Review - Life with Mr. Dangerous

Review - Life with Mr. Dangerous
by Paul Hornschmeier

Villard

Life with Mr. Dangerous is a book I didn’t buy for our collection. This is great, because my colleague who picks these up has no idea what she’s getting. Some are great, other not so. But so far, everything she has purchased has been interesting.

This book is a slice of life tale about Amy. A twenty-something angst ridden young lady who has no direction in her life. As the story starts, she breaks of a crummy relationship. Later on, we find out that she really doesn’t like her job. And the only things that she truly enjoys is a television cartoon called Mr. Dangerous and talking to her friend Michael who moved recently to San Francisco. But through different events and circumstances in her life, she feels that she needs to make some changes for her well being.

Hornschmeier uses a clean style with strong lines and simple backgrounds. Its very traditional and seems to be common with many current graphic novels. I’d hate to describe it as unremarkable, but there isn’t really anything super exciting about it. However, being a comic nerd, I could swear I saw some homages to other graphic works. I thought I saw a sock monkey on a bed stand somewhere. Also the poster on Amy’s wall looks suspiciously like a Scott McCloud character. And it really looks like a portrait of Harvey Pekar on the last page.

This book reminds me of other graphic novels in its style. And I was discussing this with one of our pages here at the library who is into the comics books. It seems that there is a glut of realistic (with some surrealistic touches) tales of angst and ennui. Works like Wilson by Daniel Clowes and Lint by Chris Ware are just a couple more recent examples. But looking over our collection, I noticed many that had similar feels. And though I appreciate them, I’m getting a little tired of reading sad/ironic/sarcastic stories about normal people. Maybe I’ve been corrupted by the super hero comics that I grew up with.

I don’t think I would of picked up this book for the library. But it’s not a bad fit for our collection. We certainly have other graphic novels very similar. But this book will be added to the adult non-fiction area because it is a grown up life Hornschmeier portrays. With swearing and sexual situations, this book won’t be going in our teen area.