Joe & Azat in the Smithsonian?

Indeed, a nice review of Jesse Lonergan’s Joe & Azat at the Smithsonian site:

“Joe’s best guide is local Azat, “the computer expert at the education department” – never mind that the entire department has but one computer. Azat, “the greatest dreamer [Joe] ever met” is also his best friend in Turkmenistan. Azat makes sure Joe gets his stolen passport back, tastes the best cooking (including his mother’s manty), meets a few of the local girls (at least one of whom Joe should marry), and enjoys every wedding with or without an invitation. In return, Joe puts up with Azat’s bully-of-an-older brother, listens to Azat’s nonsensical schemes to get rich, commiserates with Azat’s yearning for a girl he can’t have, and patiently tries to answer one absurd question after another.”

Publishers Weekly had six critics round up the best of 2009 and our Story of O and Year of Loving Dangerously made the list. Also, Augie De Bliek, Jr. at Comic Book Resources puts Trondheim’s Little Nothings 2 in the top of 2009.

Speaking of CBR, Jason Sacks there says of Royo’s newly remastered collection Malefic: ”You can’t ask for a more beautifully produced collection of fantasy art than Malefic.”   And Andrew “Capt. Comics” Smith , syndicated in many papers through Scripps says of it:

“A very beautiful book, both in format and content. Royo is an absolute master of his craft, creating incredibly gorgeous and expressive women (and sometimes men), and switching easily from fantasy to sci-fi to horror.”

“Lonergan’s clean, sharp lines, minimal backgrounds, and pure black and white (no grays, not even via shading) make another story of a youthful, probably temporary relationship vivid and affecting.
Altogether excellent.”

See more on Joe & Azat and Jesse Lonergan.

Ted Rall and Pablo Callejo’s The Year of Loving Dangerously just keeps getting the accolades, the latest from Booklist:

“He was more interested in well-stocked refrigerators than impending sexual adventures. Realistically illustrated in soft colors by Callejo, of Bluesman (2004–06) fame, and maximally unbuttoned in some places, Rall’s sympathetic account of his life on the edge encourages identifying with a situation so desperate that his outrageous choices seem necessary.”

And Publishers Weekly thought Jesse Lonergan’s Joe & Azat equally charming:

“Lonergan follows his graphic novel, Flower & Fade, with this charming and engrossing study of a friendship that transcends cultural borders. A simply illustrated charmer that grips readers from its opening pages and remains on the mind well after it has been read and absorbed.”

When you have absolute power in a country, you get to do a lot of things that most other people don’t. For example, you get to have a lot of medals on your jacket.

Just a few of the awards presented to Turkmenbashy: Hero of Turkmenistan (six times), Medal for Labor Heroism, Order of Friendship of Peoples, Medal for Love of the Fatherland, The Award for International Understanding, Order Galkynysh, Silk Road Prize for Outstanding Achievement, Order Bitaraplyk, Gold Medal for the International Informatization Academy, Gold Medal for Outstanding Contribution to the World Strengthening and Understanding among Nations, First Class Order of the Russian Orthodox Church of Saint Duke Daniel of Moscow, Grand Duke Yaroslav the Wise First Class Order, Medal of the Turkmen-Turkish Frienship Society, Order of Saint Mesrop Mashtots…

… and so many many more (and none of these are fictional).

It’s good to be the king, or at least the President for life.

Check out Joe and Azat for more about Turkmenistan and what it’s like living in a place with a president like this. And check out this review from Publishers Weekly. Check out my blog, too.

I don’t really do caricatures of people, so I was a little nervous about drawing Turkmenbashy in Joe and Azat. I suppose that Turkmenistan being the out of the way country that it is I could probably draw just about anything and most people in the U.S. wouldn’t question it, but I knew that at least some people who had been to Turkmenistan were going to see it and I didn’t want them saying, “You totally botched the bashy.”

So I kept things simple and I think it turned out all right. I also always liked Ted Rall’s drawings of Bush which weren’t the most accurate, but definitely gave you a clear impression of what Ted thought of him. So my Turkmenbashy is just a little bit cross eyed even though he wasn’t in real life.

