Category: Zine Reviews

The Paruretic 1
Mark Cunning
http://the-paruretic.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Paruretic-Young-Mans-Struggle-Bladder-ebook/dp/B07KY39361/

The Paruretic 1 is a black and white US ¼ sized perzine about living with paruresis: a phobia in which the sufferer is unable to urinate in the real or imaginary presence of others.

I think most of us have heard about being ‘pee shy,’ but I think a lot fewer people realise that it’s a real social phobia that an estimated seven percent of Americans deal with.

The Paruretic 1 opens with a definition of paruresis (what I used in the description at the beginning of this review). What follows is an introduction to Mark’s life – from places and situations Mark hates/loves to things he’s tried to get the flow going.

Mark’s writing style is clear and to the point. While I was reading, I felt like I was getting to know Mark’s personality as well as learn about paruresis and what their life is like. You can pick up the heartbreak in the piece featuring a conversation with someone from a dating site. I could almost feel the groan of ‘yes, I have’ with the “I’ve Tried It” list.

The Paruretic is an interesting perzine about a subject I’d only heard of in passing. I think it’s definitely a perzine to pick up, read, and even share with your friends in case they might be dealing with the same phobia and feel like they are alone.

A Book of Rainbows #1
Shei
12 pages
https://linktr.ee/_godsavethequeer_

A Book of Rainbows #1 is an A5, full-colour zine about witchcraft, magic, and how Shei makes it all a part of their life.

Shei opens A Book of Rainbows by writing about their journey to self-belief and claiming the title of witch. From there, Shei shares their personal take on what magic is, thoughts on witchcraft and metal health, and more. There’s even a list of witchy resources at the back, and I do love a good resources list.

I enjoyed reading Shei’s thoughts and feelings. I could feel Shei’s vulnerability about sharing combined with love of the subject. They write with passion about the subject all the while acknowledging that these are personal things with different meanings for different people.

A Book of Rainbows is primarily handwritten with the exception of a piece called “I Am Freaking Magical (And So Are You)” which serves as an awesome call to arms for people to embrace the magical awesomeness inside themselves. Shei’s handwriting is clear and massive points for minding the margins and not cutting off words.

Shei’s usual style with designs, sketches, cut and paste, patterns works so very well for this zine. I love their style in all their zines, but in this combination of perzine and educational/introduction to witchcraft zine, it feels like the zine is a scrapbook. There’s something about it that makes it feel that much more personal and fun.

All in all, I’m already looking forward to the next one.

If you’re at all interested in witchcraft and love a perzine, definitely pick this one up.

Outer Spaces Issue #1
Amanda Capasso & Others
80 pages
[posty2k@protonmail.com](mailto:posty2k@protonmail.com)
(website no longer working)

Outer Spaces is a half full colour, half black and white, US-sized half-fold photography zine featuring images from cities around the world.

One way to travel without leaving your seat.

Following an inner title page that gives you the ‘@’ for all of the photographers involved, Outer Spaces launches into a collection of people and places in cities around the world. From Hong Kong, to Chicago, to Rajasthan India, regular daily life has been captured in these images. The images are an assortment of full page spreads, half page photos, and quarter-page photos.

For me, photography is a lot like poetry: if you’re trying to tell me something specific, it’s incredibly likely that I won’t understand it. That said, I’m moving past the intimidation of such things to enjoying finding my own meaning in things. For this zine, I found myself thinking about how, yes, we’re all human, but what amazingly different lives we can lead.

We often take our world bubbles around us for granted as the normal. This zine serves as a collection of reminders that there are all kinds of normal. Beautiful walkways in front of shops filled with plants in Bangkok, so many motorbikes on a packed bridge in Vietnam… However, to juxtapose that, people walk their dogs, people gather together on public transport, and walls are covered in graffiti.

My thoughts are wandering a bit as I contemplate this zine, but I consider that to be a good thing. I enjoyed this zine the first time, and I have enjoyed paging back and forth through it many times while wondering about the people and places captured within.

The website doesn’t connect at the time of me typing this, which is a shame because I really like this project. I would have liked to have seen it continue with different focuses (this one with a city focus).

If you can find a copy of this, pick it up. I hope you get as much out of it as I have.

