Whatever [Paperback]

Karl Stevens (Author, Artist)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 22, 2008

Whatever showcases a remarkable collection of humorous and beautifully drawn short stories by Ignatz-nominated and Xeric Award-winning artist Karl Stevens. Set in the world of young artists, dreamers, drinkers, layabouts and dime-store deep thinkers of bohemian Allston, Massachusetts, the strips - originally published in The Phoenix, Boston's leading alternative weekly - are revealing snapshots of real-life urban America at the dawn of the 21st century. In addition to The Phoenix strips, Whatever features ten exquisite color pieces expertly rendered in watercolor.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Whatever, Stevens’ weekly feature in the Boston Phoenix, is about his circle of postcollegians. He shows them drinking, smoking, sleeping, waking, blundering about the apartment, waiting for buses, partying, playing in bands, in parks and on beaches, and talk-talk-talking or think-think-thinking—just about everything except working. In all this, a lot of unintentionally hilarious things are said or thought. Our hero, Karl, broods over a portrait-in-progress of the girl he broke up with; one track of his mind contemplates stylistic choices, another berates himself as a failed lover: “Is there no escape from the bullshit of the past?” he laments. A guy approaches a table at which a woman is laughing and looking at the guy sitting across from her: “Damn. Cock blocked!” the first guy thinks. Stevens gets no funnier than that, but he is reliably as funny, and he is a much more thorough realistic artist than the label cartoonist suggests. Two inserts of fully colored images bring to mind David Hockney and Philip Pearlstein, but Stevens is much warmer. --Ray Olson

Product Details

• Paperback: 112 pages
• Publisher: Alternative Comics (April 22, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1934460036
• ISBN-13: 978-1934460030
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 7.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,915,108 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating collection, July 16, 2008

By 

wiredweird "wiredweird" (Earth, or somewhere nearby) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Whatever (Paperback)

This slim anthology covers a wide range of situations and sensibilities. Each page appeared originally in the Boston Phoenix, the way Feiffer used to appear in the Village Voice. There's no similarity between Stevens's work and Feiffer's, though. Stevens documents the daily reality (and unreality) of twenty-somethings fresh from college, with their couplings, uncouplings, ethanolic excesses, room-mate woes, and the general angst of daily life

Some of these pages stand alone: teasing an over-serious art student's commentary on grafitti, or dealing with the vegetarian at Thanksgiving. Others appear as series, like a brief continuity about a small band's big break or a young woman deciding what to feel when her girlfriend seems to be drifting away. Stevens draws uncommonly well, usually in pen, but at least one page looks like B&W ink wash and some gorgeous color pages appear, too. One set of the color paintings was adapted for the cover, a young woman in tiny red bikini, obsessing in front of a mirror. Perhaps those pictures best capture the sense that unifies this whole collection: a scene that's very real and familiar, to at least some set of viewers, and emotionally ambiguous. I don't mean vague, I mean that so many possibilities lie inside the characters that it's hard to guess which dominates.

Although conspicuously set in Boston, this should appeal to anyone fresh out of college. The adults not wholly ready for adulthood are sure to represent someone familiar. Any one who like visual story-telling can enjoy it, though. I recommend this book very highly.

-- wiredweird