Graphic shorts in a JimThompson vein. "Abandoned Cars" is Tim Lane's first collection of graphic short stories, noir-ish narratives that are united by their exploration of the great American mythological drama by way of the desperate and haunted characters that populate its pages. Lane's characters exist on the margins of society--alienated, floating in the void between hope and despair, confused but introspective. Some of them are experiencing the aftermath of an existential car crash--those surreal moments after a car accident, when time slows down and you're trying to determine what just happened and how badly you're hurt. Others have gone off the deep end, or were never anywhere but the deep end. Some are ridiculous, others dignified in their efforts to struggle to make sense of, and cope with, the absurdities, outrages, ghosts, and poisons in their lives.
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Editorial Reviews
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“It’s the modern equivalent of the Raymond Chandler yarns that fill up the more exciting portion of your bookshelf — a string of police chases and back-alley fist fights with a surprisingly introspective thread running in the background.” (Kempt )
“When you put all the pieces together, you don’t simply get a story or a group of stories, you get a book that pulls back the curtain on the collective unconscious of a nation. ... Like the myths that it is inspired by, Abandoned Cars lingers long after reading and grows in stature as you re-live and re-tell it.” (Chad Derdowski - Mania )
“The spirit of the Beats imbues the debut collection by Tim Lane… The stories are united by their sense of longing and melancholy. … His pen and ink style, reminiscent of Charles Burns, is extremely detailed and noirishly evocative.” (Mike Sebastian - Campus Circle )
“The book signals the arrival of a major new voice on the American literary landscape, with or without illustrations.” (Print Magazine )
“Lane’s gorgeous black-and-white artwork — naturalistic with occasional leaps into the surreal — consistently lends tension as well as a quiet beauty to these various tales of struggle.” (Danny Graydon - The First Post )
“Dirty, greasy, and impossible to put down, Lane’s hardcover debut was the perfectly-timed summing-up of The American Dream in all its power and tail-finned delusion.” (Alan David Doane - Comicbook Galaxy )
“Tim Lane presents a personal study of what he calls 'The Great American Mythological Drama,' a fog of events/thoughts/dreams/ disappointments in music/literature/ North American life... Lane leads to something more introspective and extremely sad.” (Churrasco la Naje )
“The book is a litany of voices from the deep, and Lane's artwork is vivid and hallucinatory. All in all, Abandoned Cars reads like Jim Thompson writing about post-financial-crisis America.” (The New York Times )
“A brilliant debut....Abandoned Cars doesn’t arrive at a clear-cut solution to the American Myth, but Lane’s effort to understand it for himself is beautifully presented.” (William Jones - Graphic Novel Reporter )
“When you put all the pieces together, you don’t simply get a story or a group of stories, you get a book that pulls back the curtain on the collective unconscious of a nation. ... Like the myths that it is inspired by, Abandoned Cars lingers long after reading and grows in stature as you re-live and re-tell it.” (Chad Derdowski - Mania )
“The spirit of the Beats imbues the debut collection by Tim Lane… The stories are united by their sense of longing and melancholy. … His pen and ink style, reminiscent of Charles Burns, is extremely detailed and noirishly evocative.” (Mike Sebastian - Campus Circle )
“The book signals the arrival of a major new voice on the American literary landscape, with or without illustrations.” (Print Magazine )
“Lane’s gorgeous black-and-white artwork — naturalistic with occasional leaps into the surreal — consistently lends tension as well as a quiet beauty to these various tales of struggle.” (Danny Graydon - The First Post )
“Dirty, greasy, and impossible to put down, Lane’s hardcover debut was the perfectly-timed summing-up of The American Dream in all its power and tail-finned delusion.” (Alan David Doane - Comicbook Galaxy )
“Tim Lane presents a personal study of what he calls 'The Great American Mythological Drama,' a fog of events/thoughts/dreams/ disappointments in music/literature/ North American life... Lane leads to something more introspective and extremely sad.” (Churrasco la Naje )
“The book is a litany of voices from the deep, and Lane's artwork is vivid and hallucinatory. All in all, Abandoned Cars reads like Jim Thompson writing about post-financial-crisis America.” (The New York Times )
“A brilliant debut....Abandoned Cars doesn’t arrive at a clear-cut solution to the American Myth, but Lane’s effort to understand it for himself is beautifully presented.” (William Jones - Graphic Novel Reporter )
About the Author
Tim Lane lives in St. Louis, MO.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Brilliant Debut,
By
This review is from: Abandoned Cars (Hardcover)
To simply call Tim Lane's Abandoned Cars a collection of short stories on a particular theme is a bit misleading. While the book is presented as a collection, Lane's first as a matter of fact, it is rather a well orchestrated set of stories--likely conceived together--that return in multiple parts, are sometimes strips split and scattered throughout the book, and often framed by recurring ideas.
Lane deals with what he calls the "Great American Mythological Drama," closely associated, but not to be confused with, the American Dream. His characters are mostly on the younger side of middle-aged and dealing with what can best be described as an emptiness related to the realization that the something--a feeling sold through the collective promise that is America--they were expecting to find later in life just is not there for a variety of reasons. It deals with the time when expectations and dreams meet reality and examines the rift between them. They are mostly introspective characters, wandering in a noirish blur, staring down decrepit alleys, contemplating what life means without that feeling and how it got away, or if it ever existed. Some, as in a tale billed as autobiographical, are still trying to find a trace of it by any means necessary--in the case of the author, that means seeking the rush of hopping freight trains. The characters travel separate paths but deal with nearly identical feelings. By its nature, some of the book's tales can be downright gloomy, and fittingly Abandoned Cars doesn't arrive at a clear-cut solution to the American Myth, but Lane's effort to understand it for himself is beautifully presented. Each tale is drawn in greatly detailed black-and-white evocative of Charles Burns, and the characters, the action, and the environments (much like the stories themselves) are exaggerated, creating a surrealistic tone. Lane also takes small cues from Chris Ware and uses the medium of comics extensively. Readers are presented with cutout pages of American archetypes, fabricated advertisements that play into the theme and several panels Lane arranges out of traditional order and occasionally requires readers to turn the book to follow. The Ware-esque devices, far from being gimmicky, successfully serve the purpose of actively including the reader in the process of self-examination. The reason it feels misleading to call Abandoned Cars a collection is that every last detail of the book seems perfectly devised by Lane to bring the stories together and make the reader join the inner dialogue on the subject of the Great American Mythological Drama. It is a brilliant debut. -- William Jones
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ruminations on Lost America,
By
This review is from: Abandoned Cars (Hardcover)
An unironic loss of innocence, a blind curve, a chance encounter that changes everything (for better or worse), past mistakes distorting future plans, melancholy blues, surreal slapstick, the "true" story of Stagger Lee and an abiding sense of careless adventure...these are the overtones of Abandoned Cars. Many of these drawings and stories seem drawn from the inner eye through real experience. I wish more graphic novelists would take the risks that he takes. A serious and funny debut.
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