I was an English teacher and Turkmenistan and before every class I heard the sacred oath chanted by students. Starting from the very lowest grades they new it by heart. It was kind of like the pledge of allegiance, only…

Turkmenistan,

My beloved motherland,

My beloved homeland,

You are always with me

In my thoughts and in my heart.

For the slightest evil against you

Let my hand be lost.

For the slightest slander about you

Let my tongue be lost.

At the moment of my betrayal

To my motherland,

To her sacred banner,

To Saparmurat Turkmenbashy the Great

Let my breath stop.

… it’s a little bit more grim than the pledge of allegiance.

Check out Joe and Azat for more about Turkmenistan.

And check out these photos of the pit of hell (one of Turkmenistan’s most bizarre tourist attractions) by John Bradley.

“The art of Joe and Azat is deceptively simple. Black and white images, mostly of faces and places, do an adept job of telling the story. On the surface it represents the simple way of life for the people of Turkmenistan. However, when you study the images in adjunct with the text, the complexity of this style becomes apparent. Longerman utilizes juxtaposition to explore perception and reality. People would like things to go one way, but the reality is that they must go another. For example, the Peace Corps administrators would like for Joe to follow the rules given to him for navigating Turkmenistan, but the reality is that he would never survive if he did.

If you like graphic novels with strong characterization and crisp art, determined to open your eyes and your heart, definitely grab a copy of Joe and Azat.”

Sequential Tart, giving it an 8 out of 10.

And one of Canada’s main papers, the National Post, picked up the piece on this book that ran in the Wall Street Journal.

The Rukhnama is a truly amazing book. This is the quasi-political-spiritual-self-help-how-to-win-friends-and-dominate-people book written by Turkmenbashy (the former president for life of Turkmenistan). It was in all the schools in Turkmenistan while I was there. It was used in every classroom (I even saw it used in a math class). It was on sale in nearly every store. A copy was launched into space to orbit the earth, eternally protecting us. Turkmenbashy claimed that if you read it three times you would go to heaven. Words from the Rukhnama were even written on the inside of a mosque outside the city of Ashgabat (the inside of mosques generally being reserved for the Koran).

So it was natural when it came time to do the cover of my book I would look to the Rukhnama for inspiration. Pink and green all the way!

And you can also check out this review of Joe and Azat from the Comics Bulletin (I don’t think it’s been posted here yet). And check out my blog. And check out the arm on Matthias Schlitte!

First one out of the gate, the site Comics Waiting Room’s Avril Brown saying this:

“From the very first page it is apparent why THE STORY OF O is recognized as Crepax’s finest work. The fine, sharp pencils turn each panel into a vintage etching. Some are fractured panels, giving the effect of seeing these sexual acts in a cracked mirror, and others are overlapping, yet all are uniquely visceral and stimulating. This is not a story of men abusing women or women feeling weak, this is a story of willful submission. O makes her choice and revels in it, even introducing other women to this world.”

Boston’s Weekly Dig calls Joe & Azat by Jesse Lonergan “a damn cool book”, the reviewer admits to this being her first graphic novel and loving it. Cute.

And for Things Undone:

“White’s humor is pretty lighthearted, considering the subject matter, darkening only until the end when Rick acquires a handgun and contemplates suicide. It’s tough to get too down, however, by a book whose every page is colored in pumpkin-orange. “—Rod Lott of Bookgasm

Read more about Jesse Lonergan’s latest book JOE & AZAT in a piece on the Wall Street Journal online:

“The story follows the unlikely friendship of an American and a Turkmen as they trade cultural gaffes and tolerate life in a totalitarian regime. (Azat’s brother, for example, claims that he is the Turkmen version of Chuck Norris.)
Cartoonists have long tackled travel writing in a variety of ways. For Lonergan, who was inspired by the short stories of W. Somerset Maugham, he hoped to inject some humanity into a country that’s known mostly for its eccentric dictator.
“You only read about the crazy politics and it doesn’t give a sense of reality. I wanted to focus on what life was like for people there rather than the dictator who names January after himself,” says Lonergan. This is a real place and that can be lost in the stories I read.”
Of course, not everything Lonergan experienced made its way into the book. “I hated the food,” he says. “But that doesn’t need to be commented on.”