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A review by adenhailemariam
How to Be Happy by Eleanor Davis
4.0
3.5 The push from a 3 to a 3.5/4 is that I adore the illustration styles and, immediately after finishing reading a digital version of this book, I wanted to purchase a physical copy to have somewhere in my house I can see all the time.
This *seems* like something I’d really like. I like sequential art and short stories. I keep thinking, though, that this and other books/collections I’ve read are a mashup of comic strips and short stories that don’t quite mesh. I’ve gotten a lot out of three-panel strips, to say nothing about what a one-panel comic can do. I own plenty of books collecting the work of my favorite webcomic artists. It feels sometimes like vignettes like those in this book don’t quite do what a comic strip or a comic book or graphic novel or a more plotted short story could do…but maybe that’s just it. Maybe it’s that they’re vignettes.
As other reviews have mentioned, the stories can be a bit too short, have little plot, or a plot or message that went over people’s heads. Still there were at least a few that were moving and relatable. A little too close to home, even. I enjoyed the illustration in all of them except the one about the fox that died but that’s more the content of the illustration rather than the style.
I imagine I’m going to be thinking about this book a lot even if just In the next couple days.
This *seems* like something I’d really like. I like sequential art and short stories. I keep thinking, though, that this and other books/collections I’ve read are a mashup of comic strips and short stories that don’t quite mesh. I’ve gotten a lot out of three-panel strips, to say nothing about what a one-panel comic can do. I own plenty of books collecting the work of my favorite webcomic artists. It feels sometimes like vignettes like those in this book don’t quite do what a comic strip or a comic book or graphic novel or a more plotted short story could do…but maybe that’s just it. Maybe it’s that they’re vignettes.
As other reviews have mentioned, the stories can be a bit too short, have little plot, or a plot or message that went over people’s heads. Still there were at least a few that were moving and relatable. A little too close to home, even. I enjoyed the illustration in all of them except the one about the fox that died but that’s more the content of the illustration rather than the style.
I imagine I’m going to be thinking about this book a lot even if just In the next couple days.