Nemi - Vol. 1

Nemi #1

by Lise Myhre

Meet Nemi Montoya, the vegetarian, cynical/romantic, hilariously honest twenty-something goth, in this brand new collection from artist Lise Myhre!

Hang out in the pub with Nemi and her friends, including her flatmate, the blue-haired Cyan; hear her opinions on romance and dating; watch her watch TV in her untidy flat; learn how she feels about birch trees, spiders and blondes; and generally experience the highs and lows of being Nemi in the modern world!

A superstar in her native Norway thanks to the immense success of Nemi — also reprinted in the 1.12 million-circulation UK Metro newspaper — you too can enter Lise Myhre’s witty, wonderful world!

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Humor, Graphic Novels Comics, Fiction, Goth, Bande Dessinée

144 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Norwegian cartoonist. Her most famous cartoon is Nemi.

After a short study of graphical design at the Santa Monica College of Art in California, Lise Myhre started her career as an artist, earning money illustrating CD covers and t-shirts. She also participated in cartoon competitions and started giving contributions to Larsons Gale Verden, the Norwegian version of Gary Larson's magazine The Far Side ("M.P." in 1996).

From 1997, Myhre was given her own page in Larsons Gale Verden, "Den svarte siden" (English: the Black Side/Page), and this developed into Nemi. From 1999, Nemi was a guest cartoon in the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet, and from 2000 as a regular. The first Nemi album was published the summer 2000, and it was a great success. Since Myhre changed publisher, from Bladkompaniet to Egmont, in January 2003, there is a new Nemi magazine published every 6 weeks.

Nemi, with a circulation of more than 70,000 copies, is now one the two most popular cartoons in Norway, next to Pondus.

Nemi is today published in approximately 60 different newspapers, magazines and websites in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, England and Scotland. Amongst these, the Metro (in England, Scotland and Ireland), Dagens Nyheter (Sweden), Ilta-Sanomat (Finland) and Dagbladet (Norway) are the biggest.

Lise Myhre has also illustrated poems by Edgar Allan Poe and André Bjerke.

She is married to musician ICS Vortex (Simen Hestnæs), and they have a son, Storm, born 2007.

Reviews

[Thomas Stroemquist · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't usually read comics, but I do have a few exceptions to that rule, Christensen's Arne Anka, Kellerman's Rocky and Pirinen. For a while, these guys were accompanied by two Norweigian artists; Lise Myhre and Frode Överli (drawing the soccer-loving Pondus). Somehow, these two faded from my mind, though and later tries always fell flat.

Nemi is a same time naive and quite knowledgeable and frank goth/metal-chick that's fighting society's demands on her to grow up. This first album is quite fun and a nice read, as far as I have followed, it unfortunately never got better (or even new or different in any way).

[Jose · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great art, brilliant character.
Some strips are better than other, but a remarkably funny comic.
Almost 4 stars.

[Gabriella · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.5 stars. There were a handful of panels in this book that I liked but overall I didn't love this collection.

I've read and followed Nemi's comics strips online for several years now, but I couldn't help but think as I read this that it seems that I must not have been following Nemi from the very beginning. And while reading this I wondered if Nemi has changed over the years or if I have, and I think both are true. I do enjoy the more recent Nemi strips that are posted online and have for some time now, but the subject matter and humor feels different and like it has evolved - one would assume that the character has evolved with the creator as she has written it over the years.

