Tamara Drewe
Buy at Amazon.com

Ooops. OK, it’s not so much that I forgot to do this yesterday. Well, I mean, I did forget, but it’s more that right now, you’re lucky I know what month it is. To expect me to know what day of the week or what date is it is kind of beyond my abilities at the moment.

Written and drawn by Posy Simmonds, Tamara Drewe follows the interconnected lives of various characters who all encounter the titular character, a former small-town girl turned beautiful scenster journalist. (Link goes to the Guardian page where you can read the whole thing online.) It’s probably not what you expect it to be. Simmonds explores plenty of ideas, from the male gaze to the power of women’s beauty to society’s obsession with the media, in a fun combination of prose and comics. It’s a great one to hand to your friends who are ambivalent about comics but it’s also a great one to read yourself. I found myself engrossed and surprised by this one.

The upcoming movie seems to take a little bit different approach the material, but I’m still looking forward to it.

• Guess who’s going to San Diego for Comic-Con? That’s right — me. I will be there covering it for Geek Girl on the Street and I’m very excited. And well, perhaps a little overwhelmed. Or at least, I will be. And since I’ve already purchased my plane tickets, there’s no backing out now. (I’m flying out of Richmond, because even after paying for gas, it’s cheaper and I don’t have to worry so much about how I’d get home from BWI at 6 a.m. Monday morning since I have a very wonderful mother to pick me up in Richmond.)
• I didn’t know there was a Tamara Drewe movie coming out until today. I enjoy when movies get made of non-superhero comics (and about that, I clearly agree with TOON Books that we should just call them “comics.” I do, generally) and I’ll be seeing this one once it wanders over here.
• I did not go to the Trickster signing. Because I’m dumb. And moving. But the book looks absolutely wonderful and it’s on my list to purchase as things settle down a bit.
• And here’s a cool interview with Dave Roman about The Last Airbender: Zuko’s Story, out tomorrow. Some of us are much more excited about this than the movie itself (which I don’t think I’ll be seeing). And I’ll leave off with this quote from Roman (because it’s relevant to something mentioned above):
  

  I think that at the end of the day, it’s all comics. I think that comics as a whole always have name issues. There are people who love the phrase “comics” and there are people who hate the phrase “graphic novels.” And in the same way, there are people who hate “American Manga” as a term. There have always been always been so many names for these things, and no one is ever completely happy with them — but a lot of times the label is just to help sell books.