One Hundred Demons by Lynda Barry
Graphic novelist Lynda Barry offers comics that explore the funk and sweetness of love, family, youth, race, and the hood in this work that is equal parts memoir and creativity primer. Who’s that demon? bizarre boyfriends yelling, “Moms!” Betrayed innocence! These are some of the pickled monsters you’ll encounter in Lynda Barry’s “autobificitionalography,” which she describes as a blending of the genuine and the false. Lynda Barry’s demons burst out of these pages and double-dare you to say their names, from her whiny, intolerant, and loving Filipina grandma to her ex-boyfriend from hell who had lice. One Hundred Demons, described as “a piece of art as much as literature” by Time magazine, has received praise for its mesmerizing watercolour illustrations and timeless tales about life’s small monsters.
One Hundred Demons by Lynda Barry
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In One Hundred Demons, Even so, history is still being considered. Joe refers to his writing as “comic journalism.” Hers is what Lynda Barry refers to as “autobifictionalography.” Which I find both amusing and brilliant. She adds two checkboxes to the table of contents page, which is a gorgeous, intricate, and colourful collage, to indicate whether or not the stories are factual. She makes both ticks. She wants to let us know right away that she is a subjective person.
The best explanation of how to get through puberty when you’re different can be found in this autobiography. Barry was raised as a working-class, mixed-race child of immigrants. She also believes she is not attractive. Her adult persona summons and exorcises the ghosts that still stalk her through her art.
Barry’s artwork is also uncommon because it incorporates collages of tangible mementoes of such occasions with drawings. It accurately captures the sloppiness of youth. It is true that there was no coherent story, as some readers voiced dismay. She raises, describes, and in most cases vanquishes personal demons, from casual racism to controlling relationships, in her episodic writing.
The next amazingly fantastic book in a long line of astonishingly wonderful novels is “One! Hundred! Demons!” by Lynda Barry. She organizes the childhood demons she experienced using Japanese inks and brushes. Everything is present, from tenacity to hate to everyday smells, from magic to “girliness” to dogs to cicadas. The chapter headed “Magic” is just one of the book’s many delights, along with Barry’s incredibly straightforward yet incredibly powerful pictures, her amazing ear for children’s conversation, and the cheery colours that mask much of the misery in her work.
