Customer Reviews

I'D Scream Except I Look So Fabulous: A Cathy Collection

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I'm an avid Cathy fan and this is Guisewite at her best. She keeps to her trademark humor and perceptiveness while using very "everyday" situations. To those who complain that the cartoon plays upon stereotypical female concerns such as shopping and food, I counter that these themes make the humor relatable to many women, while providing a backdrop to the cartoonist's witty and incisive social commentary.

This particular collection plays upon an unexpected twist in the Cathy-Irving saga. After a lapse of three years, Irving turns up in a very unexpected way in Cathy's life - her professional life! - as a downsizing consultant. Guisewite very cleverly develops various angles of this theme, such as the often seen discrepancy between a person's competent "together" professional demeanor versus the more lackadaisical, sometimes inept, personal one. The irony is heightened for instance when Cathy's boss introduces Irving as being hired to do some housecleaning (as he euphemistically calls it) for the company and Cathy remembers that he does not even pick up his towels off the floor!

Of course Guisewite weaves in her usual themes into the plot. The title itself stems from a realization that her cartoon protagonist looks fabulous with the aid of the usual flesh constricting sartorial arsenal of corsets, tight hose and stillettos, etc. It speaks to the inventiveness and imagination of Guisewite that she can bring up many fresh and astute takes on these seemingly mundane aspects of the female experience.

Another great Cathy book as Guisewaite deals with downsizing, home businesses, and of course, relationships; the conflicts and triumphs that are all part of being female in America! Cathy reassures us that we're not the only one who thinks there's something slightly ridiculous about being a new millennium kind of woman!

Even in 2004, the 1999 Cathy looks as controversial as ever. No wonder so many hate her and so many love her. Her creator, Cathy Guisewite, marches in and takes no prisoners in the battle of the sexes and even more importantly, in the Ingmar-Bergman like drama of love and hate that exists between mother and daughter. Poor Cathy, we always think, when she is forced to listen to more abuse from her mother, and yet, she seems to enjoy it in a way, perhaps she really wants to have children herself.

The way she tries to fit into unsuitable clothes was obviously borrowed for another 90s sensation, the over-the-hill scenesters of ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS, and this collection in turn tips the hat right back by alluding to the UK-made TV sitcom in its title. Guisewite has made a million variations on a very limited palette of character types and her drawing isn't the greatest in the world, but she's got angst going for her and an international fan base as well.

I loved the story line when Irving downsized Cathy out of "Product Tester's Inc." That is every woman's worst nightmare.. well that and bathing suit season, but that's in here too! I believe Cathy's gotten better with age, and with her upcoming marriage to Irving, will continue to do so.

"I'd Scream Except I Look So Fabulous: A Cathy Collection by Cathy Guiswite" once again reassures the women of America (among many countries) that they are normal. They are not the only ones to fret over what they will wear, how they look in bathing suits, and why their sizes seem to get bigger and bigger as the trendy sizes are smaller and smaller. Through Cathy, people can realize that they are not strange to care about how they look, to be jealous of their dog because they are pampered more by their parents then they were, and that it is normal to hate bathing suits (sort of). Cathy has been charming the world for over two decades, and hopefully will go on doing so for a long time.