Things That Happen to Crash When She Has a Panic Attack
Crash Reynolds
4 pages
https://utopiabycrash.wixsite.com/hello
https://www.patreon.com/utopiabycrash

Things That Happen to Crash When She Has a Panic Attack is a full-colour, US-sized half-fold zine about Crash’s experience of a panic attack.

Crash comes to us once more with another mental health perzine.

I think the title makes the possible content warnings clear. I was wondering how I’d go with reading about someone else’s panic attack experiences, but I went pretty well. (Of course, that’s just me. No one knows you better than you.) I found it interesting how much we had in common but even moreso how different our experiences are. Nothing in life is ‘one size fits all’, and this is a good reminder of that.

On another level, it felt nice that Crash decided to share this. While she didn’t share this aimed at me as such, I do feel like I know her better as a friend. It gave me the idea that it could be good for people to make zines like this one about their experiences to help their friends and family to better understand what they go through (and perhaps even how they can help in different situations).

I love the glittery papers Crash uses in this zine. They’re so pretty, and yet I can’t help but be reminded of the medical videos where they demonstrate the connections inside a brain. I wonder if this was intentional on Crash’s part implying brain connections, sparks, electricity… or perhaps I’m reading too much into it. Either way, it’s an element I enjoy.

Wednesday
George Rex
16 pages
http://www.georgerexcomics.com/
https://linktr.ee/GeorgeRexComics

Wednesday is an A5 black and white Hourly Comics Day collection of short comics about a day of trying to create one short comic per hour in a day.

Reviewing a zine called ‘Wednesday’ on a Wednesday? Yeah, I’m pretty easily entertained.

I love a perzine, and a perzine comic is a fun flavour of the genre. George opens with a note on the inside cover by letting the reader know this is their first attempt (from back in 2017) at the Hourly Comics Day Challenge. From there we go into the comics.

For each one-hour segment, we get a one-page comic featuring something from that time slot. Breakfast, email overwhelm, existential scrolling dread… Wednesday is a real peek into a day that many of us can identify on one level or another.

George’s art style is fun and makes me smile. Everything is easy to read and easy to see. There are still little details that you could miss if you take things too quickly like a t-shirt slogan.

I thought it was fun to get a peek into an artist’s life and find out how much we had in common. We tend to think other people do things so differently, so much better, in such a more organised way… But a skilled artist scrolls perhaps a little too much and enjoys making pasta just like me. It is a fairly quick read, and a pleasant one.

Check it out if you’d like to see some chill ‘day in the life’ comics. (And perhaps feel inspired to take up the challenge yourself.)

The Puss And The Shade: Transylvania Bible #1
M.J. Ocasio & Monstark
http://mjocasio.com/
https://www.monstark.com/

The Puss And The Shade: Transylvania Bible #1 is a 7cm x 10.7cm black and white comic about an epic battle between a brave cat and a shade.

You had me at the metallic cover.

The Puss And The Shade is the first of the ‘Transylvania Bible’ mini series of graphic vignettes. The mini opens to a lovely inside cover page and then launches into the dark tale of a cat defending his baby human.

I love it. I’ll come right out and say it from the get go. Everything about this zine really hit the spot for me.

The art style uses a lot of lines, leaving the overall page darker at a glance and thus adding to the dark tones of the story. The story itself is great. Few words are needed, and the artists do a great job of visually telling a story. A cat and a baby but in a grim tale? Wow. It combines the usual cute with a horror feel in both art and overall story, and I enjoyed it a lot.

You may be able to tell I don’t want to give away too many details about the story itself because of the length of the zine, but the ending really caught me by surprise. Of all the ways things could have gone…

This is a great zine in the materials used as well. The cover is a metallic blue while the paper inside is textured. Things can be a touch difficult to read on the blue cover depending on the lighting, but that is a small hiccup and – I think – is worth the tradeoff with the awesome cover paper.

I’m happy to see a “#1” with this because I’m looking forward to seeing what comes next in the series.

I highly recommend checking out this mini zine for awesome art styling, an awesome story, and a well put together zine.

Graffiti From an American Refugee
Pockets
https://www.instagram.com/pocketsthepoet/

Graffiti From an American Refugee is an 11cm x 9.5cm accordion fold, black and white zine of poems.

