The Essential Dykes to Watch Out for

<p>Settle in to this wittily illustrated soap opera (Bechdel calls it half op-ed column and half endless serialized Victorian novel) of the lives loves and politics of Mo Lois Sydney Sparrow Ginger Stuart Clarice and the rest of the cast of cult-fav characters. Most of them are lesbians living in a midsize American city that may or may not be Minneapolis. Bechdel's brilliantly imagined countercultural band of friends--academics social workers bookstore clerks--fall in and out of love negotiate friendships raise children switch careers and cope with aging parents. Bechdel fuses high and low culture--from foreign policy to domestic routine hot sex to postmodern theory--in a serial graphic narrative suitable for humanists of all persuasions.</p>