DRAWN & QUARTERLY SPRING 2020 The LoNELINESS of The LONG-DISTANce CArtOONIST ADRiAN TomiNE CONSTITUTION ILLUSTRATED R. Sikoryak I KNOw You RIDER LESLiE STEiN WEndy, MaSTER of Art walter ScoTT CITY of beLGIUM BREchT EvENS LITTLe LuLu: The FUZZYTHINGUS PooPI Joh N STANLEY NORI RUmi hARA The SKY IS BLue wITh a SINGLe CLOUD kUNiko tsurita MOMS YEoNg-ShiN mA THe loNelINeSS of THe loNg-DISTaNCe CarTooNIST adrian tOMINE A comedic memoir about fandom, fame, and other embarrassments from the life of The New York Times bestselling cartoonist What happens when a childhood hobby ries are delineated in excruciatingly grows into a lifelong career? The Loneli- hilarious detail. ness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist, In a bold stylistic departure from Adrian Tomine’s funniest and most re- his award-winning Killing and Dying, vealing foray into autobiography, offers Tomine distills his art to the loose, lively an array of unexpected answers. When a essentials of cartooning, each pen stroke sudden medical incident lands Tomine economically imbued with human depth. in the emergency room, he begins to Designed as a sketchbook complete with question if it was really all worthwhile: place-holder ribbon and an elastic band, despite the accolades and opportunities The Loneliness of the Long-Distance of a seemingly charmed career, it’s the Cartoonist shows an acclaimed artist at gaffes, humiliations, slights, and insults the peak of his career. he’s experienced (or caused) within the industry that loom largest in his memory. Tomine illustrates the amusing absur- Praise foR adrian tOMINE dities of how we choose to spend our “Even his smallest, plainest panels are time, all the while mining his conflicted heavy with subtext, thick with unstated relationship with comics and comics emotion and full of the kind of informa- culture. But in between chaotic book tion that can never quite be conveyed in tours, disastrous interviews, and cringe- language.”—The New York Times inducing interactions with other artists, life happens: Tomine fumbles his way “Deft and subtle…he traces small lives, in into marriage, parenthood, and an in- which love blurs into self-delusion, and disputably fulfilling existence. A richer we do what we have to do to get by.” emotional story emerges as his memo- —The Los Angeles Times May 2020 • $24.95 USD/$29.95 CaD • 2-Color • 5.5 x 8.25 • 200 pageS CoMICS & grapHIC NoVelS/lITERARY • ISBN 978-1-77046-395-0 • HarDCoVer Adrian Tomine was born in 1974 in Sacramento, California. He began self- publishing his comic book series Optic Nerve when he was sixteen, and in 1994 he received an offer to publish from Drawn & Quarterly. His comics have been anthologized in publications such as McSweeney’s, Best American Comics, and Best American Nonrequired Reading, and his graphic novel Shortcomings was a New York Times Notable Book of the year. His most recent book, Killing and Dying, appeared on numer- ous best-of-2015 lists and was a New York Times bestseller. Since 1999, Tomine has been a regular contributor to The New Yorker. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and daughters. CONSTITUTION ILLUSTRATED r. SIkoryak The master of the visual mash-up returns with his signature idiosyncratic take on the Constitution R. Sikoryak is the master of the pop cul- ous depiction of Wonder Woman breaking ture pastiche. In Masterpiece Comics, he free from her chains. American artists interpreted classic literature with defining from George Herriman (Krazy Kat) and twentieth-century comics. With Terms Charles Schulz (Peanuts) to Raina Telge- and Conditions, he made the unreadable meier (Sisters) and Alison Bechdel (Dykes contract that everyone signs–and no one to Watch Out For) are homaged, with reads–readable. He employs his magic yet their characters reimagined in historical again to investigate the very framework of costumes and situations. the country with Constitution Illustrated. We the People has never been more apt. By visually interpreting the complete text of the supreme law of the land with more than a century of American pop culture icons, praISe for r. SIkoryak Sikoryak distills the very essence of the gov- “Interesting and subversive.”—Forbes ernment legalese from the abstract to the tangible, the historical to the contemporary. “Outside of the novelty of such a project…the Notable among Sikoryak’s spot-on unions best part is seeing Sikoryak style every page of government articles and amendments into a different comics homage.”—GQ with famous comic book characters are: the eighteenth amendment that insti- “A fiendishly exact homage to beloved tuted prohibition articulated with Homer comics.”—Chicago Tribune Simpson running from Chief Wiggum; the fourteenth amendment that solidifies “Proof, if it were needed, that comics citizenship to all people born and natural- make everything better.”