Customer Reviews

Freaks of Nature

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

It is amazing how someone who barely has use of their arms and hands, and actually no use of their fingers per se, can draw as eloquently and in a graphically pleasing manner as John Callahan, the paralyzed cartoonist from Portland, Oregon. This guy laughs it up over everything, including handicapped people, no one is safe. You'll laugh until you cry. Freaks of Nature is a great book. If someone in your life is depressed, even yourself, give the gift of laughter.

I just wanted to clarify something in light of the previous reviewer's comments. The reason the art quality is less than stunning is that Callahan is a quadrapalegic and has to draw with a pen held in his mouth. And I've seen other professional cartoonists who don't draw any better despite having more experience and the use of both hands.

John Callahan's drawings are intentionally simple and primitive. Even though he draws with a pen in his mouth; he can still draw beautifully, but chooses not to. The drawings are raw and crude, just like the humor they portray. Callahan is a genius! Read everything he's written!

I made a gamble in buying this book as there were no existing previews on it and was disappointed with what I got.

John Callahan's drawing is pretty poor and is what you could describe as being a messy style almost like a doodle or something that you would expect someone in Year 8 or 9 to do whilst they were sitting in a boring class.

Being from Australia I also found some of the cartoons will not appeal to people outside the USA, as like me you might not know who he is referring to. An example of this is a cartoon of the three wise monkeys where he has one labelled Baily, one labelled Cochrane and one labelled Shapiro. There are other cartoons which refer to people such as Alan Dershowitz, Gerald Uelman etc. that many people outside of the USA have probably never heard of.

There are some genuinely funny cartoons in this book but considering the cost of this book it was overall rather dissapointing. But unfortunately the poor drawing detracts from it.

I would only recommend this book to those that are familiar with John Callahan's work.