Sam Zabel and the Magic Pen -- Graphic Novel

Sam Zabel is a cartoonist that hasn't written anything in years and suffering from a serious writers block. Sam accidentally finds this magic comic book that takes him into the fantasy world living in the pages of his comic. He reflects on his imagination, his creativity and learns about letting go and creating than holding onto the past and getting stuck worrying if his new work will be good enough.

I think there is an underlying message here that is creative and honest, but for me the story kind of flopped. Instead of finding this work inspiring and motivating, as I would assume is its intention, I kind of had second hand embarrassment as far as the writing went.

The illustrations were good, it reminded me of an adult version of Herge's work (illustrator for Tin-Tin), but the plot and settings that this character was in and a stereotypical nerd feminist telling Sam about 'how women think' was really kitchy and stupid. The story just felt like a pervy Harold and the Purple Crayon to me.

I then read that Dylan Horrocks hadn't put out a book since 1994, and felt like this story was more of a fantasy memoir for Horrocks, which made it seem even less fun for me as a reader. Not very down.