Rebel
by Fred Fredericks
Scholastic Book Services

“Meet REBEL–the wild, mod teen who’s the rage with teens everywhere!”

“What a crazy crew! You’ll laugh through every madcap cartoon adventure!”

My local renegade bookshop Arise! Resource Center & Book Store will close its doors this weekend.  It’s sad for anyone who has passed through the Minneapolis underground within the last 17 years to see this monument to anarchy and activism give up the ghost.  Members of the collectively run shop are restructuring though and will renovate and reopen the shop as a new creation — Boneshaker — but what will that new shop mean to former Arise! volunteers?  Or customers?  Will they continue to stock zines and minis which were their best selling items? Will they still support local cartoonists by hosting release parties? Will their dollar bin still be as excellent and jam-packed with jems like it was this week when I picked up Rebel and the 1995 Osseo High School yearbook?

I bought Rebel on an impulse. The girl at the counter was so excited to see it again that she generously threw it in for free. She was delighted by this book ready to share.  So am I.

This book is so painfully dated but so beautifully illustrated, so completely unaware of its own cornball structure, so classically prone to predictable punchlines — basically, Rebel is a hipster’s wet dream.

Rebel is a pre-ironic comic book from a time when comics for kids were chiefly “madcap romps” populated by archetypes.  It’s the kind of source material that has inspired loving (or disaffected) parody from artists like Dan Clowes or Tim Hensley.  ‘Til now, I’d really only read underground comics from that era, never the mainstream or serialized stuff, so it was really illuminating for me to have found this book.  It’s easy to think that what’s going on with comics now is super-great simply because diversity within the genre is so explosive and inspiring, but if the recent Popeye and Peanuts and re-prints teach us anything, it’s that there’s plenty to take away from past comic works — if not in terms of story, at least in terms of art.

Our boy Rebel is a leather-clad high school musician.  The book jacket promises he’ll a rebellious trouble-maker, but he’s actually quite tame.  In fact, Rebel is always trying to convince his zanier, chubby hippie friend Wreck to stay in school!  Staying in school is a big theme in Rebel.  Sometimes Rebel, Wreck and their other pal Groover will hang out with girls, but relationships aren’t nearly as important as being a committed student.  Thanks for the message, Scholastic!

Rebel appeared in Scholastic’s Scope magazine for decades [source].  It may yet live on in those pages.  The author, Fred Fredericks, has cartooned in different styles over the years, but this black-and-white book looks like it was penned with a nib in a loose, cartoony style.  It’s evident from the pages that he is a seriously talented cartoonist.  Each page is really lovely.

I believe he authored much of the book, but some of the ideas for strips came to him through write-in gags from the public.  Each kid who wrote in got a credit within the comic, which is a really sweet thing to do.  I bet those kids never forgot participating in Rebel.

I wish I knew more about Fredericks’ work and life as a cartoonist.  He’s probably someone with a huge following, but because I only really know about indie comics, and he’s not making indie comics, he’s been totally off my radar.  He still works in syndicated strips and mainstream comics (as an inker) but from what I can tell has never produced his own personal projects.  The internet tells me he has drawn Mandrake the Magician for over 40 years — a newspaper strip comic created by Lee Falk (The Phantom) which Fredericks has written since 1999 following Falk’s passing.

There’s a subtle kind of snobbery within indie comics because our “graphic novels” double as “literary comics” but it’s impossible to deny the allure of a great cartoonist with a long legacy of beautiful work.  Even if you discover that artwork in a corny little book like Rebel that instinct tells you not to value much because it was free.

Rebel is out of print but might be available through aggressive ebay searches or used-bookstore hunts.

Still, Fredericks has an enormous body of work under other titles which I encourage you to check out.  You can read recently released Mandrake the Magician comics via King Features Syndicate.  Or, if I know you and I trust you, I’ll let you borrow my copy of Rebel.

