Page 45 Review by Stephen
“I’ve been outwitted by a carp.”
Hahaha! This is brilliant, but I’m not sure it’s a children’s book.
Okay, yeah it is, but it’s for those with the blackest sense of humour.
In oh so many ways its closest cousin is THE DAY I SWAPPED MY DAD FOR TWO GOLDFISH by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean which is, essentially, a witty wake-up call for all Dads everywhere to stop being so bloody boring and self-obsessed and wake up lickerty-split to the responsibilities as well as the wonders of parenthood. It’s either that, or you risk getting swapped further and further down the street until you’re completely forgotten, never to be thought of or missed again.
K is indeed in trouble here, perpetually, but not through any fault of his own.
K is instead abandoned, time after time, by those whom he should fully and obviously be able to trust the very most: his mother, his father, his teachers, and the police. Not only that, but when he plucks up the courage to plead for help during his direst moments, lost and alone in a great big city bustling with commuters too wrapped up in their own walled-off worlds to pay him the slightest moment’s heed... he is abandoned yet again. Or, worse still, castigated, screamed at, even taken advantage of.
Every adult in this graphic novel – every single one, without exception – displays not the faintest flicker of humanity. No adult displays any kindness, any consideration or compassion. No adult equips K with the information he needs to fulfil the assignments he’s sent on, alone.
Some of this is, remarkably, a painfully accurate representation of some of my very worst nightmares. That’s pages 84 to 146, if you buy the book.
And I love that it’s all drawn with all the innocence and whimsy of an old-school kids’ comic. The style oozes nostalgia. It all looks kinda Edwardian, the formality of the adults’ conduct following suit, the space in each panel emphasising both the epic scale of the city and the unremitting bleakness of poor K’s life spent utterly alone.
Apart from a beetle, briefly – I don’t think those crows are there to help.
Nope. No, they’re not.
The book is much loved by Lemony Snicket.
SLH
The publisher writes:
K is nice, polite, and always does as he's told. K is also always, always in trouble. No matter what he does or says, it seems there is someone ready to blame him for everything. K is in trouble for going to school. K is in trouble for staying home. K is in trouble for running an errand, getting sick, or just being thirsty. K gets into trouble with imperious crows, persnickety station agents, bombastic teachers, his own classmates... even one nice fresh carp.
Whether it's his easily annoyed parents or prickly pedestrians on the street, K gets on everyone's bad side… and he didn't even do anything wrong! Gary Clement takes a unique approach to the absurdities of childhood in this hilarious series opener that reinforces a timeless message: Most adults know less than a talking beetle.
