Curses

The River at Night cartoonist revisits his early-aughts breakthrough

In the two decades since Curses first hit the shelves, River at Night cartoonist Kevin Huizenga has taken his rightful place on a short A-list of comics experimentalists. Deep research and loopy cartooning serve up philosophical musings while maintaining a classic comic-strip devotion to “the gag.” Huizenga remains one of the funniest and smartest cartoonists working today, and now, the very book that heralded his arrival as a talent to watch is available once more in deluxe paperback as the early work of a now true genius.

The short stories collected herewith confront the textures of mortality in unique and peculiar ways. Central character Glenn Ganges is a seemingly middle-class, suburbanite whose blank-eyed wonderment at the everyday brings together diverse aspects of our world—like golf, theology, late-night diners, parenthood, politics, Sudanese refugees, and hallucinatory vision—into a complete experience as multifaceted as each of our own lives.