I don’t remember how I found out about Liz Climo’s Tumblr, and I don’t remember how long I’ve been reading it, but I seriously love it, so I was very excited about this book, which is a mix of comics from her Tumblr and new ones. As the back cover puts it, this is a “charmingly quirky animal kingdom, a place where grizzly bears, porcupines, rabbits and anteaters all grapple with everyday life with wit and humor.” It’s organized thematically into four sections (“love and friendship,” “holidays and celebrations,” “family,” and “daily life”), which I think mostly works, though some of the ones in “holidays and celebrations” felt a little repetitive to me. But, I mean, I can’t really complain. I laughed out loud multiple times while reading this, and kept interrupting my boyfriend to show him pages I particularly liked. I like Climo’s style, which is visually simple: these are mostly one-panel or two-panel comics, generally with a white background, so the various animal protagonists and the jokes/wordplay are front and center. (Example joke, from page ten of the book: An otter says to a clam, “why are you mad at me?” The clam says, “because you called me selfish.” Otter: “no, I called you shellfish.” Clam: “oh. well, that’s accurate.)
Some favorites:
Fishbowl
Don’t be afraid
Relationships are complicated
Mmm, ants
Never pass the ball to Larry
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