Jar of Fools: A Picture Story

by JasonLutes (Author), RuiTenreiro (Cover Design)

New
Paperback
2008
$12.39

Haunted by a failed romance and the death of his escape-artist brother, Ernie Weiss is a washed-up stage magician whose remaining hope lies in his ageing mentor, Al Fosso. But Al is slipping further into senility with each passing day. Meanwhile, Esther O'Dea, Ernie's ex-love, struggles to find peace in her own life, and then a con-man named Nathan Lender sets some mysterious plans in motion that will affect the futures of them all. Fascinating and tragicomic, Jar of Fools is a classic of its genre.

Synopsis

Haunted by a failed romance and the death of his escape-artist brother, Ernie Weiss is a washed-up stage magician whose remaining hope lies in his ageing mentor, Al Fosso. But Al is slipping further into senility with each passing day. Meanwhile, Esther O'Dea, Ernie's ex-love, struggles to find peace in her own life, and then a con-man named Nathan Lender sets some mysterious plans in motion that will affect the futures of them all. Fascinating and tragicomic, Jar of Fools is a classic of its genre.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 142
Edition: illustrated edition
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Published: 01 May 2008
ISBN 10: 0571236979
ISBN 13: 9780571236978
Book Overview: A classic graphic novel, Jason Lutes's Jar of Fools is a compelling rumination on the nature of love, loss, magic and memory.

Media Reviews

A lovely, short 'picture novel' exploring the tenacious bond between an alcoholic stage magician and his cranky mentor. -- New York Times Book Review
Jar of Fools is full of people trying to stop things they care about from melting away, like estranged lovers and old-fashioned jobs...all the main characters--the magician, a coffee-shop cashier, a small time con-man--are in danger of ending up beaten down and swallowed up by the silences of life which Lutes' well-paced art evokes so effectively -- Details
The story itself is so masterfully told that it could stand alone as a novella in Harper's, When combined with Lutes' spare black-and-white line drawings and creative use of the comic book medium, it becomes something transcendent--a piece of literature that speaks to the emotional core. -- Wired
Employing the lost skills of mood, sparseness, and language, Lutes' stunning comic Jar of Fools transcends the usually mealy-mouthed limits of graphic novels and, in the process, winds up being a damn good read. -- Spin Magazine
Reading Jar of Fools is like getting a slow motion punch in the face. There's plenty of time to get out of the way, but something compels you to wait and find out of it's actually going to hurt as much when it hits. And, of course, it does. --Chris Ware, author of Jimmy Corrigan

Author Bio

Jason Lutes was born in New Jersey in 1967. He worked at Fantagraphics Books in Seattle before publishing his first graphic novel, Jar of Fools. His current project Berlin: City of Stones, about the city and its people between the wars, is currently being published in serial form before being collected into a single edition book.