Customer Reviews

She's Turning into One of Them! A For Better or For Worse Collection

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I adore this comic strip. It has been wonderful to see the whole family grow up before our eyes.

In this treasury of 136 pages, the focus is mainly on April who has become a teenager. I remember reading this strip when April was a little girl being saved by my beloved Farley! Now, she is a teenager!!! Its making me feel old.

This is a collection of the strips that have appreared in the Sunday pages and is pretty funny considering the situations the whole family is often put in. Although there is a focus on April, there are also many, many wonderful strips on the other family members.

I have to admit to feeling a little disconnected when Lynn gives us too much of the outside world, i.e. Mike's wife, Liz boyfriend's etc. This strip works best for me when the whole (or part of) the family is together.

Nonetheless a wonderful read. Pick it up.

I have every one of the FBFW collections. I've been a part of the family since they first appeared. Probably because this is the family I'd have had if not for the divorce. My favorite part is that each member isn't really cartoonish. They have faults and frustrations, they fight, they make up....it's believable. I'm an avid reader and part of the enjoyment is caring for the characters involved. I care for these characters. This is the only strip I need a daily fix for. I reread the series over again, just as I do Little House on the Prairie and for very much the same reason. These stories are a history of our time. Lynn has recorded the last 20+ years of family life and the world that affects it.

Lynn Johnston's books are always great. She is the only cartoonist who ages the characters in her strip in real time. In this episode, which lasts about a year, the youngest Patterson turns 13 and her parents have their hands full with a new teenager. Her sister, Elizabeth begins to grow away from the family. Mike and Deanna expect their second child. Elly and John begin to adjust to middle age. Grandpa and Iris are managing well at this point.

If you love For Better or For Worse and have missed this issue, you will certainly enjoy it.

We own all of the "For Better or For Worse" books and the whole family enjoys them! In fact some of us read them more than once. This one is just as good as the others.

aprils teenage years are forcing the patersons to rewrite the rules they have relied on for so long in regards for their parenting. The greated media threat to april's brother and sister was Mtv and keeping them from watching it was probably a simple task compared to what they are faced with April. Outside influences once thought to stop at the front door are easily accesable through the computer and satellite TV and the reality of how unsafe society has become. Face it, we all have a real fear of someone so desperate to kidnap a child they will break in to a locked home. Their fear has forced them to keep April within their sphere of influence evenif it means she has to work at the store along side her mom, something Elly never had to even think about when Micheal and Elizabeth were April's age. This book, even though its humor, is a brilliant editorial on the radical adjustments parents are making in their lives with the onslaught of the radical changes in our society.

Another Great book to visit the Patterson's with. "For Better / For Worse" has to be one of the best comic strips of all time. It really makes you think, "They are just like my family", and if you do not have kids, read the books so you know what to prepare for.

If you are a devotee of Lynn Johnston's work, you won't be disappointed in this newest work. I just wish she would produce more books more often! I have enjoyed every single one she has done!

Again - what memories there are in these - we've all been there and remember this kind of thing.

Really enjoyed this book, chuckled again over the strips we had enjoyed in the newspaper.

Although I am a longtime reader of For Better or For Worse, the last few years have been painful. This collection begins to show the downward slide of the storytelling and artwork. The native characters introduced have recently been completely trashed by Ms. Johnston, and this collection also covers the ongoing story of two main characters who conduct an emotional affair, even though one character is married and has a child. Even more bizarrely, everyone in the strip is portrayed as endorsing the breakup of the characters marriage and the hookup of these two.
Many of the forums devoted to FBOFW, have completely predicted all the storylines months (sometimes years)in advance. The plots are predictable and the character developments have been completely messed up, simply to fit into a nice little tie-up for Johnston's scheduled retirement date. Unfortunately, she should have retired two years ago when readers still had an affection for the characters.