The Collected Innocent Bystander Volume One

Rating:
Summary: The Nice Comic I Took Home To My Wife
Review: I've always enjoyed good comics, from the newspaper funny pages to Superman and Spider-Man comics. My wife doesn't, but she does like cats. And that's why I had to bring this comic home to her, because the antics of Stan & Ollie are eerily similar to the antics of the feline masters of my household. But there's more to Innocent Bystander than the cats -- lots more. But the cats make a good introduction. Show those sections to cat lovers, and watch as they gradually move on to the other sections of the book that cover the Marx Brothers, television and everything in between. This is a fun comic that illustrates the best of what the comics medium has to offer.

Rating:
Summary: Totally endearing, lovingly nostalgic, funny stuff.
Review: If you've ever been a kid, breathed the air of summertime freedom when school lets out, sneaked out of the house at night to look at the sky or played kick-the-can and hide-and-go-seek in your local cemetery, this book is irresistible. Gary must have had a warm, wonderful childhood and lots of family around to keep him honest. IB is ageless and like an orange popsicle on a hot summer day. It may even make you go out and get a cat!! Who could resist? Warm, wonderful, honest and funny. Absolutely five stars.

Rating:
Summary: A Charming, Anecdotal Book.
Review: Innocent Bystander is tough to pigeonhole....It's filled with humerous anecdotes from the life of the Writer/Artist, but it also has stories about various other subjects that interest him, such as a long discourse on his love of the Marx Brothers. (My personal favorite story....)

The book is alternately funny and touching; I particularly liked the one-page story about a sign the Author saw once, "A Deaf Child Walks This Road". The one drawback? I'm not a cat-lover, so the fact that one-fifth of the book is dedicated to the antics of Sassaman's cats, Stan & Ollie, didn't really thrill me....

Comis fans looking for something out-of-the-ordinary would do well to check this out.