Never Bite Anything That Bites Back

Sherman's Lagoon #16

by Jim Toomey

Sherman's Lagoon is a comic strip that combines the upbeat tone of under-the-sea fun with a real-life look at our environment and oceans.

Collecting more than 42 weeks of Jim Toomey's Sherman's Lagoon, Never Bite Anything That Bites Back transports readers to an imaginary lagoon near the South Pacific island of Kapupu where a cast of coral reef critters battles the encroachment of the hairless beach apes (a.k.a. humans).

Commenting on such timely issues as rising sea levels, the Gulf oil spill, and social media, inhabitants of Toomey's nautical neighborhood include Sherman, an always-hungry, but otherwise typical kind of great white shark; his witty pearl-wearing wife, Megan; friendly Fillmore the turtle; geeky fish Ernest; macho hermit crab Hawthorne; and salty old Captain Quigley. Inside Never Bite Anything That Bites Back, these bottom-dwelling denizens offer under-the-sea hilarity, along with a real-life call-to-action in relation to our environment and oceans.

Genres: Comics, Humor, Fiction

128 pages, Paperback

First published October 4, 2011

About the author

Jim Toomey is an internationally published humor writer and syndicated cartoonist best known as the creator of the popular comic strip Sherman’s Lagoon, published daily in over 150 newspapers including The Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle and the Chicago Tribune. Jim has produced 28 Sherman’s Lagoon books, published by Andrews McMeel, and most recently a travel memoir, entitled Family Afloat, about his two years sailing the world’s oceans with his wife and family.

Sherman's Lagoon combines two of his lifelong interests: art and the sea. In addition to drawing his comic strip, Jim is active in ocean conservation and serves on several nonprofit boards, including the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. Jim has given talks at a variety of venues, including the Royal Society in London, Harvard University and twice at TED. The conservation message in his comic strip earned him the Environmental Hero Award in 2000, presented by NOAA “for using art and humor to conserve and protect our marine heritage.” Jim won the award again in 2010.

Jim holds degrees from Duke and Stanford. He currently lives in Annapolis, Maryland, with his wife and two children, where he tries to get his family back on a sailboat as frequently as possible but can rarely make it happen.

Reviews

[Narariel · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable collection, the book contains strips including ones about an oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and the Shark X-games.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Did you know there are Shark X games? And that Megan is amazing at them? This and other hysterical stories await you in this one.

[SeanV CLC · Rating 5 out of 5]

EXTREMELY FUNNY. Everyone should read this series. I've read it over 50 times no joke.

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I CAN TIP. WATCH THIS!"

[Potassium · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sherman's Lagoon is always hilarious. Definitely worth the read.