I'm so used to what I gather is newer Nemi material, that as I was reading I was wondering when her Peter Steele look-alike boyfriend might make an appearance. But, it would seem that this volume is from before he came into the comics at all. In fact, quite a few of the comics here are about Nemi being single, and her one night stands are a recurring subject.
It struck me how often the material felt dated to me...Nemi's chunky blue iMac computer, her cell phone, little details like this that are visual cues to the time this is from. At times the humor and some of the content, including Nemi's attitude in general, felt passe as well. She has a Donnie Darko poster on her wall, she thinks "beam me up" when an enthusiastic girl says she likes listening to Kylie Minogue... it just brings to mind Ghost World, Hot Topic, Happy Bunny, Myspace...you know, pretentious judgey goth/alt girls who are "not like other girls." One comic where Nemi throws her jacket over a buxom skinny woman (who is standing with an identically-built friend who has a £3000 price tag on her chest) though there is a coat rack on the other side of the door...SHE MISTOOK HER FOR A COAT RACK BECAUSE SHE'S SO SKINNY AND OBVIOUSLY VAPID THAT SHE'S BASICALLY AN INANIMATE OBJECT LOL. 🙄
A page before that, she's at a table with two women having drinks...one woman says something about an attractive lead singer, the other says something about how she got new lipgloss and her friend compliments it. Then, in the next panel (I think something may have been lost in translation here?) the two women are pigs oinking at each other and Nemi is a crocodile looking confused. Next panel, "You're quiet, Nemi." "I don't understand what you are saying."
There's a certain degree of hypocrisy with this sort of elitism, which I've observed *frequently* in alt./goth circles since probably about middle school though it seems to carry well into adulthood. I can't help but roll my eyes at it. For instance: Nemi finds guys attractive all the time...but when one of these girls (always blonde) thinks a guy is attractive, or has any interest in anything for that matter, it's suddenly shallow. Nemi appears to have lipstick, eyeliner, and mascara on at all times. But let two plain-faced blonde ladies have an exchange to the tune of "Hey, I'm wearing my new lipgloss!" "Cool!"...and they're speaking another language. 😑
If I had read this when it was published in 2008 when I was a teenager (and more of a judgey bratty goth youth myself) I would have probably liked it more than I do now. But at this point in time, this volume just feels overall pretty dull and unrelatable. I know that I like Nemi comics, but I guess I prefer the more recent material to the older.

I read through the first 100 pages before I gave up on reading every panel and just started skimming for the last 40 pages or so.

[Lily Burton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Always love Nemi. I find her funny and relatable :D I am also rating the other 3 volumes of Nemi as 5 stars :D

[Blodeuedd Finland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nemi is a Norwegian comic strip, written and drawn by Lise Myhre.

Nemi is a "tough girl" with an attitude, is not afraid to speak her mind and more often than not in confrontational ways: blunt rejections of would-be one-night stands at the pub are not uncommon. At the same time, she can be very sensitive: she is apparently incapable of killing anything, including spiders, of which she is very fond. She can also feel very alone at times. She is afraid of growing up, and loathes blonde bimbos (viz cartoon in which she insinuates that Tim is nothing more than a replaceable penis for his new blonde-bimbo girlfriend). Her fear of growing up is reflected in her appeal to readers through her child-like qualities and innocence, as well as her sense of fun. (wikipedia)


She is a goth, who loves chocolate and dragons, and she is just like the rest of us women and I can relate to her, most of the time, lol. I have already finished volume 1 and 2. And yes they were funny and great. I couldn't stop reading when I had started.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my thing. Nemi herself comes off as imaginative and fun-loving, but also shallow, volatile and can be kind of a jerk to people. Her world is constant clubs, hangovers, one night stands, and crowds of friends, yet she's also paradoxically an outcast. Nemi's friend Cyan isn't given much characterization, unfortunately; she's basically a vehicle for lines. The other characters are recurring faces who aren't given names. At least in this first volume, Nemi's frequently a talking heads strip; the joke is in the dialogue and the art doesn't matter. It could just as well be a script.

There was a standout sequence: Nemi locking herself out of her apartment, crawling back into the window of the wrong room by mistake, and being discovered by a kid who believes she's his imaginary friend come to life. That's a brilliant setup! I also have to admit I do like one particularly wicked comeback Nemi dished out:

Lady: I never listen to that kind of stuff. It gives me headaches.
Nemi: Mm. Those phantom pains can be nasty.

Laugh-out-loud count: 3 laughs in 131 pages.

[Ape · Rating 3 out of 5]

I first came across Nemi a lot of years ago when I was living in Sweden, and rather fell in love with the comic strip. She's a Norwegian goth who doesn't want to grow up and her head is full of dragons and fantasy and films. She loves her chocolate. She doesn't take any crap from people. Wonderful. I came across this compilation in English and thought I would give it a go. It is all the same wonderful Nemi-ness, but it's wierd reading her in English. Plus she is from Norway, not London. I can understand why the translators might have gone down the route of translating all the cultural references as well as the words... but I think it looses a little something. Plus they've randomly left a few Scandinavian references in which makes for a bit of a wierd mix. Hey ho.
There's no particular plot or anything to this book, it's a comic strip of Nemi musings on life.

[Sarah M · Rating 4 out of 5]

So happy to have found the first volume in the library today!

I read the second one in the library as a teenager and have been looking for the first one ever since!

There are some great lines in this and it’s really comforting to read!

