Description
This original graphic novella is a funny and moving story of escalating humor and tension between two disaffected teens, Mike and Wolf, who take a spontaneous summer road trip after dropping acid. As the stark black and white of Forsman’s cartooning indicates, however, this is not a psychedelic, Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby kind of trip. Instead of the escapism they crave from their fragile home lives, the LSD only heightens their sense of ennui, exacerbates their fears about the world they’re about to enter as adults, and creates doubts about everything they think they know.
Though not entirely what they bargained for, will Mike and Wolf look back on their adventure as part of the “celebrated summer” of their never-to-be-recaptured youth, or a carelessly wasted part of the best years of their lives? Or both?
“Isolated and longing to connect, Chuck Forsman’s Wolf reminds me of other great characters like Charlie Brown and Holden Caulfield. Celebrated Summer is a primal scream drawn in a casual, hypnotic monotone. Few comics are this soulful. Few cartoonists can make work this assured.” – James Sturm
“I love the spare elegance of Chuck’s storytelling style. I also love, in this book in particular, his relaxed approach to examining the lives of his characters.” – Chester Brown
Ranked #1 on The A.V. Club’s Best Graphic Novels and Art Comics of 2013
64 page flexibound paperback
Fantagraphics, 2013
