Growing Like A Weed : A For Better of For Worse Collection

Rating:
Summary: I CAN'T STAND APRIL!
Review: Count me in as an April buster. I think she is one of the biggest brats to hit the funny pages in years. She hogs the bathroom, thus negatively impacting on Liz's time. Poor Liz keeps taking the rap for nasty April's misdeeds. April has tantrums, has a fresh mouth and never once gets punished. She does not own up to her actions and has no sense of responsibility. I agree with the other reviewer that her stunt down by the river cost poor Farley his life. Had he not sacrificed his own life to save the brat, he could have at least died in a warm and comfortable house.

April is very babyish for her age. She wears these stupid overalls and says "gots," which sounds just plain stupid. She never helps around the house and she asks for trouble. Don't forget, it was Bratface April who came up with that mean song about Jeremy. She's no innocent bystander. She is trouble with a capital TROUBLE and, like another reviewer aptly noted, head for the hills and don't look back once she hits the terrible teens. I can't abide April!

Rating:
Summary: Another hectic year in the life of the Patterson family
Review: I would say that Lynn Johnston's "For Better or Worse" is the "Gasoline Alley" for modern times, but there is a good chance the reference would be lost on most of the readers who have been enjoying this daily cartoon strip for the past couple of decades. The point is simply that in a world where Charlie Brown, Dennis the Menace, and other cartoon kids stay eternally young, the Pattersons having been getting older (and better) year after year. "Growing Like a Weed" is the 18th collection of "For Better or Worse" daily and Sunday strips, and the titles reflects both the misadventures of Michael Patterson and his friend "Weed" away at college as well as the fact that his baby sister April is now five. This was also the year that Elly and John took a vacation to Mexico, Gordo and Tracey announced they were going to have a baby, and Elizabeth's hair turned out purple instead of burgundy while her friend Candace shaved her head. Then there is the bunny that Elizabeth brought home from Manitoba, but the pivotal story line here is the one about the car accident that Michael and Weed witnesses, where Michael gets all excited about taking photographs and never bothers to find out the name of the girl who was injured. Clearly, from the perspective of today, this is the major story development in this collection.

Johnston has always described her strips as a humorous but down to earth look at parenting, although obviously she knows about sibling rivalry and other family dynamics, as well as the joys of friendship. One of the reasons I have always liked "For Better or for Worse" was that my three kids pretty much parallel the Patterson trio, both in terms of having a first born named Michael but also with the key gap between sisters that really inspires the older one to make trouble for the younger one, although Elizabeth employs a more low keyed approach to what I get to see in my house. I had always assumed that Johnston was basing all of the Patterson on her husband and kids, but then I found out that while she was using them as models, albeit based on middle names (Roderick John, Aaron Michael, Katharine Elizabeth), April was the result of her creator's desire to have another child. Somehow I think that the irony that April does not have a real world counterpart might explain why she comes across as the most realistic kid you have ever seen in a comic strip. However, whichever one of the Pattersons provides your conduit to "For Better or for Worse," the important thing is that you make this comic strip one of your minimum daily requirements.

Rating:
Summary: Another hectic year in the life of the Patterson family
Review: I would say that Lynn Johnston's "For Better or Worse" is the "Gasoline Alley" for modern times, but there is a good chance the reference would be lost on most of the readers who have been enjoying this daily cartoon strip for the past couple of decades. The point is simply that in a world where Charlie Brown, Dennis the Menace, and other cartoon kids stay eternally young, the Pattersons having been getting older (and better) year after year. "Growing Like a Weed" is the 18th collection of "For Better or Worse" daily and Sunday strips, and the titles reflects both the misadventures of Michael Patterson and his friend "Weed" away at college as well as the fact that his baby sister April is now five. This was also the year that Elly and John took a vacation to Mexico, Gordo and Tracey announced they were going to have a baby, and Elizabeth's hair turned out purple instead of burgundy while her friend Candace shaved her head. Then there is the bunny that Elizabeth brought home from Manitoba, but the pivotal story line here is the one about the car accident that Michael and Weed witnesses, where Michael gets all excited about taking photographs and never bothers to find out the name of the girl who was injured. Clearly, from the perspective of today, this is the major story development in this collection.

Johnston has always described her strips as a humorous but down to earth look at parenting, although obviously she knows about sibling rivalry and other family dynamics, as well as the joys of friendship. One of the reasons I have always liked "For Better or for Worse" was that my three kids pretty much parallel the Patterson trio, both in terms of having a first born named Michael but also with the key gap between sisters that really inspires the older one to make trouble for the younger one, although Elizabeth employs a more low keyed approach to what I get to see in my house. I had always assumed that Johnston was basing all of the Patterson on her husband and kids, but then I found out that while she was using them as models, albeit based on middle names (Roderick John, Aaron Michael, Katharine Elizabeth), April was the result of her creator's desire to have another child. Somehow I think that the irony that April does not have a real world counterpart might explain why she comes across as the most realistic kid you have ever seen in a comic strip. However, whichever one of the Pattersons provides your conduit to "For Better or for Worse," the important thing is that you make this comic strip one of your minimum daily requirements.