[Mathias Karlsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

ALL OF NEMI IS AMAZING. LOVE ME A GOTH QUEEN

[Calzaslargas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Generación Z, supongo

[Stéphanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

BD Très drôle, écrite sous forme de courts sketchs. Nemi est très attachante et franchement barrée. Perso je la trouve plus métalleuse que goth, mais ce n’est que mon point de vue et cela ne change pas grand-chose de toute manière. Je pense par contre que certains gags sont ultra référencés et que certaines personnes pas assez familières avec la musique metal/goth passeront à coté. Sinon on passe un bon moment de lecture !

[Lea Dokter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny, relatable and awesomely drawn.

[Patrick O'Connor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Goth, Geek, Costumer? Heavy metal afficionado? What's not to like.

[Dbgirl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Olen muutaman Nemi-stripin lukenut joskus kauan, kauan sitten. Ne olivat mielestäni ihan OK, mutta sitten unohdin sen kunnes tässä pari viikkoa sitten törmäsin sarjakuvaan uudelleen Kirjavinkit-sivustolla ja päätin kokeilla sarjista uudelleen ja ihan alusta. Kävi kuten arvelinkin, eli alkupään tuotanto on vielä hiomatonta ja rosoista. Kaikkia ruutuja en edes tajua.

Yllätyin että Nemistä saa hakemalla hakea goottia, pikemminkin näiden strippien perusteella luokittelisin hänet hevarin ja punkkarin välimuodoksi. Positiivisesti taas yllätyin siitä miten moniulotteinen sekä Nemi että sarjis on. Pidin kuitenkin enemmän sarjan huumorista kuin Nemistä itsestään. Kuten aiemmin sanoin, jotkin stripit eivät auenneet minulle mutta useimmat kylläkin. Osa oli todella hauskoja. Nauroin esim. sille kun Nemi kulkee myrtsinä, huomaa koiran irrallaan, halaa sitä ja tulee hyvin onnelliseksi ja toteaa että apteekista pitäisi voida vuokrata koiria. Ihan kuin minä! Ja nauroin itsekseni pitkän aikaa sille kun Nemi oli kirjoittanut ylös unensa ja aamulla herätessään pöllämystyneenä katsoo kirjoittamaansa lappua jossa lukee ”paprika”. Poikaystäväni hieman katsoi minua oudosti kun hihittelin täysillä vielä hampaita pestessänikin. Se tilanne oli jotenkin niin arkisen absurdin koominen.

Nämä alkupään stripit olivat useimmat ihan hyviä mutta vielä se on liian kömpelö jotta voisin enempää tähtiä antaa.

The same in my poor English:

I’ve read a few Nemi strip a long, long time ago. I thought they were OK and then forgot it until I bumped again into this comics on one Finnish book recommendation site couple weeks ago. I decided to read this from the beginning.

Happened as I thought would happen: these early strips are yet rough. I don’t even understand some of the panels. I was surprised that there isn’t much a goth in Nemi, instead she is more like a mix of metalhead and punk rocker based on these strips. I was positively surprised how multi-dimensional Nemi and the comics are. I liked the humour more than Nemi herself. Like I said earlier, I didn’t get some of the panels but most I did understood and some of them were very funny. For example I laughed when Nemi is so angry, then she sees a dog, hugs it and she becomes so happy and says that you should be able to rent a dog from a pharmacist’s. She’s just like me! And for a long time I giggled when Nemi had written down her dream and in the note which she read in the morning, was written a word ”paprika”. My boyfriend looked at me weirdly when I still giggled to it when I was washing my teeth at night. That situation was just so mundanely absurd and very comic.

These early strips were alright but still too clumsy that I can’t give more stars than I do now.

[Giancarlo Rogatis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Due parole: adoro Nemi.
Chi non vorrebbe un'amica come lei? Credo che tutti abbiamo bisogno di un'amica così, una persona folle, divertente, romantica, nerd (con un po' di cinismo e misantropia al punto giusto) che ci faccia uscire dal grigiore della vita reale nonostante lei vesta solo ed esclusivamente di nero. E credo che tutti e tutte ci siamo trovati almeno una volta nelle situazioni moleste, folli o bizzarre in cui spesso lei si ritrova.
Che dire... l'ho adorata ancora di più. Cercavo le strisce di Nemi tradotte in italiano da anni, da quando fecero chiudere la pagina di Facebook che le traduceva amatorialmente. E finalmente l'ho trovata.
C'è da dire che molte prendono in giro la cultura e la società norvegese di cui noi sappiamo ben poco e dunque, alcune strisce possono risultare incomprensibili o non divertenti. Però, per il resto, è stato uno spasso e spesso mi ci sono anche immedesimato, visto che molte situazioni sono identiche in ogni angolo del mondo.
Il mio preferito è stato "Carpe Noctem", un vero e proprio piccolo fumetto e non una striscia.
Spero di trovare anche il secondo volume e lo consiglio vivamente.

