Subtitled A Unit of Work, Erg is a locally produced zine featuring poems, prose, and comic strips about work. It features an interview with an illegal immigrant, illustrations by Nikki McClure, a nifty poem by Katherine Ogle titled "I Am Taking This Job for the Possibility of Office Romance," an unmarked timecard, and a poem tucked inside an envelope. Some of the work is uneven, but at $5, this is too good a deal to pass up.
Even better, though, is Detained, a beautiful piece of comic book reportage by Eroyn Franklin, about two area immigrant detention centers. The comics are told in two thirteen-foot-long strips of paper that detail, panoramically, what life inside the interior of Seattle's old INS Building and Tacoma's Northwest Detention Center is like. The narrative unfurls in one long pan-shot through the facilities, based on interviews with people who have been through the system. And it comes with two posters that provide post-scripts for each individual story. This kind of excellent, artistic, independent reportage needs to be supported. And for $16, you won't find a better comic book value.
I've got a few more photos up in a slideshow over here. Neither of these books would work in e-book format, and they're both locally produced. Go and support local artists and local businesses and get something neat to read at the same time.
* He was interesting, funny, and charming, and you should read the book; it provided me with one of the best reading experiences of 2011 so far.
