who it's supposed to be."

"You're also frequently crabby like a lot of cartoonists," Brennan says.

Adrian was also recently interviewed by The Economist's More Intelligent Life this week:

If the hypothetical reader's life has progressed similarly to mine, they'll probably enjoy the book. If it hasn't, then they might want to sit this one out. What can I say? I took a gamble! The one thing I'd say is that the only thing this book really whole-heartedly endorses is a good relationship. I should mention that another impetus for publishing this work was the simple fact that it was time for me to do something different. I think the worst thing I could've done to follow up “Shortcomings” would be to do another book with a similar tone and drawing style. So it was kind of exciting for me when I realised that kind of departure that I was aiming for was already completed and ready to go.

You can read a 6-page PDF preview of Scenes from an Impending Marriage is available here.

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When Do They Serve The Wine?

by Dan
Graphica / October 26, 2010

 

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Night of the Living Trekkies Trailer

by Dan
Fiction + Humour / September 14, 2010

I don't think I need to say anything about this new book trailer for Night of the Living Trekkies other than it is a) AWESOME b) not for the squeamish...

 

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We were no longer “good society” . . .

by Dan
Fiction + Humour / July 26, 2010

At some point over the weekend this hilarious video for Jane Austen's Fight Club went viral:

  

Of course, all this ass-whupping Austen action started with Lizzie Bennett kicking seven shades of shih tzu out of the undead in Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and its prequel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls, but we're not going to begrudge them that. Well played ladies... 

And, if you haven't seen it before, here is the fantastic trailer for PPZ: Dawn of the Dreadfuls:

(via Mashable)

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All My Friends Dead Book Trailer

by Dan
Humour / July 13, 2010

"No animals were harmed in the making of this video. Except for the dog we murdered..."

All My Friends are Dead is available next month. For a preview of the book check out www.nomorefriends.net.

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Better, Stronger, Faster

by Dan
Fiction + Humour / June 08, 2010

The latest Quirk Classic, Android Karenina  by Leo Tolstoy and Ben Winters, is released today, and as with Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters and PPZ: Dawn of the Dreadfuls, Quirk has released a fantastic teaser trailer for the book:

Let us know what you think! 

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Into All of It: Kristen Schaal in Vanity Fair

by Dan
Humour / May 20, 2010

The very funny (and apparently filthy) Kristen Schaal — known to viewers of HBO's Flight of the Conchords as obsessed fan Mel — talks to Vanity Fair about her new TV show Penelope Princess of Pets (only available in UK sadly) and her new sexy book The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex:

 (Warning there's some strong language in the interview!)

We decided to explore every aspect of sex that we could think of. It’s actually the biggest task I’ve ever taken on. Sex is so vast, and it has so many parts and layers, and you can’t really encompass all of it, can you? You never will. We tried to get into the fetishes and the different sexualities and toys and diseases, all of it. I think we only just scratched the surface. And it’s not even a real surface. It’s like our twisted version of the surface... 

I wrote something about a woman from 1897 who had the first female orgasm. Oh, and we’ve got a new and improved formula for coming up with your porn star name. You know how it’s your first pet along with the street you grew up on? With our formula, it’s your favorite alcoholic beverage plus your biggest insecurity.

So yes, as you can gather, with The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex, Schaal and her real-life boyfriend Rich Blomquist (a writer with The Daily Show) are bringing a whole new brand of full-colour illustrated sex advice to the masses, gross (and funny) details and all... 

And if that doesn't <ahem> "turn you on" </ahem>, here's the trailer for Penelope Princess of Pets:

And Kristen Schaal is on Twitter if you feel like following her and making this even creepier and weird than it already is. 

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