- Sarah Morean

Bone: Rose
By Jeff Smith and Charles Vess
Scholastic

In interviews conducted with Jeff Smith, the artist has stated, time and again, that he envisioned Bone’s final page long before beginning the book. After 13 years, the book’s 55-issue run seemingly exhausted the story of the Bone cousins’ journey through the plague-ridden Valley, with said ultimate panel finding the trio riding off into the proverbial sunset. While the success of Bone—ultimately and frequently hailed as one of the greatest independent comics of all-time—no doubt resulted in plenty of demand for a sequel from the industry and fans alike, there seemed little doubt that the saga was at an end.

Even with a storyline that would ultimately consume some 1,342 pages in its single collected edition, Smith didn’t exhaust the storytelling potential of the Valley. During a hiatus from the series, the artist collaborated on two additional complementary storylines–Stupid, Stupid Rat-Tails, which he drew, but didn’t write, and Rose, which he scripted, but did not draw. For years, these serialized books have existed as much sought after items for collectors anxious for additional glimpses into the Bone universe. And now, thanks to a new edition from Scholastic, one of those two puzzle pieces is now far easier to come by.

At first glance it’s clear that Rose is a very different book than Bone. Smith put down his pen for the volume, recruiting fantasy artist Charles Vess for that role—a very deliberate decision on the part of the author. If Bone is indeed as Time Magazine somewhat famously described it, “as sweeping as the Lord of the Rings cycle, but much funnier,” then Rose is its shorter, darker, more seriously sibling. Bone was, indeed a fantasy epic in the truest sense, but any self-seriousness that the book possessed was, more often than not, countered by comic relief largely provided by its titular cousins.

Rose, on the other hand, explores the rise of Gran’ma Ben in events unfolded long before the Bones unwittingly stumbled upon the Valley over which she once reigned. As such, the book lacks much of the family-friendly material that made Bone one of independent comics’ few all-ages success stories. That tone is compounded by Vess’s paintings, which, save for a largely intact imagining of Bone’s Great Red Dragon, stray from Smith’s perpetually playful Walt Kelly-indebted line. This, of course, is no shot against Vess’s clear artistic abilities, but rather just a statement that—for better or worse—Charles Vess is no Jeff Smith, and given the source material provided, it’s clear why Smith wouldn’t have it any other way.

As far as origin stories go, Rose is a fascinating and gripping, if ultimately unnecessary prequel to Bone. The book helps shed light on many of the events that shaped the Valley before the opening pages of Smith’s epic—though the artist is careful not to fill in all the pieces. As countless fans can testify, reading Rose is far from necessary in order to enjoy the contents of Bone’s fairly self-contained 55 issues. Rather the book seems intended as a supplement to that enjoyment—a place where fans can prolong their enjoyment of Smith’s world.

By that token, the book is a success. Bone fans will happy devour the origins of one that book’s more fascinating characters.  Where the book falls short is in the absence of much of the charm that helped make Bone such a nearly universal success, ultimately serving as a reminder of why the goofy cousins were so necessary in saving the Valley from certain doom.

–Brian Heater

Tales From Outer Suburbia
By Shaun Tan
Scholastic

Published in here in late 2007, it was the fittingly-titled book The Arrival that truly established Shaun Tan in the States. Over the years, the Australian artist’s work has navigated the nebulous space between graphic novel and picture books. That book, a fantastical take on the traditional immigrant story, landing firmly in the latter camp, eschewing the written word altogether, save for the occasional reliance on an entirely made up alphabet—another striking element in Tan’s attempt to import the reader into his newly conjured strange land.

In that sense, Tales From Outer Suburbia falls staunchly on the other side of the fence. While Tan’s always-stunning illustrations still play a vital role in the book, they have been largely decentralized. In the above, perhaps false, dichotomy, Tales unquestionably exists in the picture book camp. In some sense, however, even that broad descriptor seems somehow false. Rather, for the most this is most accurately a book of short stories supplemented by graphical representations.

