Hey you! Have you ever wanted to read some different comics? Hopefully! Do you have a friend who you are always trying to get into comics? Yeah, you probably have 20! Are you living a painfully ordinary, locked down life but are somehow sick of escapism and just want to see ordinary life that’s a marginally less depressing? Well aren’t you in luck! If you answered yes to at least one of those questions then boy do I have the article for you! In Pageturn, I’m going to break down comics genre by genre and give you the best recommendations you can pester yourself and others into reading.
Some rules before we start (Even though I’ll almost certainly break all of them)
1. No superheroes
2. No Marvel or DC (maybe a sneaky Vertigo here and there)
3. Mostly modern reads
Daytripper
I think “Daytripper” was the comic that really showed me you could do slice-of-life stories this way, sure I’d read biographies like “Maus” and “Persepolis,” but it’s just so rare to see stories like this in the comics medium. Still, “Daytripper” is special for more reasons than just that.
Brás writes for a newspaper, or at least he does for a period. Brás also dies a lot, but that only happens after he lives for a while. This is a book about one man’s life and all the deaths he could have had alongside that living. It draws on the culture of native brazilian authors (and brothers!) Gabriel Bá and Fabio Moon, as well as universal themes of family, legacy, purpose and fatherhood in this really nuanced and beautiful, understated style. The key to this whole book is just how well it uses restraint in service of the profound. “Daytripper” has this interesting format and often dips into points of surrealism, but only after finding ways to ground and humanise the central motifs it will later skew in its efforts to paint an extraordinary image of the life we’re following. I think by not basking in its own surrealism and not getting bogged down in the ‘rules’ of its form, “Daytripper” is able to spotlight some really profound moments by throwing away that restraint entirely and reveling in the unique identity its created for itself, issues #6 and #9 are great examples of this (see, now you have to read the majority of the book if you want to prove me wrong).
“Daytripper” is also one of the best examples you can find of artistic synchronicity in comics, both Bá and Moon are writer/artists and by having them both writing and drawing this comic it feels especially special. It’s rare to see projects formed like that in comics, so I love looking for the ways that that pokes through in their work. For one, their art in this is far more rich than I’ve seen elsewhere (and that’s saying a lot when they’ve come off of “Casanova,” “B.P.R.D.” and “Umbrella Academy”). There’s a sort of colorful spirituality to this whole story and a soft edge to the figures and landscapes. It all feels inviting, even the darkest moments are emotionally receptive in a way. I just find it really interesting looking at two artists who have always reveled in spectacle and genre who can use all those same techniques and stylisations to instead emphasize emotion, passion and expression.
“Daytripper” is such a beautiful series of endings, it’s like a book made out of echoes, one that ends far too quickly and yet right when it should. I’ve always thought that the more personal a story is, the more universally it can be understood. “Daytripper” proves that sentiment in every way; it’s deeply mired in culture, artistic style, familial patterns, paternalistic recollections and a wealth of experience that could never be fully understood by a reader, yet can be empathised with wholeheartedly when codified into a text like this. This is the best gateway you can find into slice of life comics, hopefully it leads you somewhere great.
Grab it if you like:
-Surrealist interpretations of everyday life
-Books rooted in non-Western culture
-Stories about family and legacy
If you like “Daytripper” read:
Continued below
-“Two Brothers” by Gabriel Bá and Fabio Moon
-“are you listening?” by Tillie Walden
-“Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi
The Violent
Okay you could definitely argue that “The Violent” by Ed Brisson and Adam Gorham is more of a crime book than Slice of Life, I mean it comes off of Brisson’s crime comic hot-streak, follows two ex-addicts and has a good smattering of murder throughout; but ultimately that’s not where this books preoccupation lies. “The Violent” is, in a roundabout sort of way, a story about sympathy.
The book follows Mason and Becky as they’re trying to put their life back together, Mason is out of prison after getting caught for a B&E, Becky has been raising their daughter Kaitlyn alone for those years in between. Both are struggling to stay clean after shared drug addiction, and are working to just stay afloat amidst their flawed states and circumstances. I feel like that’s a very cut-and-dry way of framing this book, but it gets the message across. This is a post-crime story, life after conviction, life around the systematic circumstances of illegality, life on the cusp of collapse. I don’t think I’ve ever read a book that could make me this anxious or be as emotionally devastating. You’re just constantly being reminded of how close to the tipping point these people are living and how much extra weight is coming down at each moment from other people whose lives are just as ramshackle. And yeah, there are moments where Mason or Becky or anyone around them will just fuck up so badly that everything feels ruined; but you get it and you feel even more sympathetic because of it. This story escalates very quickly at times, but it feels believable in doing so, there’s no moment that’s necessarily out of character because you can see how those actions would seem rational from that POV, it’s a really stunning degree of characterisation.
