My post from two weeks ago (Zines for Kids), featured a number of zines from people that are working in picture books. Today’s zine is also from a kidlit creator, none other than Andrea Tsurumi!
This zine is in this state because my kids took it into the bath one time. That’s how much we love Andrea’s work in this house.
Personally, I’ve been a fan of Andrea’s work since NOT YOUR NEST, the art for which reminded me of a mashup between Wallace Tripp and Benjamin Chaud. Andrea, like Tripp, carefully observes their subjects, and like Chaud, renders them with a wonderfully loose but deliberate pencil line. Just look:
Anyway, I’d take any chance to promote Andrea’s work but this week I get to show off this zine AND boost Andrea’s latest POP! GOES THE NURSERY RHYME (written by Betsy Bird!).
It’s a strange enough feeling, to sense that the country you’re living in is about to cease being, but it’s far stranger to feel like the great majority of the people around you don’t seem to notice. I was raised in Indonesia and Canada and have, for that reason probably, never been under the delusion of American Exceptionalism. In general, I believe that nothing lasts forever—not even nation states. It’s not impossible that the US could just… dissolve. This doesn’t cause me a crisis. As nostalgic and backwards looking as I tend to be, I usually look forward with hope and excitement.
Lately, though, not so much. National Parks are being gutted, as are health agency, as soon will be libraries and education. None of this is a surprise, it’s what the ruling classes have wanted to do for a long time. What’s surprising is that, as I said, so many people around just don’t seem to notice or care. There is time yet to fight, time yet to believe in and build the type of future we want for us and our kids (read, one that isn’t fascist). So, here, for #ZineMonday, a guidebook for tough times.
There’s a question I’ve wanted to tackle for a while but it’s one that’s going to take more time than I have this morning to figure out. So, I’m just going to throw down some thoughts and maybe something will come of it. In short, my question is this: is there such a thing as a picture book zine?
Zines, by definition and by legacy are usually for mature audiences. They were born of the punk rock music scene and tend to stay in the “alternative press” world and they are (or were) seldom created with a kid audience in mind. Often zines were text heavy and read as (punk) music reviews of personal manifestos. Still, though, you do find kid-friendly zines from time to time (and lately, more and more) and some actually work as picture books. Here are a few from my collection with the barest bit of commentary:
PICKLE, I think, is more picture book than zine. In form, it’s absolutely a zine. But in production quality it’s a picture book. That’s due in no small part to Chau’s exquisite watercolor illustrations but also because this book was meant to accompany a companion app. If you remember the mid to late 2000s, apps were (as CD roms were in the 90s) poised to make books obsolete. This project, I think, was meant to bridge those media.
THE GOLDEN HORSESHOE always stood out in my mind as almost a picture book. The story feels like such a classic “how a (thing) got its name” fable but it’s told in comic form (Baczynski is an excellent cartoonist) so maybe I should be thinking of it as a graphic novel. It’s short, though, so it’s maybe a minicomic.
There’s an energy in Joe Maccarone’s DOG BREATH that reminds me of Marc Simont’s illustrations in THE STRAY DOG. I could see this as a picture book, probably published by Enchanted Lion.
A POCKET BOOK OF WITCHFOLK AND DEMONS by Nat Andrewson
Everything Natalie Andrewson makes is magic. And, lucky for us, she’s making a lot of things. This one’s definitely a zine, but it feels like something from the Nutshell Library. It’s kind of its own thing but its very close to a picture book.
The Helena comics by Michael Furler feel like something between TALES OF A FOURTH GRADE NOTHING and DIARY OF A WIMPY KID. I would call them… MG autobio comics. Not quite a picture book but really, really good.
Charmingly bizarre and bizarrely charming, LITTLE TADPOLE MAN is like the kind of comic you’d get in the middle of the old Nickelodeon Magazine. I think this also falls in the graphic novel camp (and I think it could be really popular with upper elementary readers).
Not only is Angela Poon’s OUR HOME is a straight up picture book I think it’s a Caldecott-level picture book (Poon being Canadian notwithstanding). Wholly original in technique (at least in the US, I think Korea has a tradition of using photographs of handmade dioramas like this) OUR HOME is an intimate and warm story about a kid and their grandmother moving into a new home. I have to share more pictures of this one.