A collection of 15 fictional memoirs, Tales From Outer Suburbia is, arguably, too wordy to be a picture book.  Together the stories frame the young life of an unnamed narrator, coming of age in a fantastical town that might easily exist on the outskirts of the city mapped out in The Arrival. The texts and images are largely situated on opposing pages, though Tan does, from time to time, construct clever methods by which to incorporate the two into a single piece of art, such as the extended poem ‘Distant Rain’, which takes the form of a scrapbook and ‘The Amnesia Machine,’ which sits the typed story in the middle of a newspaper.

On a whole, however, the art seems to be present in support of stories, which infuse largely familiar suburban existence with the presence of fantastic events and creatures, like an omniscient water buffalo and a misplaced dugong. While the mere existence of Tan’s prose may prove initially off-putting for those only familiar with the book’s predecessor, his words go far to capture a similar sense of wonder.

But where The Arrival was invested in a world that, even devoid of fantasy, would likely prove foreign to most younger readers, Tales From Outer Suburbia has one foot firmly planted in the familiar—a world of mowed lawns and highway overpasses. For all of its strangeness, the book is somehow familiar, and as such, may connect even more strongly with its readership, spurring on that wonderful ingredient in the best of kids literature: a catalyst for helping young readers discover the world around them.

–Brian Heater

Frank Cammuso first entered the world of sequential art some 20 years ago as an editorial cartoonist. It was the publication of Max Hamm: Fairy Tale Detective for his own Nite Owl Comix , however, that really helped put the artist on the map amongst comics fans.

The book had another surprising result for the artist. Cammuso insists that he never set out to make the story of the diminuitive pink private investigator an all-ages book, per se, but when it proved a hit with younger audiences, the title helped open a new career for the artist as the creator of kids books. Most recently Cammuso has begun the Knights of the Lunch Table series for Scholastic as co-created Otto’s Orange Day for Francoise Mouley’s Toon Books, alongside underground comics legend, Jay Lynch.

We caught up with Cammuso recently to discuss his unexpected new career path.

Do you come out to a lot of conventions?

I used to.

What  happened?

The Scholastic contract happened. Once you have to start doing graphic novels, it kind of keeps you away from everything—seeing your family, seeing your friends. It’s amazing how much time it takes.

How many have you done this year?

I did a few. I did MoCCA, Baltimore, and SPX.

Pretty exclusively comic shows, then?

Yeah, mostly comics. And I did some signings. I did some library stuff, too. But I have to do a new Knights of the Lunch Table right now. It’s due in March, so it doesn’t leave me a lot of time to go out and do stuff.

But the media junket hasn’t really changed since signing with Scholastic?

No, it’s my media junket. They don’t send me out on tour to do any of that stuff. I’ve always loved SPX, it’s the show I ever really went to, about 10 years ago. I really wanted to do this. It’s always had a very special place in my heart.

Do these sorts of shows afford you any opportunity to interact with your young readership?

Well, there are a few kids. At Baltimore there were a ton of kids. There were more kids there than I had seen at any comic show, ever. They just loved it. I had about about four or five sets of parents come up and say, “thank you for doing comics for kids.” It was incredible. People were really jazzed about there being stuff out there for kids.

The medium has really moved away from young readers over the past 20 years.

It has. But people are starting to realize that that market is aging out—it’s getting older and older. You’re not really attracting it that much, anymore. Everybody who buys comics got into them when they were kids, so how do you get those kids into comics. If they’re going to find something else, then they will, especially if there are no comics there. They’ll pick video games If there are comics there, kids run for them. Kids really take to comics. They’ve always loved them.

Kids who are weaned on video games—do you think that comics are too inactive for them?

I don’t think so. I think if they pick up something that they like—a comic or a novel—it’s very engaging. There’s a whole immersion factor. You get into it. it’s nice. It’s very personal. Especially if it’s a subject matter that they like. Video games is a totally different medium.

