Monday, August 11, 2008

Graphic Novel Monday: The Fart Party, by Julia Wertz

The Fart Party, by Julia Wertz. Published 2007 by Atomic Book Company. Graphica. Memoir.


A fellow LibraryThinger summed up Julia Wertz's collection of web comics and zines thusly: "Wildly inappropriate."

The Fart Party is absolutely hilarious. Wertz is a comics artist originally from California, who's published most of her work online at her website, www.fartparty.org, and in a number of self-published zines. In fact, after I got The Fart Party home I was going through my small zine collection and found one of hers, so I guess that means I really like her work.

Yeah. In the introduction Wertz describes herself as a 23 year old living in San Francisco who likes "nerd stuff" and "wanderin'"; this book tells the story of her breakup with her then-boyfriend Oliver who she describes as liking "lushing and swaggering." The comics also cover her family, childhood and various adventures in and around her town. For example, she bikes around and gets rained on, which leads her to question why God hates her, or lolls in the tub feeling sexy but then gets angry because Oliver doesn't come quickly enough when she calls, and by the time he gets there her mood has become as frizzy as her hair. You know, the kinds of things that happen to all of us.

Except that when it happens to her, it's much funnier than when it happens to me, because I can't write and draw as expressively as she does. The art is definitely crude and simple, but it's a simplicity that works because of the crudeness of much of the subject matter. Raunchy, a little violent and laden with swears, The Fart Party is a lot like South Park- a cartoon for grownups, not appropriate for anyone. But still really funny.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review from the publisher.

1 comment:

Alea said...

I love the Fart Party! Julia is so funny. I think I discovered an issue while at Atomic Books in Baltimore and was very excited to find this big book coming out! Love it!