#carolyn nowak

[cosmiclvoe]

from Diana's Electric Tongue (2016), by Carolyn Nowak

[thewhip]

Carolyn C. Nowak

[notalisonyet]

Lumberjanes (2014-20)

featuring the work of:

Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, Shannon Watters, Brooklyn Allen, Carolyn Nowak, Kat Leyh, Carey Pietsch, Ayme Sotuyo, Maarta Laiho, and more

It’s hard to say anything about Lumberjanes that won’t be either (1) so obvious it goes without saying to anyone familiar with the series or (2) a big spoiler for anyone who hasn’t read it. And I would hate to spoil this for anybody.

So, in short, Lumberjanes is a long-running comic-book series about a group of cabinmates at a weird summer camp where strange things happen and they get through it using intelligence, hard work, book knowledge, craft skills, guesswork, determination, the piecing together of seemingly unrelated facts, the power of friendship, and a raccoon.

There may or may not be Greek statues that talk and play games, yetis, punk mermaids, rule-breaking,* lanyards, pirate ships, glitter,** moose travel, fox mischief, mysteries being slowly revealed, outhouse portals, bird romance, human romance, someone’s abuela, and kitten dieties.

Along the way the girls get to know each other and themselves better, and maybe even learn better ways to communicate who they are. The series is fun and intelligent and clever and thoughtful and well-stocked with things you didn’t expect.

My favorites are Ripley for her quirkiness and Molly for her quiet angst.

Occasionally girls from other cabins witness the strange things (I’m not even talking about the dinosaurs) and I take it as a reminder that although the stories focus on one group of girls there is no reason to think the other cabins aren’t out there having their own bizarre adventures and seeing their share of mysteries.

I’ve read the first five volumes of the To the Max hardcover editions (collecting issues 1-40), and I’m waiting impatiently for a retailer to ship the copy of volume 6 I’ve already ordered.

“Jen help”

*Okay, yes, there’s definitely rule-breaking.

**Thankfully, no actual glitter that falls out of the books and stays on your clothes and in your carpet for five years.

[weirdbynorthwest]

From Lumberjanes #36. Writ. Kat Leyh and Shannon Watters. Illus. Carolyn Nowak. Colours: Maarta Laiho. Letters: Aubrey Aiese.

[biandlesbianliterature]

What a weird and wonderful book. This a collection of comic short stories, which differ in characters and style, but have a similar vibe of women’s complicated relationships with each other, and a general sense of unease and yearning. With beginning lines like “I have lived with Ashley and Jolene since we all got kicked out of astronaut school for being too good-looking to be sent to space,” Girl Town wastes no time in introducing you to a world that’s one step out of sync with our own, while still seeming eerily familiar.

Girl Town by Carolyn Nowak was reviewed at the Lesbrary

[startedreadingthisbooktoday]

Girl Town by Carolyn Nowak is all kinds of amazing!

[newrulesnewlife]

Girl Town: http://www.comixology.com/Girl-Town/digital-comic/685790

Girl Town won an award, is on sale and has maybe the best opening panel of any comic I've read

[buffythecomicslayer]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer vol. 2: Cursed Coven [preview]

A Buffy the Vampire Slayer remake in middle-grade book series.

Author: Carolyn Nowak; publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.

[fromthestacks]

Lumberjanes vol. 9: On a Roll by Shannon Watters, Kat Leyh, Carolyn Nowak, Maarta Laiho

[counterintuitivecomics]

I did the OC Meme!

Big thanks to @sev-elbows​ for including my character Shifter in their version of the meme! I really enjoying going through my comics and picking who to draw (so much so that I kind of overdid it and hurt my hands, ha) and I hope I did them all justice. C: I officially release people from any obligation to draw their own though!

Here are all the credits, going from top to bottom in columns from left to right:

Iris from Darryl Ayo’s comic “Little Garden” @littlegardencomics​

Bobby Dal from Mimi Chrzanowski’s issue of Ley Lines, “Made with Love in Hell” @bbytown​

Agony from Gwendolyn @skeletonpendeja​‘s webcomic “Nothing Girl” @nothinggirlcomic​

Jane Doe by Sara Freya aka Sev @sev-arts​

Rosie and Isabelle from Juniper’s webcomic “Close Your Eyes Look at the Mountains” @cyelatm​

The unnamed protagonist from April Malig’s comic “Questions of Space Travel” @aprilmalig​

Kimberley Yu from gray Folie’s webcomic “Fresh Meat” @pluralthey​

Diana from Casey Nowak’s comic “Diana’s Electric Tongue” @caseyboots​

The unnamed protagonist from Karen Charm’s comic “Te Gusta Así” in their book Fütchi Perf @czapbooks​

[spuffyverseonthecomics]

[graphicpolicy]

Lumberjanes Adult Coloring Book

Publisher: BOOM! Box, an imprint of BOOM! Studios Writer: n/a Artist: Brooklyn Allen, Carey Pietsch, Carolyn Nowak, Ayme Sotuyo, Dozerdraws, Rosemary Valero-O’Connell and more Cover Artist: Brooklyn Allen Price: $16.99 Synopsis:

Grab your favorite colored pencils, markers, glitter, and even the yellow ochre crayon you unearthed from that ancient cave so many years ago! Now you can join the Lumberjanes in earning your Friendship to the Craft badge.