How do you get them to take that first step?

Well, first of all, there has to be stuff out there for them, and there hasn’t been, up until a couple of years ago. Once they see that there’s stuff for them, they like it. The response has been terrific. Knights has only been out been out since June, and it’s already in its second printing. My Toon book is also in its second printing. People see it and they want more.

Do you think that the Baltimore show with all of those kids present is symptomatic of a larger trend?

I think that, if there’s comics for kids at these shows—if you’re a parent who’s a comic book fan, you’d love to share that with your children. I think any parent would like to do that. The problem is that you just can’t give them a lot of the stuff that’s out there right now. But if there’s stuff for them, all of the sudden this becomes a family event. It’s great, there’s so much energy. Kids come up and tell you a story, they tell you what they like—they’re so into it. you can remember, when you were a kid, when you found something that you were into, it was cool, and to see it in their eyes, it’s amazing. If that doesn’t tell you that you’re onto something, I don’t know what would.

Does interacting with the kids ever impact something you’re working on?

A little bit. I always ask them what they like. Like you said earlier, it is such a solitary thing, especially when you’re doing a graphic novel, it’s such a long process, and when you’re in the middle of it, you have no idea what’s going on. It’s nice to hear what they think. They like this part, or this part. It’s nice to know, because on the next book, you try to hit those notes again.

How long have you been working on books for a younger audience?

I’ve been a political cartoonist for about 20 years. Then I did the Max Hamm books, and they were kind of for kids, but not really. I didn’t really start out thinking they were for kids, and then, all of the sudden, I realized they kind of liked it. and then, after that, Scholastic came by and said, “pitch us some stuff,” and they liked what I pitched, and then Francoise Mouley at Toon Books asked if I wanted to do something with them. It was very much, “oh, I can do that.” It’s been great. It would be nice to do something later on. I have more Max Hamm stories to tell.

Are there specific things that you’d like to say with your work that you feel like you can’t say in a children’s book?

Well, I have to say at a certain age limit. They tell me things like, boys at age eight don’t really like girls. That’s not really relevant. So, any kind of romantic thing doesn’t work—not that it would be romantic, but somebody liking somebody. But other than that, it’s not really tough.

And Toon Books caters to an even younger audience.

Yeah. These are books that are really made for those readers. This is a kid’s first comic book. That’s exciting. They’re a lot of fun to do. I’m supposed to do at least one more. I like the beginning reader stuff. It’s very open and a lot of fun.

We spoke with Art Spiegelman and Jay Lynch recently, both of whom have worked with Toon Books. They both had strict parameters that they set out to work from. Art had a word list that he was working from, and Jay said that the book he was working on had to have a central lesson. What kind of parameters are you setting for yourself?

With Toon Books, I really wanted to open it up. I really wanted to make it a big, fun book. I didn’t want too many panels on a page—I don’t think it ever had more than four on a page. I just really wanted it to be a big, open book. For Knights, I really wanted something where a kid could read it, but if a parent or a librarian was reading it also, that they would get something out of it. you have the whole kids being bullied in school, but the parent reads it and sees the whole Athurian legend. If the kids pick up on it later, that’s great. But those are my favorite things, things that can be seen from both sides.

Do you have time to work on anything else, at this point?

At this point, no. I’m doing everything for the book—writing, drawing, inking, coloring. The only thing I’m not doing is lettering. So it’s a lot. This last one was 144 pages. I’m not sure how many the new one will be, but probably fairly close.

What do you hope to be working on, when this one’s in the can?

Well, I have two more for Scholastic. I’ll have a new book for younger readers called The Misadventures of Salem Hyde, so that’s two books for that, and then I’ll probably do another Toon Book. I think Jay’s writing it now.

And there are some Max Hamms on the horizon?

I’d like to, but as long as there are paying customers…If someone wanted to pick up Max Hamm, I’d be thrilled.
[Concluded in Part Two]

–Brian Heater