In 1970, director Robert Altman released a film that, despite its blatant anti-war rhetoric and heavy criticism of Cold War attitudes, would win several awards including five Academy Award nominations and an Oscar for it’s screenplay, and a designation of “culturally significant” from the Library of Congress. M.A.S.H — and the TV show that followed…
Grotesque, Anxious and Delightful: A Review of The Wicked and the Tired
The Wicked and The Tired Sheika Lugtu (editor), Jenna Kang (assistant editor), Connie Chu (cover art), A. Cris Valles, Daimon Hampton, Rivven Prink, Gabriel Mason, Gabi Mendez, Sheika Lugtu, Yewon Kwon, Woodbury Rand (Contributors) Cow House Press One of my favorite things about Chicago’s independent comics scene is that it’s filled with people who are downright inspiring,…
Cover Girl: Coady and the Creepies #1
Each month, we gather a team of WWAC contributors to analyze a new and notable comic book cover featuring a woman. This month Melissa, Alenka, Alexis and Rosie look at Coadie and the Creepies #1.
Small Press Bites: A Girl & Her Cat, A Catgirl, and More
Something Familiar Pam Wishbow Pam Wishbow’s work is delightfully creepy, always adorned with eyes and runes and enough esoteric symbols to catch my eye from across a room. Something Familiar, true to form, is a dark and creepy comic drawn in stark black and white, its shadows often dominating each scene in a way that…
Trust, Trauma, and Family in Caela Carter’s Forever, or a Long Long Time
Forever, or a Long Long Time Caela Carter Harper Collins March 7, 2017 Disclaimer: A review copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Trauma does not define a person, but it can cause seemingly endless aftershocks. Flora and Julian, a sister and brother who spent a considerable amount of…
Snowy Days With Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber: Part One
Welcome to The Bloody Chamber roundtable; a collection of short stories by speculative author Angela Carter. We’ll be discussing the short stories — their themes, the craft and the feelings they’ve elicited — in a four-parted series for every season starting with cold, frosty winter. We broke up the collection and have started with wolves:…
What is Journalism? A Review of Rolling Blackouts
Rolling Blackouts: Dispatches from Turkey, Syria, and Iraq Sarah Glidden Drawn + Quarterly October 2016 A review copy was provided by the publisher. What is journalism? This is the primary question cartoonist Sarah Glidden pursued while traveling through Turkey, Iraq and Syria in 2010. Glidden’s friends and co-founders of The Seattle Globalist, Sarah Stuteville and…
Jane Mai Is an American Hero
Memoirists, unsurprisingly, often retell moments of their lives to extract a lesson from their experiences. It is natural to use the act of writing or talking about yourself to generate meaning, but lately I’ve been wondering if building narratives out of one’s own incomplete life can be dangerous. We all have, at one time or…
Myth, Motherhood and Buttered Toast: An Interview with Sophia Wiedeman
Nothing makes me happier than a story that gets in my head, manipulates my emotions, and controls how I read. I am a fast reader, and poor pacing or lazy writing — whether in comic or prose form — cause me to speed through a book, letting my impatience get the better of me. This…
Review: Train I Ride by Paul Mosier
Train I Ride Paul Mosier Harper Collins January 24, 2017 Train I Ride is a middle grade novel that takes place over a days-long Amtrak ride from California to Chicago. Rydr is 12, soon to be 13, and must move to Chicago to live with her only remaining family member: a mysterious uncle who she…
Reading Art Speigelman’s Maus In 2017: A Roundtable
Maus by Art Spiegelman is one of those comics that’s brought up again and again, and not just by people within comics communities. August of 2016 was the 30th anniversary of the Pantheon collected edition of volume one, and 2017 will mark 25 years since it won the Pulitzer Prize. This Washington Post retrospective on…
WWAC Contributor’s Favourite Writing of 2016
I asked our contributors to tell me what their favourite piece by another WWAC writer was this year. They’ve picked articles that made an impact on them and on our readers and that, I think, stand among the best writing we published on the site this year. As our annual holiday break comes to a close, I’m…