Name: Good-bye, Chunky Rice
Rating: 3.388888888888889 (18 reviews)
ISBN: 0375714766

Craig Thompson

Good-bye, Chunky Rice

Sarah Sammis

Dimitris Papastergiou

Harvey Award. This one won a Harvey Award. 

And because of that, and some other nominated shit, I'm pretty much convinced anything can win a Harvey fucking Award. Draw a cute fucking animal on a piece of paper and you got it.

Ugh....

Ok. 

Good Artwork (at times) Like the cute little animals. 
Bad artwork... The humans in it are not the best to look at. They look like fuckin graffiti quick sprayed on walls.. Oh well.. personally not my thing. Ugly.

The story is mediocre at best overall, but it really stands out as a personal story for the creator and his friends that he decided to be like, yeah, fuck it... I'm gonna publish this to the world.. lemme add some cute animals so I can do that... so.. yeah.. 

It's ok. It reads ok. The characters are ok. The cute turtle is the best. The inks is what I REALLY liked at this one and kept reading. The story and dialogue is ok/good half the time, but it is NOT for awards for fuck's sake.

If this can win a Harvey Award then fuck it. Give telletubbies a fucking award or Barney the purple fuckin dinosaur an award. Because Barney is teaching kids about friendship. And here is the adult version of this. 

No. Just no. It's ok, and I'm willing to say it's even a good solid story about "leaving" people and situations behind. Moving on... and making decisions etc. etc. 

But it is NOT "amazing" or "groundbreaking" or something that deserves fucking awards allthewhile me ranting about it is the only reason, because that's why I read in the 1st place. Because of the award.

Oh well...

Maggie Gordon

That's it, I give up with Craig Thompson (that's a lie, I will probably read his most recent book when it gets to the library). His stuff just doesn't work well for me, despite the mountains of critical acclaim he receives. 

Good Bye Chunky Rice, like Blankets, has a good story at its heart, it's just that Thompson never really lets it properly shine. Instead, we get a book that ends somewhere in what should be its middle. Chunky Rice is a strange little turtle person who has decided to move away to seek out something new. But in doing so he is leaving behind his best friend and he's not very sure he's okay with that. I hope you don't want to explore those feelings because we don't. Chunky Rice leaves, gets dumped on by the sea captain of the boat he's on, and generally doesn't grow much at all. 

In better stories, dealing with separation and loss would be at the heart of Chunky's journey. Instead, you see other people dealing with the various difficulties life throws at them, but this doesn't actually cause Chunky to reconsider his own behaviour, nor is there really enough emotive power behind each of the stories to make them effective vignettes. Some of them are painfully obvious and stereotyped, such as the one where a man nurses a bird back to health and is dismayed that it leaves when he lets it fly again, only to rejoice when it comes back. 

Thompson's art, on the other hand, continues to be amazing. He is an exceptionally detail-oriented artist, and his character designs remain unique and memorable. If only the stories he tells had the same qualities..

Chunky Rice, a small turtle, embarks on an ocean voyage, where he meets a shady skipper and conjoined twins, Ruth and Livonia,, but he also leaves behind his girlfriend Dandel, who sends him letters in a bottle.

Kali Nichta

My friend Rob gave this to me as a going away present when I left California. It's a loving treatment of the bittersweet event of saying goodbye to a loved one so she can spread her wings. It still makes me a little forklempt.

Good-bye, Chunky Rice

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