THE CARTOON LIFE AND LOVES OF A STUPID MAN by Marc Joan

THE CARTOON LIFE AND LOVES OF A STUPID MAN

Marc Joan (marc-joan.com)

Deixis Press (deixis.press)

£13.50

Philippe Favrier is a Frenchman living in Geneva with his beautiful wife, Marilyne. Philippe owns a comic book shop – La Market Jaune – and is heir to a pharmaceutical fortune. Marilyne is a heart surgeon who works, to Philippe’s chagrin, with a man they jokingly call Georges Clooney, because of his resemblence to the actor as a younger man. Philippe struggles with mental health issues, and has been prescribed, by his wife, a revolutionary pill that his father invented. But Philippe is beginning to wonder about the pill: is it a means of controlling him, so that Marilyne and Clooney can carry on behind his back? When an original page from Edgar P. Jacobs’ first Blake and Mortimer book, La Marque Jaune, appears in the window of a nearby auction house, Philippe sees it as a sign, and stops his medication altogether. As his life begins to fall apart around him, we watch as Philippe spirals out of control and he moves, inexorably, towards the inevitable horror that awaits him at the end of the bande desinée that tells the story of his life.

Marc Joan’s The Cartoon Life and Loves of a Stupid Man is part examination of mental illness, part family drama, part humourous look at modern life, part horror and part love letter to The Ninth Art, bandes desinées. All this packed into fewer than 270 pages may seem like a daunting proposition but Joan pulls it off admirably. Told in the first person from Philippe’s point of view, it takes a couple of chapters to get the measure of the man, and of the story, but once you find the rhythm, Cartoon Life sucks you right in, and puts you in Philippe’s head. Obviously, this is not the ideal place to be, as we soon discover: Philippe is a man with many troubles, not least the fact that he believes his wife is having an affair with an attractive colleague. One day Philippe catches sight of his profile in a mirror and discovers that it’s not a profile that he recognises. It’s all downhill from here as Philippe’s paranoia takes over and he begins skipping his medication, making things steadily worse. Philippe and Marilyne have fled to Geneva from Paris following the death of their baby boy, Antoine, and the pain is evident in both characters, writ large in every action they take, every word they speak. Being in Philippe’s head is heartbreaking and, while we see everything from his point of view, we can still see many warning signs that he is missing.

While Philippe is on medication for his mental health problems, it’s clear that he is not alone when it comes to these issues. Marilyne is obviously equally as burdened, though she often hides it better. Her aversion to mirrors and her inability to often connect with her husband, or understand his point of view are obvious red flags. Outside of their small family unit (they share an apartment with Marilyne’s cat, Infelix) Joan introduces Clooney, the smug heart surgeon with whom Philippe believes his wife is having an affair; Yves, Marilyne’s friend from Paris who just happens to have followed them to Geneva; and Laurence, one of Philippe’s regular customers, who spends most of his time berating Philippe about the choice of books he stocks in his shop. Each of these characters feels well-rounded and solid and we find that we are constantly reminding ourselves that Philippe may not be the most reliable narrator and that these people can’t possibly be as bad as all that.

Philippe is a lover of comics, and in particular the French and Belgian bandes desinées. His ownership of La Market Jaune – a play on the title of EP Jacobs’ first Blake and Mortimer book – allows Philippe to remain active in the world of comics. Once a well-respected artist, the new medication has robbed him of his creative streak, and he finds himself solely as a purveyor of the Ninth Art rather than a creator. He runs a monthly competition and soon finds a regular anonymous entrant who has included a poorly-disguised version of Philippe in his comic as the arch-nemesis of superhero Madame Médicin, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Marilyne. This is just one more puzzle to solve – who is the writer behind this deliberately poorly-written fiction and what are they trying to say? The shop also gives Joan the chance to wax lyrical about this oft-maligned area of literature, and why people should be reading less Hergé and more of the superior Jacobs, amongst other controversial topics. To underline the comics angle, Philippe talks about his life as if he were reading it from the Book, a bande desinée that tells his story through sequential art.

It took me a few chapters to get the hang of Philippe’s voice, and to properly settle into the book, but once I got there, I found myself engrossed any time I cracked the book open. Joan writes with masses of humour and even more humanity. While we are inside Philippe’s head, and feeling the pain he feels over the death of his child, the betrayal of his wife, the loss of his artistic side, we’re also aware – unlike Philippe himself – of what’s going on around him. What’s really going on between Marilyne and Clooney; what has happened to the original comic page that Philippe feels is his by right, given that he named his shop after the book of which it is a part. There’s a slow inexorability to the path which Philippe finds himself on, and every mistake he makes – every incorrect assumption, every harsh word, every missed pill – is like a knife to the heart of the reader.

Marc Joan is an extraordinary writer and one to watch over the next few years. He manages to pack so much into this small volume without it ever feeling overcrowded. It’s a perfectly-paced and layered story with a broken man at its centre. Philippe Favrier is the type of character that is likely to stay with you long after you finish the book and you may find yourself wondering if he’s got the help he so obviously needs yet. The Cartoon Life and Loves of a Stupid Man is a must-read for anyone who likes comics in particular, and for those who enjoy well-written fiction that packs a below-the-belt punch in general.