Featuring 96 gorgeous pages of original Lumberjanes art to color from series artists like Brooklyn Allen, Carey Pietsch, and Ayme Sotuyo, this book is an azure-dly good time for all.

Lumberjanes Adult Coloring Book preview. Grab your favorite colored pencils, markers, glitter, and even the yellow ochre crayon you unearthed from that ancient cave so many years ago! #comics #lumberjanes Lumberjanes Adult Coloring Book Publisher: BOOM! Box, an imprint of BOOM! Studios Writer: n/a Artist: Brooklyn Allen, Carey Pietsch, Carolyn Nowak, Ayme Sotuyo, Dozerdraws, Rosemary Valero-O’Connell and more…

[saraljewell]

I wrote a review of one of my favorite indie comics, Carolyn Nowak's remarkable "Diana's Electric Tongue" over on YCE! Check it out! 

[ourcomicsourselves]

Artist Spotlight: Carolyn Nowak

Hi! My name’s Athena Naylor, and I’m a cartoonist and recent graduate of the George Washington University. I currently live in D.C., and I got involved with Our Comics Ourselves while the exhibit was at George Mason University this fall. I’m excited to contribute to the blog this week!

The first cartoonist I want to highlight this week is Carolyn Nowak, whose recent work has been on my mind ever since this year’s Small Press Expo. 

I first stumbled upon Nowak’s work here through tumblr, particularly when her comic “Rungs” achieved some notoriety through the reblogging circuit. But it’s really her mini-comics that stand out to me. I picked up “Girl Town” at Small Press Expo in 2015 and quickly fell in love with Nowak’s cartooning and storytelling style.

 Nowak’s characters, along with the world she pens in around them, are endearingly strange. In “Girl Town,” the main characters are women who were rejected as astronauts because they were considered to be “too distracting” for their male counterparts (too painfully typical and relevant), and now they live together in a grungy community of outcast women.

This soft sci-fi set up, however, is really a backdrop for the tale of a crush between our nameless narrator and the source of her romantic obsession, Betsy, her next-door neighbor.

Betsy is not a typical love-interest. She and her roommates are mocked as “lunch-ladies” for their looks, and besides her common-place appearance Betsy’s personality is hardly warm or welcoming. Unlike in many love stories where female romantic interests are portrayed as soft and vulnerable, the narrator of “Girl Town” is enamored most of Betsy’s bold and blatant rage. I don’t know if I’ve ever read another story quite like this where a woman’s anger is cast as her most attractive attribute, rather than a “bitchy” or “shrewish” personality trait. I kinda love it.

I think the sequence that really sold me on Nowak’s story was the one below: any cartoonist who incorporates a line like “her nipples rattled against the windowsill in an odious rhythm” has earned my upmost admiration and respect. How can anyone not pause and grin after this scene?

Nowak’s most recent mini-comic, “Diana’s Electric Tongue,” only shows how much her work has progressed.  “Diana’s Electric Tongue” won an Ignatz Award at this year’s SPX, and the initial plot seems fairly straightforward: a woman buys a robot boyfriend, shenanigans ensue. It sounds like a comedic premise, and Nowak’s work does always maintain an undercurrent of humor. But what I did not expect was how much heartache this comic made me feel.

 The real driving force behind “Diana’s Electric Tongue” isn’t how Diana navigates a relationship with a robot, though that is certainly explored. The focus is instead on the main character’s motivation for buying the robot. Diana is dealing with the aftermath of her previous relationship, which closely coincided with a disastrous motorcycle accident that caused her to lose her tongue (thus the title). The story becomes more a meditation on heartbreak and how the impact of relationships can be insidious and encompassing, all while suggesting parallels between emotional loss and physical injury. It’s the kind of story I would want to write—one that finds its narrative tension in well-timed disclosures of information and the accumulation of small details that snowball into a final emotional punch. Every time I pick up the book I find new layers to contemplate and I become engrossed, even though I know the story by heart.

Besides all this, Nowak’s artwork with all its organic, fluid linework and pastel candy colors (props to Nowak’s coloring assistant Lisa DuBois) is completely captivating.

I’ll leave it at that since I don’t want to spoil anything else. Know that these review blurbs I’m posting below are correct and that I highly recommend the book.

More of Carolyn Nowak’s work can be found at her website: www.carolyncnowak.com