Review by Booklist Review
Like a scene out of When Harry Met Sally, this slice-of-life story is at once funny and cringe inducing. Having taken up running as a way to boost his endorphins after a nasty breakup, Pascal trips over a rock, hurts his back, and is told by his doctor to rest. Despite being warned against making major changes in his life while on the romantic rebound, Pascal deals with his recovery period by making a series of dubious decisions, including trailing the young woman he spots shoplifting a book he wrote from his local bookstore. Pascal's constant rationalization of his passive-aggressive behaviors is both grating and true to life, giving the reader the same sense of amiable exasperation felt by Pascal's friends and family. Girard's sketchy black-and-white cartoons are drawn with a deceptively light hand that gives his artwork a sense of fluid movement and accentuates the funnier moments. Girard's protagonist is a genial slacker Everyman who makes less-than-great choices in other words, he's painfully relatable, but in the best way.--Volin, Eva Copyright 2014 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
A chatty, neurotic cartoonist becomes obsessed with the beautiful kleptomaniac who stole the book he wrote from his local bookstore. Fine cartooning by Girard (Reunion) enhances an already lively and agile plot, and his plainspoken but funny urban characters. Like Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window, cartoonist Pascal is kept away from his favorite physical activity-running-by a back injury, engaging in amateur detective work while falling feverishly in lust with the object of his amateur investigation. Pascal's bumbling, passive-aggressive plots to reform thief Sarah are met with her gleefully unrepentant resistance to change, until Pascal resolves to catch a criminal by becoming one: stealing back the books from Sarah. Girard's fluid and simple but immensely expressive cartooning enlivens Pascal's increasingly ridiculous plans and sexual daydreams, and his cartoon self is a celebration of sheepish absurdity. Quirky supporting characters-the sadistic chiropractor, the grizzled work supervisor with a sure solution to all of life's problems, and Pascal's ever-present ex, in the form of an oversized novelty Halloween head-contribute to the avalanche of hysterical catastrophe on Pascal's journey. Girard's overanxious and wired protagonist will draw quirky comparisons to Seinfeld's George Constanza and Woody Allen, and his breezy, evocative cartooning creates its own distinctive vision. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