Adam Gorham isn’t necessarily a super stylised artist, but he quietly enhances all of these elements in his own manner. He’s got this way of drawing tired, stressed faces that has a real depth of expression in it. Plus his cover work is top stuff. Similarly colorist Michel Garland uses a palette that doesn’t drench the book, but just tints it in this soft, cold light.
There are definitely a lot of stories like this in other mediums (though I’d still argue not enough), but it’s refreshing here. We need more crime stories that look at the circumstances that induce crime, not the glamour or depravity of the actions themselves. I think this works well as a comic too because it’s naturally more of an understated medium, so it glorifies the protagonist less. It’s not like we’re ending up with Breaking Bad where a cautionary tale of a flawed man suddenly turns to idolisation and deification. Anyway, “The Violent” will put at your heartstrings and tear them out, it shows that everything is just one car ride away from falling to shit, it makes you fall in love with people just so it can show you how selfish they can be. But in the end, people will come out okay, not everyone, hardly anyone, but there will be somebody who can find themself something better because of that pain.
Grab it if you like:
-Stories about life on the periphery
-Crime with heart
-Addict fiction
If you like “The Violent” read:
-“Murder Book” by Ed Brisson and various others
-“Pearl” by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos
-“The Dregs” by Zac Thompson, Lonnie Nadler and Eric Zawadzki
Royal City
Jeff Lemire’s “Royal City” is a comic that finds its uniquity in its scale; in a genre full of high-stakes, high-conflict storytelling, “Royal City” is not only a low-stakes venture, but one where the majority of emotional damage that could possibly happen already has. It’s a story about a family who have each suffered a laundry list of little defeats, compromises and tragedies across a lifetime, where the only real thing left to bind them together is the death of Tommy Pike, the youngest of the family. It’s some depressing, familial shit and I guarantee you’ll eat that up just like I did.
Continued below“Royal City” isn’t necessarily new ground. If you look down at the further reading section I feel like you’ll be able to tell that Jeff Lemire has a lot of experience with this sort of book already, honestly the fact that this series doesn’t even include one disgraced hockey player is a pretty big departure for him. Still, “Royal City” feels very cumulative because of the texts that precede it, not in spite of them. It has all these great classic Lemire-ish elements like overlapping narratives, a sliding timescale, recursive small-town tragedies, reconciling families, and that even methodical pace he’s nailed down in his cartooning, then it takes those elements and blends them together into this really engaging and powerful story. The Trillium cameo probably helps too.
Just like “Daytripper,” “Royal City” doesn’t have to be too literal, it doesn’t have to be too surreal, it just has to be cathartic, and it excels at that every time. Probably the best example of this is the use of the aforementioned Tommy Pike. Even though he’s long-since croaked it by the start of the book, the way different family members manifest him as an emblem of their own anxieties and neuroses is really interesting. Middle-child Richie regrets his cycle of self destruction, so naturally he sees Tommy as the one feeding his lack of impulse control, while eldest-child Pat feels like he’s screwed up the silver platter opportunities he’s had, so naturally Tommy just feeds his impostor syndrome. I know this is all fairly vague, inside-baseball kind of stuff, but I think what I’m trying to point out is the amazing way that Lemire uses his form to bring this deeper understanding of character and story to the world. Feeding the mundane with the miraculous.
The last thing that I thought was necessary to talk about when discussing “Royal City” was the life behind the town. Where Lemire ended up with this sort of project. See, despite everything he achieved on this story he’s said that “Of all the books [he has] done, this one feels like a failure of sorts,” that this “pushed me to exhaustion and I had to wrap up Royal City sooner than I wanted just to keep my sanity.” And while a large part of that was credited to the demands he put on himself as an artist, I think it does present an interesting case study for Slice of Life as a genre in comics. Afterall, it’s such a personal style of story that there is a pressure to produce such a comic in singularity, which is a really taxing endeavour. It’s a format especially, that doesn’t really lend itself to the freight-train pace of monthly serialized comics, hence his adamance that “As far as the projects that I both write and draw, I think I am done with monthly serialized projects for now, and maybe forever.” Still I really believe there’s a place for slice of life stories in this medium, that that incongruence can be overcome, and it seems at least, Like Lemire feels that way too.
