Blessed Be

Small-town weirdness scales new comedic heights in Altergott's long-awaited graphic novel.

Publisher Marketing: When Tom "The Acid King" Cottonwood is sentenced to prison for dealing, he vows to exact revenge on the judge and all of Flowertown, U.S.A. One year later, when hillbilly Henry Hotchkiss violates the single principle binding the members of the local men's group, the 40 Acres Club -- preserving his virginity -- he proactively excommunicates himself to the woods in shame, prompting his distraught best friend, Doofus Anderssen (he of straw boater and Beatle haircut over a permanent five-o'clock shadow), to organize a community search. But little does he know that Cottonwood has been paroled and is making plans in those same woods to fulfill his destiny as "The Acid King" -- in the form of a deadly act of terrorism he calls "Scorpio Rising." Review Quotes : Rick Altergott is the unsung genius of American comedy. An amazingly well-crafted conflation of queasy psychology, sub-moronic toilet humor, and fine art.--Daniel Clowes (Ghost World) Review Quotes : Altergott's narrative tone resembles an educational video voice-over, while his dialogue explodes with outdated hipster lingo, beatnik terms, pseudo-psychology and small-town weirdness. Better witnessed than explained, Doofus is a fantastic compendium of American marginalia and degradation.-- "Publishers Weekly" Review Quotes : Each time you turn the page, something hilarious is ready to confront you.-- "Cinema Sentries" Review Quotes : A razor-sharp satire of conservative values, bohemian ideals, outlaw culture, capitalism, and more, from a creator evincing a powerful, if idiosyncratic, vision of modern American life.-- "Library Journal Starred Review" Review Quotes : In Altergott's first long-form comics work, the slacker comedy and unrepentantly lowbrow humor associated with the strip is being given an extended space in which to breathe.-- "Broken Frontier" Review Quotes : Doofus is one joke, but one joke told with such delightful attention to craft, scouring the seediest facets of Wally Wood's risqué humor oeuvre with a deadly eye for anachronistic pastiche.--Tegan O'Neill "The Comics Journal" Review Quotes : I sincerely doubt you'll read anything that makes you laugh more, and laugh harder, than Altergott's delightfully inane opus.-- "Four Color Apocalypse" Publisher Marketing : When Tom "The Acid King" Cottonwood is sentenced to prison for dealing, he vows to exact revenge on the judge and all of Flowertown, U.S.A. One year later, when hillbilly Henry Hotchkiss violates the single principle binding the members of the local men's group, the 40 Acres Club -- preserving his virginity -- he proactively excommunicates himself to the woods in shame, prompting his distraught best friend, Doofus Anderssen (he of straw boater and Beatle haircut over a permanent five-o'clock shadow), to organize a community search. But little does he know that Cottonwood has been paroled and is making plans in those same woods to fulfill his destiny as "The Acid King" -- in the form of a deadly act of terrorism he calls "Scorpio Rising."

Format: Hardcover | Pages: 152 | Publication Date: 2024-04-30