Review: Soppy by Philippa Rice

Title: Soppy

Author: Philippa Rice

Publication Date: December 2nd, 2014

Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing

Genre: Graphic Novel

Pages: 108

ISBN: 1449461069

Source: ARC from NetGalley

Rating: 

Synopsis (from Goodreads):

Sometimes it’s about sympathizing with someone whose tea has gone cold, watching TV and sharing a quilt, or allowing your partner to order take-away pizza again. When two people move in together, it soon becomes apparent that the little things mean an awful lot. The throwaway moments in life become meaningful when you spend them in the company of someone you love.

Soppy is Philippa Rice’s collection of comics based on real-life moments with her boyfriend. From grocery shopping to silly arguments and snuggling in front of the television, Soppy captures the universal experience of sharing a life together.

 

Currently I live in Nottingham and work from my beautiful home studio. I mostly make comics but also spend a lot of time making animations and illustrations too. 

I work in a bunch of different styles and mediums. People keep asking me which is my favourite and I can't choose. It's nice to switch between different materials and techniques. 

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Either you're going to love this book or you're going to hate it, but I thought it was one of the most adorable stinken' things I've read in a long time. Perhaps because I'm in a comfortable, happy relationship and can relate to a lot of the little moments found in Soppy, or because I enjoyed taking pleasure in the simplicity of a blossoming relationship without the torture of a love triangle gone awry. I felt like Rice took even the "boring stuff" and made it into a light flavor that triggered fond memories of cozy love.

If I had to describe this book in one word (other than "soppy"), I would call it simple. There is minimal text, a fairly ordinary storyline, and an incredibly limited color palette (you get what you see on the cover...negative/positive space and red). All of these elements reflected the tone, and yet they worked perfectly together to create a soft and sweet storyline.

Rice pours enough of her heart into this book that the love story becomes tangible to the reader. You find yourself relating to the little moments and adoring the declaration of affection jumping off the page. It isn't just sickening sweetness, though. It celebrates the silly moments, the frustrating moments, the selfish and selfless moments, even the mundane every day moments that encourage teamwork. It creates an entertaining little masterpiece to just sit back and enjoy.

Soppy probably wouldn't appeal to those who spend Valentine's Day bitterly sitting at home eating take-out and watching whatever movie-of-choice that helps them cope with being single. But if you like sweet, sappy, and dripping with cuteness, then you'll enjoy this collection of sketches.

This book is a light read and would also make a great gift for the sweetheart in your life.

Review: Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? by Roz Chast

Title: Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?
Author: Roz Chast

Publication Date: May 6th, 2014

Publisher: Bloomsbury USA

Genre: Graphic Novel, Memoir

Pages: 228

ISBN: 1608198065

Source: The Library
Awards: National Book Award Nominee for Nonfiction (2014), Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction (2014)

Rating: 

Synopsis (from Goodreads):

#1 New York Times Bestseller

2014 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST

In her first memoir, Roz Chast brings her signature wit to the topic of aging parents. Spanning the last several years of their lives and told through four-color cartoons, family photos, and documents, and a narrative as rife with laughs as it is with tears, Chast’s memoir is both comfort and comic relief for anyone experiencing the life-altering loss of elderly parents.

When it came to her elderly mother and father, Roz held to the practices of denial, avoidance, and distraction. But when Elizabeth Chast climbed a ladder to locate an old souvenir from the “crazy closet”—with predictable results—the tools that had served Roz well through her parents’ seventies, eighties, and into their early nineties could no longer be deployed.

While the particulars are Chast-ian in their idiosyncrasies—an anxious father who had relied heavily on his wife for stability as he slipped into dementia and a former assistant principal mother whose overbearing personality had sidelined Roz for decades—the themes are universal: adult children accepting a parental role; aging and unstable parents leaving a family home for an institution; dealing with uncomfortable physical intimacies; managing logistics; and hiring strangers to provide the most personal care.

An amazing portrait of two lives at their end and an only child coping as best she can, Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant will show the full range of Roz Chast’s talent as cartoonist and storyteller.

  

Roz Chast has loved to draw cartoons since she was a child growing up in Brooklyn. She attended Rhode Island School of Design, majoring in Painting because it seemed more artistic. However, soon after graduating, she reverted to type and began drawing cartoons once again.