Grab it if you like:
-Small town fiction
-Overlapping familial plotlines
-Stories about the nostalgia of tragedy
If you like “Royal City” read:
-“Roughneck” by Jeff Lemire
-“Essex County” by Jeff Lemire
-“Underwater Welder” by Jeff Lemire
On the Shelf: Bad Karma
It’s genuinely hard for me to think of a book I fell in love with as quickly as “Bad Karma.” This series, which is currently being published through Panel Syndicate from writer Alex de Campi and artist Ryan Howe, is literally two issues in but has already convinced me to go back through the whole bibliography of both creators. It’s a hell of a drug.
“Bad Karma” is a story about veterans, and it’s just about the most insular portrayal of that you could find in comics. It gives this very authentic look at how isolating things like mental degradation, amputation, and veteran stigma can be in a way that isn’t necessarily melodramatic, but instead painfully everpresent. This authenticity even extends to the language and dialogue; everything is minutely specific or colloquialised in a way that can be confusing at first, but upon rereading is so much more involved. The book doesn’t try to hold your hand, it trusts you to research what you don’t understand at first and build on your awareness for a richer reading experience. All this comes together for a book that doesn’t have to mythologise veterans in order to respect them, “Bad Karma” just thrives on accuracy and sympathy to tell an emotional, engrossing and reverent story.
Continued belowAlex de Campi’s writing only really gets to flourish when it’s paired with Howe’s linework. His more cartoon-y style carries a depth of expression that gives the book texture as well as expression, all while keeping a pretty fun pace. Every element of this book comes together orchestrally in this uniquely beautiful, fragile, funny and dramatic manner, using the mundane in the most stand-out manner. “Bad Karma” just pops in a way you so rarely see in comics.
There’s a reason I’ve been so light on details in this book, for one I’d rather just let you enjoy that all for yourself, but also because so much of the joy in this book stems from seeing just how adventure pokes through the layers of drudgery in this story (I will say though, the drudgery here isn’t that bad when it’s so often accompanied by onion rings). This book manages to find something really innovative in an era filled with great veteran media (Da 5 Bloods, Hurt Locker, “Lost Soldiers” hopefully), it shows the everpresent pains of having served. Maybe that’s what we need more of, stories that explore hardships through consistent circumstances, rather than moments or periods of tribulation.
P.S Panel Syndicate have just been absolutely crushing it since the site debuted. Everything I’ve read on there has been stand-out, it’s more malleable and it’s simpler than ComiXology (and not run by Amazon). It’s just this super simple way to access really good stories. If you’re ever just generally bored and need some new reading material maybe go and plunder that site.
Grab it if you like:
-Stories about veterans
-Comics that revel in simplicity
-Engrossing and insular writing styles
If you like “Bad Karma” read:
-“Twisted Romance” by Alex de Campi and various others
-“Sheriff of Babylon” by Tom King and Mitch Gerads
-“Last Sons of America” by Phillip Kennedy Johnson and Matthew Dow Smith
Rulebreakers
Unsurprisingly, the shelves aren’t really bubbling with Slice of Life superhero comics (afterall, there’s a slight paradox in that title), so I decided to break the rules of rulebreakers and focus in on one particular book that I think finds the perfect middle ground in this contradiction, Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross’s “Marvels.”
The book follows a photographer through the gold and silver ages of Marvel history as he watches his previously-predictable world shift under the grip of the new titans holding it up. Each issue we get a beautifully painted depiction of Phil Sheldon’s new status quo, his relationship with ‘The Marvels’ and his goals in life. It’s both grand in its intimacy, and timeless in its specificity on period. “Marvels” should be the first and last street-eye view superhero story, because it’s simply not going to be matched anytime soon.
I think what makes “Marvels” as engaging as it is, is the incongruence it has with the genre it’s so deeply entrenched in. Every single panel and page is paying homage to the works of Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and the other artistic architects of Marvel Comics, yet Alex Ross’s art is such a far cry from those styles. Similarly, Phil Sheldon’s story is so engaged with superheroics and yet the book is almost entirely bereft of violence. There’s a contrast there that feels true to life. So often we live our lives reeling from the massive-scale events around us and yet so often our perceptions and engagements with those events manifest entirely differently than the actual events themselves. And that’s what superheroes are essentially, politics and pop culture and social values made manifest in spandex and steel.
“Marvels” looks at life inside obsession, what happens when we chase events outside of our ordinary lives and hold tight to them regardless, let them take us to those worlds we just presumed we were too small to ever inhabit. Phil Sheldon never really gets to make a difference like the Marvels he follows do, but he immortalises them. He learns from them. He finds the life in them. Phil Sheldon shows people the humanity in the superhuman, they get to keep their masks on because people like Phil reassure the public that there’s always going to be a face behind those costumes, even when they can’t see it.
Thank you all for reading, stay homely, stay humble, stay hooked.
