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We mentioned this in our official MoCCA report for Publishers Weekly, but if there is one must-read this week, it’s The Cartoon Crier from The Center for Cartoon Studies. Distributed as a lovely free paper at MoCCA, you can now read it in Issu form at the link.

But we must warn you. DO NOT READ IF YOU ARE NOT SAD. Because it will make you sad.

The Cartoon Crier features the saddest strips from iconic comics like Family Circus, Beetle Bailey, Dennis the Menace, B.C., and For Better and For Worse. The Cartoon Crier also includes comics by Ivan Brunetti, Mell Lazarus, Melissa Mendes, Joe Lambert, Tom Gammill, Hilary Price, Laura Park, Richard Thompson, and Mo Willems, as well as new work from the paper’s editors, Cole Closser, R. Sikoryak, and James Sturm.


And it is a heartbreaker, tearjerker, soul-killer. Common themes include sick pets, injury to cute little animals, dark nights of the soul, heartbreaking relationships, sudden revelation of the uselessness of life…and so on. We showed FMB one strip only and then we sat there hugging for the next half hour.

If you’re one of those folks who takes comfort in withstanding the bleak and confronting the void, dive right in—you’ll eventually arise reborn and cleansed and ready to face the great yawning abyss with courage and foresight.

That’s the plan, anyway.