I think at this point, though, you don’t call them zines. You call them “mini books”. It’s a weird nebulous distinction between the two, but I think that makes the most sense. Then again, I’m not sure I like the diminutive prefix. Here’s another “mini book” that offers as much as any traditionally published picture book.
See, again I feel weird calling this a mini book. To be sure, it’s small (measures 6×6 inches), but it’s also a really fun and funny (and brilliantly illustrated) annoying sibling story. And maybe I don’t need to call it a mini book. Maybe it’s just me and my need for tidy labels that’s making me draw these arbitrary distinctions. After all, I bought MY BROTHER THE DRAGON at Powell’s Bookstore in Portland where it sat proudly and legitimately amongst many other picture books, including the similarly sized Mr. Men volumes.
IN CONLUSION
So, can zines be picture books? I guess? I think in form and content, yes, absolutely. In public perception? Probably not. I think the buying public still likes knowing that picture books are vetted, to some degree, by publishers, editors, librarians, reviewers (in that order) to be made sure they are good and safe for young readers. Zines, by their very nature, are independent works and come with no such guarantee (irrespective of whether a guarantee is even needed).
As you probably noticed from the hashtag on this post (#ZineMonday), I’ve been taking a day a week to share some of my favorite and most recently acquired zines. This blog is mostly about picture books but really it’s about my inspirations. I find a lot of inspiration in zines but I have to say, they’re not always the most kid-friendly. This week’s zine* in particular is intended for mature audiences.
What I’m finding inspiring here is the technique. It’s risograph but it looks like something between a watercolor and marker.
The line drawings underneath this color remind me very strongly of Joann Sfar’s work. There’s a raw energy in this comic that I really admire.
Beanboy’s original’s story feels like a Creole folktale viewed through a sort of 1920s comic strip lens. I don’t know enough about the main character or the artist’s background to know how much of the story is drawn from life but the fact the book is dedicated to the artist’s mother makes it feels like the subject and themes are all very personal.
The book is small, measuring something like 2.5 by 4 inches, which seems to suit it perfectly.
MONTANA DIARY is a comic journal by Whit Taylor, detailing a summer’s road trip across “Big Sky Country”.
Whit’s journey across Montana is beset with anxiety. First from being a Black traveler in a very white, very red state (where Whit sees Confederate memorabilia on display at a gift shop).
Then from nature itself. An imagined stalking bear turns out to be a territorial grouse (their fears weren’t unfounded, they would later encounter a bear on the same hike).
Whit’s anxiety comes across as does the irony of not being able to breathe in Big Sky Country. Eventually, Whit manages to be more present with her surroundings and this is where the zine digs into the history of Montana and its indigenous people as preserved by museums in various National Parks.
This reference to National Parks is why the zine is on my mind. National Park employees have been laid off en masse under the guise of “government efficiency” but is really nothing more, as far as I’m concerned, than a longer term play to privatize public lands and turn the Grand Canyon into a casino and Big Sky Country into a tar pit. I wish more people would call these layoffs out for being just that. I can’t be the only one who sees this, can I?
Whit’s zine ends with some tender watercolor observations that feel bittersweet. They remind me beautiful places exist and make me glad National Parks exist.
Avy Jetter, who posts on IG as @nuthingoodat4, does a drawing a day every February in honor of Black History Month. At the end of February these portraits are matched with a short biography and collected in a zine, I picked up this one a number of years ago.
Black History Month Daily Drawing Zine by Avy Jetter (2018)
I had this James Baldwin drawing on a pin I kept on my brown corduroy jacket but some young filmmakers borrowed my jacket for their wardrobe and lost it (the pin, not the jacket). I need to get a replacement.
James Baldwin
I love pen and ink crosshatching drawings and Avy gets some really good tones in her work.
Marsha P. JohnsonTupac Amaru Shakur
The zine provides a good cross-section of historic and modern figures and seeing that this project has been running for seven years (or longer?), there’s always something new to learn. Here’s one of my favorites from this year:
You can see process videos on Avy’s YouTube. Certain portraits are available to buy from her Etsy.
This zine is so good. I’ll let the reviews on the Silver Sprocket website (where you can and should buy the zine) do the talking but I’ll add that the punchline ending is heartbreakingly good. Absolute perfection.
*edited ’cause this is a mostly #kidlit site, although there’s only two swears in the whole thing