When it comes to reviews of poetry zines, I always preface the review with letting you know that I know nothing about poetry other than what I like. I took a poetry unit at university, and I still know nothing about poetry. Now with that out of the way…

Usually I jump right into what comes after the cover at this point, but – as is habit – I looked at the front and then the back. And I have to mention the back, which is one of the coolest introductions to a person I’ve seen. I won’t quote it, because I enjoyed it so much I feel like that would be a spoiler, but it felt like ‘punk poetry’. Comfortable and cool.

Inside Graffiti From an American Refugee, you find four poems. To me they read like slam poetry. I read the words and could almost hear the emphasis on certain words and almost see someone in front of a mic delivering them. I couldn’t always quite get into a rhythm as such, but the messages were clear and left me feeling inspired.

Aesthetically this zine is fun. The accordion fold is different than the usual fold, the type is easy to read, and there are a few images to help keep visual interest.

All up, I enjoyed this a lot. Not finding a rhythm here or there didn’t stop me from getting into the overall feel of this zine. It was interesting and fun – one to check out and see if you like.

Proper Use of a Condom
Debbie Bamberger
https://www.instagram.com/debbiebamberger/

Proper Use of a Condom is a black and white, US-sized, one page folded mini-zine that is about exactly what the title says.

To be honest, the title made me think this zine was going to be for a giggle. But it’s exactly what it says it is, and I love it even more.

Proper Use of a Condom starts beautifully with “obtain enthusiastic consent” and takes you from there through the few, clear steps on how to use a condom. Every step is written in clear writing and accompanied by simple line drawings to illustrate. Even in something fairly straightforward, Debbie does inject a bit of humour to make you smile.

I love the idea of taking on instructional type minis for things a lot of people might take for granted as common knowledge. I also love the idea of zines being a source of information for things that might otherwise be prohibited in certain situations for young people. It’s plain, simple, and that’s awesome.

Proper Use of a Condom is great and worth picking up if you’re interested. I’d love to see it as part of a whole series of ‘quick and practical’ mini-zines for all sorts of things.

Untitled
Latibule
https://linktr.ee/latibule_art

Untitled is a full-colour, A7, one-page folded mini-zine about the distance between two people.

In few but impactful words and watercolour art, Latibule taps into the sad but yet somehow still hopeful feelings that come with knowing someone from a distance. It’s not specified whether it’s a friendship or a romantic relationship, but it doesn’t have to be. Distance is hard on people who just want to be in each other’s presence. And I think the feelings that come through in this zine are relevant in whole new ways since last year.

I love watercolours, and Latibule uses my favourite colours – blues, greens, and purples. Her style has a touch of surrealism without taking away from the feelings that come from the words or the overall feeling of the zine itself.

This is a mini-zine that is very bittersweet, but it hit me right in my heart as someone who has a lot of friendships overseas. i have read this many times, and I know i will come back to it many more.

Sometimes People Don’t Suck #5
HRW
https://www.etsy.com/shop/HRWzines
https://www.instagram.com/hrw7005/

Sometimes People Don’t Suck #5 is a black and white, one-page-folded, US-sized one-page zine containing a beautiful true story about sharing and mulberries.

If this title sounds familiar here on the blog, it’s because I reviewed Sometimes People Don’t Suck 1, 2, & 3 (and loved them).

Set on patterned backgrounds, the typed text tells a sweet story that swept me away with pleasant images of a day spent berry picking – with the positive surprise of strangers sharing. It is a quick read, but such a lovely one that I read it twice. As it’s short, I don’t want to go into too many details, but I will say the kindness shown in this zine had me smiling.

One nit pick that I also mentioned in the previous review is that there aren’t any links of any sort for following up. There absolutely may be a reason for this, which is why I call it a nit pick. But it does niggle me just a touch more in a series because, for instance, I would like number four to complete my set. If I didn’t know where this zine had come from “HRW” wouldn’t be a lot to go on. Searching the title itself means you have to tag on ‘zine’ as well to get close to results about this actual zine.

Anyway, that’s a touch of a tangent there, but it goes to show just how much I like this series. (I want more people to read them!) There’s so much out there about how awful people are. It’s so lovely to me to see some positive human interactions documented in zine form.

Pick up the whole series.