Her cartoons have also been published in many other magazines besides The New Yorker, including Scientific American, the Harvard Business Review, Redbook, and Mother Jones. Her most recent book is a comprehensive compilation of her favorite cartoons called Theories of Everything: Selected, Collected, and Health-Inspected Cartoons of Roz Chast, 1978-2006. She also illustrated The Alphabet from A to Y, with Bonus Letter, Z, the best-selling children's book by Steve Martin.

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Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant? : A Memoir, Is a graphic novel by Roz Chast that tells the story of her experiences caring for her elderly parents as they make their way through the least popular stage of life; the last one. Chast uses her unique and candid voice and eccentric drawing style to illuminate a very dark topic in society. What she creates is a story that is equal parts hilarious, heartwarming and downright depressing. 

Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant gives a brutally honest account of the author’s life and the lives of her parents from childhood to the inevitable conclusion. Chast pulls no punches when describing the challenges of caring for an aging parent. She manages to distill every moment of heartache and comedy out of everything from senility to generational differences to just plain stubbornness. Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant is part biography, part memoir, part new Yorker comic, except it’s actually funny. The comedic portions are extremely funny but the dark aspect to the humor had me wondering if I should be laughing at times. The idiosyncrasies of Chast and her family make for some truly funny moments until they are put against the backdrop of the hurt that bore them. In that sense, Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant is a perfect slice of the human experience; funny on the surface, dig a bit deeper and it is morbidly depressing, see the big picture and everything kind of turns out all right. 

The entire book feels like a therapeutic exercise on the part of the author. She really delves into the problems she had with her parents, especially her mother and how those problems affected their dynamic later in life. Extremely complex feelings are unearthed and captured in comic form. The medium of the comic lends a lighthearted air to what is a very uncomfortable subject, but Chast also uses it to profound effect to plumb the depths of familial relations. Her brutal honesty for her portrayal of events is only matched by her brutal honesty about herself. For every strip about an annoying quirk of her father or the brash overbearing nature of her mother, there is one about her own guilt over her impatience with her parents or selfish thoughts. It all goes a long way toward chronicling the unceasingly arduous, mercilessly expensive, insanity inducing and at times extremely funny experience of taking care of the people who once took care of you. 

Calvin and Hobbes holds the same kind of importance for young, only children as Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant will hold for those in the sandwich generation. It is the quintessential dark comedy for anyone with aging parents but should by no means be limited to that. Within hours of reading it, I had already recommended it to everyone close to me. I would recommend it to anyone who is in need of a laugh, a cry, or both at the same time. Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant is incredibly evocative and charming and is well worth a read.

My Favorite Books from 2014

2014 was a really good year for reading! I've collected some of my favorite books from different genres to share:

Adult Fiction

    

The House We Grew Up In by Lisa Jewell

Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult

All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

Non-Fiction

    

Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? by Roz Chas

The Bohemians by Ben Tarnoff

#GIRLBOSS by Sophia Amoruso

People I Want to Punch in the Throat by Jen Mann

Young Adult

    

To All They Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny 

Letters to the Dead by Ava Dellaira

We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith

Middle Grade

(This was a tough one! So many great books this year)

   

Oliver and the Seawigs by Philip Reeve

The Riverman by Aaron Starmer

West of the Moon by Margi Preus

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

Children's Books (This was also a tough one!)

    

The Pigeon Needs a Bath by Mo Willems

The Book With No Pictures by B.J. Novak

Before After by Matthias Arégui

Have You Heard The Nesting Bird? by Rita Gray illus. Kenard Pak

Graphic Novels

   

The Graveyard Book, Vol 2 by Neil Gaiman

Through the Woods by Emily Carroll

Soppy: A Love Story by Philippa Rice

Manga Classics: Pride and Prejudice by Stacy King

Poetry

   

Lullabies by Lang Leav

Faithful and Virtuous Night by Louis Glück

Jessica's Journal by Kathryn Perez

No Matter the Wreckage by Sarah Kay

Christian Fiction

   

The Sea House by Elisabeth Gifford

The Butterfly and the Violin by Kristy Cambron

Seagrass Pier by Colleen Coble

A Promise Kept by Robin Lee Hatcher

Christian Non-Fiction

   

I've Never Been to Vegas, but My Luggage Has by Mandy Hale

The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey

Unstoppable by Christine Caine

The Storm Inside by Sheila Walsh

What were your favorite books this year? Did you get to read any of these?