The Big Book of Weirdos

Technically this book was a re-read. Only I read this book years ago. Long before I started to keep a reading journal. The first time I encountered this book was when I was living in Durham NC, after having just got married. So at most, I read this book for the first time 25 years ago. The Big Book of Weirdos was one of the Durham Public Library Main Branch's few honest-to-God graphic novels placed in the graphic novel section of the library. In those days, if you went looking for graphic novels at the library, you were lucky if you could find something other than Garfield and Bloom County on the shelves.

This book written by Carl Posey examines the lives of famous people we collectively think of as rather strange, like Howard Hughes, depraved, such as Rasputin and Caligula, or rather terrifying, such as Ivan the Terrible. However, the majority of the book is made up of people who had underlying mental illness brought about the abuse of drugs and alcohol or those whose lives spiraled out of control because they lived in an age of primitive mental health practices or were surrounded by 'yes men'. Occasionally, there's a subject or two of which my grandmother would classify as 'just damn mean.'

This is the 6th book from Paradox Press that I now own. I love these treasuries of various subjects that are given the short story sequential art treatment by multiple talents. In this edition, Rick Geary, Batton Lash, Kieron Dwyer and Frank Quietly are among over 5 dozen talented artists who contributed. There's about 8 more books in the series out there that I hope to one day get my hands on.

Though I haven't read them all yet, The Big Book of Weirdos is one of more spicier books. Sex, murder, cheating, corruption are just some of the seven deadly sins being broken in this book. And that's not to mention the 10 Commandments, of which at least 13 are broken by the artists, politicians and socialites whose alternative lifestyles are examined inside.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.