—Wired ized in the USA personified by Ms. Marvel; and, of course, the nineteenth amendment “Mischievous, pastiche-heavy.” offering women the right to vote as a glori- —The New York Times jUNe 2020 • $15.95 USD/$18.95 CaD • 4-Color • 5 x 7 • 128 pageS CoMICS & grapHIC NoVelS/lITERARY • ISBN 978-1-77046-396-7 • paperBaCk r. Sikoryak is the cartoonist of Masterpiece Comics, Terms and Conditions, and The Unquotable Trump. His comics and illustrations have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, The Nation, The Onion, and MAD as well as on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Sikoryak teaches in the illustration department at Parsons School of Design and previously at the Center for Cartoon Studies. Since 1997, he’s presented his live cartoon slideshow series, Carousel, around the United States and Canada. He lives in New York City with his wife, Kriota Willberg. I KNOw You RIDER LESLIe STEIN A candid and philosophical memoir tackling abortion and the complex decision to reproduce I Know You Rider is Leslie Stein’s rumi- ability, change, and adaptability, add- nation on the many difficult questions ing a much-needed new perspective to a surrounding the decision to reproduce. topic often avoided or discussed through Opening in an abortion clinic, the book a black and white lens. People are ever accompanies Stein through a year of her changing, contradicting themselves, and life, steeped in emotions she was not quite having to deal with unforeseen circum- expecting while also looking far beyond her stances: Stein holds this human condition own experiences. She visits with a child- with grace and humor, as she embraces hood friend who’s just had twins and is the cosmic choreography and keeps walk- trying to raise them as environmentally as ing, open to what life blows her way. possible, chats with another who’s had a va- sectomy to spare his wife a lifetime of birth control, and spends Christmas with her own PRAISe foR LESLIe STEIN mother, who aches for a grandchild. “Effervescent. Her handwritten dialogue, Through these melodically rendered con- squiggly forms, and watercolor washes versations with loved ones and strangers, are irresistible.”—The Paris Review Stein weaves one continuing conversation with herself. She presents a sometimes “Frank, charming, insightful meditations sweet, sometimes funny, and always pow- on daily life.” erfully empathetic account, asking what —BuzzFeed, Best Books of 2017 makes a life meaningful and where we find joy amid other questions—most of which “Strangely immersive, like experiencing have no solid answers, much like real life. the inside of someone else’s head. [These Instead of focusing on trauma, I Know are] modest, compassionate epiphanies.” You Rider is a story about unpredict- —The Globe and Mail May 2020 • $24.95 USD/$29.95 CaD • 4-Color • 6 x 7.75 • 144 pageS CoMICS & grapHIC NoVelS/lITERARY • ISBN 978-1-77046-401-8 • HarDCoVer Leslie Stein is the creator of the books Bright-Eyed at Midnight and Present, as well as the Eye of the Majestic Creature series. Her diary comics have been featured on The New Yorker, Vice, and in the Best American Comics anthology. She lives in Brooklyn, NY. WEndy, MaSTER of Art WAltER SCOTT The existential dread of making (or not making) art takes center stage in this trenchant satire of MFA culture Wendy is an aspiring contemporary performative activism, the precarity of a artist whose adventures have taken her life in the arts, as well as the complexi- to galleries, art openings, and parties ties of gender identity, sex work, drug in Los Angeles, Tokyo, and Toronto. In use, and more. At its heart, this is a Wendy, Master of Art, Walter Scott’s book about the give and take of com- sly wit and social commentary zero in munity–about someone learning how to on MFA culture as our hero decides to navigate empathy and boundaries, and hunker down and complete a Masters to respect herself. It is deeply funny and of fine arts at the University of Hell in endlessly relatable as it shows Wendy small-town Ontario. growing up from Millennial art party Finally Wendy has space to refine her girl to successful artist, friend, teacher— artistic practice, but in the calm, all of and Master of Art. her unresolved insecurities and fears explode at full volume—usually while PRAISe foR wAltER SCOTT hungover. What is the post-Jungian object “I am blown away by Walter Scott’s as symbol? Will she ever understand Wendy.”―Zadie Smith her course reading—or herself? What if she’s just not smart enough? As she de- “The funniest, most touching, most relat- velops as an artist and a person, Wendy able comic I have read in a really long also finds herself in a teaching position, time.”―Vice mentoring a perpetually sobbing grade- grubbing undergrad. “[Wendy is] a comedy of manners about a Scott’s incisively funny take on art particular scene; a dead-on representa- school pretensions isn’t the only focus.