Rating:
Summary: Best guide to home gardening illegal substances! haha DEA!
Review: Lynn has outdone herself in this anthology, which collects all of the exciting strips detailing the blossoming of John's indoor gardening hobbies. Watch the Patterson's triumphantly thwart the DEA! Feel the suspense as Mike and Elly get hooked on dad's stash behind their parents' backs, further cementing their sibling bond of "best buds!". The conflict deepens, however, when Mike can't stop eating from the munchies, and soon ballons up like PJ in Bil Keane's "PJ's still hungry!" Will the folks find out about Mike and Elly? Will the government be tipped off by John's soaring electric bill? Or will everyone just hang out in the Patterson's basement, drying out the purple buds in the microwave and whippin up brownies while watching videotaped reruns of "H.R. Puffenstuff"? With guest cartoon appearance by Tommy Chong and William Jefferson Clinton, this collection is not to be missed.

Rating:
Summary: Oh, no! Here SHE comes!
Review: Mrs. Lynn Johnston continues to impress us with her very skillful artistic talents and true-to-life storytelling (though she does has an assistant or two in her studio) and all the characters are quite believable and lovable, thus easy to relate to. Especially the funny young Michael! But guess who's the least easy to relate of all. Little Missy Princess April Patterson, of course. That arrogant little kid rules over the whole household with a very sticky fist. She's forever lost in her own little fantasy world and whether she's back in the "reality", she's always throwing temper tantrums, demanding her way, molesting her big sister's personal things, leaving such disgusting messes (including fecal matter in the pet rabbit's litter box), and just plain driving the poor middle-aged mother right out of her mind with her "cutesy" antics. In fact, she even gets involved into two real crisises; one at the riverbank that cost the life of the poor old Farley and the other that left Jeremy Jones with a broken leg in the hospital. But - that's not the worst yet to come...so when she becomes a rebellious teenager - RUN, RUN FOR YOUR DEAR LIVES!

Rating:
Summary: A HARVEST OF GREAT STORIES!
Review: This book has yielded a rich crop of great stories. The cast is certainly a convincing one. They are all folks one can recognize from real life counterparts, from funny, savvy Mr. Jim Patterson to the spoiled, unplesant April. She's the only one I have never been able to like. (I don't know how she gets by with her mouth. I'm surprised nobody ever put their foot down to her and she takes advantage of everybody. April is the weed growing in the garden)! It was good reconnecting with Gordon, who is a sterling success story (from the poor boy who was often picked on and who lived with domestic violence to the successful entrepreneur -- you go, Gordon)! Lawrence, too, was an added treat as his orientation has helped pave the way for acceptance of gays among his "real" counterparts. Love the book! It was great, as I expected it would be.

Rating:
Summary: Great, as always
Review: This book was a cornucopia of laughs. It is one of the best drawn books I ever read. Nobody is anywhere as good a cartoonist as Lynn Johnston. I wish somebody would put a muzzle on April. She has a big mouth and I wish she'd keep her feet in it because she keeps saying the wrong things at the wrong times to the wrong people. April is a Pest with a capital P-E-S-T. She's the weed that is in the title. It's time to call the gardener.

Rating:
Summary: Great!
Review: This delightful collection of a very high caliber strip does not disappoint. The strip boasts of a delightful cast of characters with the exception of obnoxious April, who is the sole weed growing in the comic's Garden of Eden. This book will not disappoint loyal FBOFW followers, myself included.

Rating:
Summary: SPECTACULAR!
Review: This was by far one of the best and most touching book in the FBOFW collection. I could not stop reading this book. I loved how Lynn brought back a very old character back into the strip, and for all of you FBOFW fans.......you will be surprised at who it is and how they are brought back into the strip. I cannot believe how talented Lynn is! This book proves true talent of yours Lynn. I can guarrentee that you will not stop laughing and that you will not stop turning the pages. Before you read this book, you might want to go out and buy something for a stomachache 'cause you will be working that diaphragm of yours. I hafta admit that I cried and was truly touched by some of the book issues. Get out the kleenex, too! There are no words in any language to describe how truly wonderful this book is!

Rating:
Summary: Growing Weed?
Review: Why would this beloved author write such a dreadful storyline? Growing weed? C'mon why do we need another book about the glories of weed. I know that Johnston is fron Canada, where the laws on marijuana are a little more liberal than that laws in the US, but to actively promote getting high and then eating everything in sight makes for a good comic? Micheal, Elizabeth and April have become no match for the evils of marijuana. In fact the dad has been giving prescriptions to his patients of medical marijuana. Watching the kids get high at home, at school, at dance class and other places is a shocking thing to see in the comics. In one of the episodes, Micheal has a gay encounter with a man twenty years older than he is, is this Johnstons way of showing support for her liberal causes? One of them being the support of the disease of gayness? I generally don't like cutesy comics, such as FBOFW, in fact I think comics should not be cutesy and only be funny, but at least the original formula was less offensive.