[Colin Murtagh · Rating 4 out of 5]

The great thing about unpacking old boxes of books, is every so often you come across something you have forgotten about which stops you and forces you to read instead.
This is the first volume of the collected strips of Nemi. Originally this was a Norwegian strip, however it did run in the Metro newspaper in the UK for a while, and some strips are amended to fit the change in country.
The strip revolves around Nemi, a goth style character. Happy to get involved in a fight, but too gentle to squish a spider. She hates being an Adult, and still has an imaginary friend. Of course her imaginary friend is Alice Copper. She feels cut off from society, a few strips show her as, for example, a cat while her company are all birds. She does come across as a paradox. She can be horrid to people she doesn't like, while being caring towards a school kid she's never met before.
I'm not sure I'd want to hang out with her in real life, but I love reading about her

[Matti Karjalainen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Norjalaisen Lise Myhren Nemi-sarjakuva huvitti 2000-luvun alkupuolella siinä mittakaavassa, että hyllyyni ehti kertyä myös albumi jos toinenkin. Ensimmäinen kovakantinen Nemi-kokoelma (Arktinen Banaani, 2005) esittelee sarjan mustavalkoiset varhaisvaiheet vuosilta 1997-2000. Strippien lisäksi mukana on muutama pitempi tarina. Lopputulos on sangen mainio, huomasin naurahtelevani ääneen aina silloin tällöin. Strippien aiheet pyörivät baareissa kännäämisen ja parinmuodostuksen ympärillä, mutta mukana on myös populaarikulttuurin suuntaan nyökkääviä vitsejä. Nemin hahmo on suunnilleen totutun kaltainen jo tässä vaiheessa, mutta sarjan muut henkilöhahmot eivät ole vielä löytäneet itseään. Piirrosjälki saattaa olla vielä hieman kömpelöä.

[Ezma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty enjoyable. Nemi's a fun character, goth, outspoken, and still a believer in a magical world. Relatable for us in a lot of ways. That said, the supporting cast around her is pretty bland in comparison. Her constant friend, Cyan, never really builds much of a personality besides being Nemi's friend. There's also a few too many strips in here that feel more made to be pinned up on a cubicle wall than to actually make you laugh, and some of the reliance on geek culture feels shallow. References to Highlander and Lord of the Rings don't pop the same way as when specific metal bands are named. The art is fun and expressive throughout. Liked it overall but probably wouldn't go out of our way to seek out additional volumes.

[Vegan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really like Nemi, her silliness, her enthusiasm for the things she likes and all her bad habits. The translation is the tricky part. Taking a Norwegian goth and putting her in London doesn't really work, the music and film references are rife and date it. But sometimes the humour is just wonky and I don't understand it! Still, it's superbly drawn and she's the most attractive and fun woman out there. I'll be continuing to read her.

[Rob · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's okay. If you wondered what Cathy would be like as a Emo girl [Nemi is supposed to be a Goth, but the music references here in get way too much radio play for that], this is it. I laughed a bit, but some of the jokes are either dated or just didn't click. Myhre's art has developed in subsequent years, but she says in the introduction that she was relatively inexperienced drawing human beings at the time. Like I said, just okay.

[Calcra · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the art style and the short comic strips. Some definitely aged poorly, there's some woman on woman hate which is like my least favorite thing. Plus some humor we left in the 00' years for a good reason. Most of it was short, sweet and enjoyable though. Had a good time, got through it quickly.

[Kirsty Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book !!! . Upon remembering reading the cartoon strips in the metro newspaper and how much I used to enjoy them . I went to look to find the cartoon and found this book . Fully enjoyed this slice of escapism and Nemi’s humour

[Enno · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the comic that made me learn Norwegian, and this book collects a lot of the strips from that period. Still holds up.

[Emma Valieu · Rating 2 out of 5]

Très déçue... j'adorais pourtant lire ses strips sur les réseaux sociaux... Je suis sans doute plus fan de la Nemi moderne plutôt que celle des débuts.

[Grim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolute Genious!!

[S.L. · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's Nemi, what more is there to say? Perfect in every way 🧡

[Emelie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hilarious! I love the Nemi comic!

[Josephine Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cute and well crafted series of comics.

[Katja]

Problematic. Has not aged well.

I remember enjoying it back in the day.

[Vix · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nemi's origins, the author hasn't completely grasped our favorite outcast's persona yet - but we're getting there quickly.