Product Description

Spend some time with Ethan Green as he explores...rejection...career opportunities...and commitment...in this new collection from The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green. For more than a decade, the ever-increasingly popular comic strip "The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green" has tracked the foibles and failings of gay everyman Ethan Green. In this latest collection, Ethan again faces the terrors of gay America--from ex-boyfriends to new relationships, from relatives to best friends. With wry wit and uncommon insight, Eric Orner hilarously exposes the truth about gay life.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1060925 in Books
• Published on: 1999-08-19
• Format: Illustrated
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 144 pages

Amazon.com Review
The fourth collection of strips from Eric Orner's syndicated comic, "The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green," flips back and forth between the latest developments in Ethan's life--including his on-again, off-again romance with Doug and a new job as a personal assistant to a closeted celebrity weatherman--and hilarious one-off gag strips like "Really Pretty Far Off the Circuit Circuit Parties" and the "Dream Date Alphabet" ("Umberto is Unfaithful, and Vincent is Vicious"). Part of the joy of reading Orner's work in these collections is that it highlights the strength of his long-range storylines, which include a cast of nearly a dozen supporting characters, from his best friend, Buck, to the wacky Hat Sisters--who, in one memorable strip, provide their own delicious solution to the Clinton impeachment crisis, including washing out a certain independent prosecutor's mouth with soap.

Review
In Ethan Exposed: Further Adventures from Ethan Green's Social Life, Ethan-- the quinttessential gay everyman---blows sideways through awkward family gatherings, shady ex-boyfriends, thankless jobs and cybersex with startling realism and warmth.

The sucess of the Ethan Green franchise lies in the author's unique ability to insert subtle yet biting commentaries on everything from bar culture to the delicacies of maintaining a three-way relationship.

Ethan Exposed is the fouth book in the Ethan Green series. Reading an Ethan Green comic is a bitter-sweet, raw experience because its humor is based on universal feelings of isolation, self-doubt and a need for acceptance.

What separates Orner's work from other gay-themed comic strips is his uncanny attention to detail..forming a richly textured, multi-layered comic.

Litterary bullies may kick sand in Orner's face, claiming a book comprised of cartoon strips could not equal the substance of a novel, but Orner's fans would argue that certain elements of gay culture can only be told through this medium. -- The Windy City Times(Chicago Illinois) September 9, 1999

About the Author
Eric Orner sold his first cartoon to the Chicago Daily News in 1977 and has been drawing for publications ever since. Upon graduation from college, he worked as the editorial cartoonist for Concord Daily Monitor in New Hampshire. His cartoons and illustrations have appeared in newspapers and magazines across the country, including the Washington Post and the New Republic. Eric's Ethan Green comic strip is published in weekly newspapers across the United States, Canada, and Britain.

Customer Reviews

More Exposure Wanted
Ethan Exposed is the third in the published series of the cartoon adventures of thirty-ish gay guy whose life is so instantly recognisable to all of us, and the friends and lovers who share his social circle somewhere in New England, judging by the odd clue - Cambridge Massachussetts, perhaps? The drawings are well draughted (English spelling - I'm English), and the real joy lies in the tiny incidental details, which means that to get the most out of an Ethan Green cartoon, it needs to be revisited constantly, and this is always a pleasure.

The character of Ethan himself, who is sympathetic but by no means perfect, just like the rest of us, is the true reason why these cartoons are so good. We see him coping with his ghastly Jewish family on compulsory visits home, consulting the mercenary (though Eth doesn't realise this) Madam Zolna about the future, trying to persuade his on/off lover Doug to commit himself and buy a house with him, and indulging in cybersex only to be interrupted by a chatty instant message from his adoring mother.

Other joys include the Hat Sisters, supportive of Ethan at all times, Ethan's almost-human cat Lucy, who acts as a kind of Greek chorus on much of the action, and the odd cartoon which does not involve Ethan at all, but is a kind of commentary on other aspects of gay life.

This book, and the other two, are collections of cartoons published in the Washington Blade and elsewhere, and long may Eric Orner continue to draw them, and observe the gay scene so realistically.

Fabulous Literature
I will be brief. This book by Eric Orner is often hysterical; but it goes beyond being funny and those who have read Orner's three previous books know this. It is a journey into a world where humor, love, death, and relationships are explored in entirely new and different ways. A book that will make you laugh at loud and then rush to mirror asking is this me? Is this my life? And it is, in all it's saddness, comedy, and moments of bumbling glory.

Real, Funny, and Sad-or-Real Funny and Sad
Poor Ethan.

Orner watches his world carefully and with sympathy and empathy he brings his characters to life and makes me laugh.

A few of things spouted by characters in Ethan's world are direct quotations from my ex-boyfriend (Who now, by the way, has frosted his hair and gained 30 pounds---he looks like a bloated Vanilla Ice. I'm not even vaguely bitter.)

I bought all the Ethan books at once and never tired of his antics.