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Cooper, Dave – Suckle: The Status of Basil

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Suckle: The Status of Basil

There are times when I can read a book from somebody who’s been around for a while and have my opinion about him or her change completely. I’d read an issue of Weasel by Dave Cooper a few years ago and, honestly, it didn’t do much for me. Whether that was the mood I was in at the time or if it was just a crappy issue is something that I don’t remember, but this book is amazing. It follows the adventures of Basil, a man who we see being born and who spends his days trying to find something that looks an awful lot like a vagina. There’s a lot more than that going on, of course. He gets used at every turn because of his innocence and an awful lot of the book is dedicated to pictures of vaginas, just so you know if you’re stupid enough to try and buy this for your little grandchild or something. The whole journey was riveting to me even though he didn’t really go anywhere, and I have to say that I like this art more than most stuff I’ve seen recently. Kind of a cross of Chester Brown and Jamie Hernandez maybe? I don’t know, but it looks just like a Dave Cooper drawing. Here’s a page. I’m listing the rest of his books because I’ll be getting them real soon. Most authors don’t hit me over the head like this, but I really want to read everything I can from this guy as soon as possible. Hey, feel free to e-mail the guy too. By the way, Amazon says that this book is out of print, so if they try to charge you some ungodly amount for this book, head on over to the Fantagraphics page (even though they don’t have it in their online catalog, they just put out a new printing) and pay cover price for it there.