B: A Year in Plagues and Pencils

by Edward Carey

Author and illustrator Edward Carey presents a paean to connection at a time of a year of daily lockdown drawings posted on social media from his home in Texas.In March 2020, as lockdowns were imposed around the world, author and illustrator Edward Carey published a sketch on social media with a plan to keep posting a drawing a day from his family home in Austin, Texas, until life returned to normal. One hundred and fifty pencil stubs later, he was still drawing.Carey's hand moved with world events, chronicling pandemic and politics. It reached into the past, taking inspiration from history, and escaped grim reality through flights of vivid imagination and studies of the natural world. The drawings became a way of charting time, of moving forward, and maintaining connection at a time of isolation.This remarkable collection of words and drawings from the acclaimed author of Little and The Swallowed Man charts a tumultuous year in pencil, finding beauty amid the horror of extraordinary times.

Genres: Nonfiction, Art

237 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 7, 2025

About the author

Edward Carey is a writer and illustrator who was born in North Walsham, Norfolk, England, during an April snowstorm. Like his father and his grandfather, both officers in the Royal Navy, he attended Pangbourne Nautical College, where the closest he came to following his family calling was playing Captain Andy in the school’s production of Showboat. Afterwards he joined the National Youth Theatre and studied drama at Hull University.

He has written plays for the National Theatre of Romania and the Vilnius Small State Theatre, Lithuania. In England his plays and adaptations have been performed at the Young Vic Studio, the Battersea Arts Centre, and the Royal Opera House Studio. He has collaborated on a shadow puppet production of Macbeth in Malaysia, and with the Faulty Optic Theatre of Puppets.

He is also the author of the novels Observatory Mansions and Alva and Irva: the Twins Who Saved a City, which have been translated into thirteen different languages, and both of which he illustrated. He always draws the characters he writes about, but often the illustrations contradict the writing and vice versa and getting both to agree with each other takes him far too long. He has taught creative writing and fairy tales on numerous occasions at the Writers Workshop at the University of Iowa, and at the Michener Center and the English Department at the University of Texas at Austin.

He has lived in England, France, Romania, Lithuania, Germany, Ireland, Denmark, and the United States. He currently lives in Austin, Texas, which is not near the sea.

Reviews

[Jenny Lawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

365 drawings...one for every day Edward Carey experienced through the pandemic. A strange and unique sort of diary.

[Kerri · Rating 5 out of 5]

✏️
This was incredibly enjoyable - I especially loved seeing the literary characters and historical figures. Some of the politicians (usually from the US) were of less appeal as I usually had to Google who they were, and didn't often understand the references - - however the art itself was still good.

The animals were a highlight, especially the hedgehog, which I am always drawn to, a sleeping dormouse, and the giant Texan centipede.

For Day 149 I confidently identified the subject as Anderson Cooper, only to read the caption and realise it is Steve Martin. What makes my incorrect assumption odd is I am much more familiar with Martin than I am Cooper!

The famous faces I was most pleased to see (and correctly identify) were: Tom Waits, Jim Henson, Sylvia Plath, Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, Hayao Miyazaki, Bram Stoker and the Brothers Grimm,as well as Charles Dickens Shakespeare, Daniel Defoe, various Brontes, Mervyn Peake, Angela Carter and many iconic characters: Mr Brumble, King Lear, Fiver from Watership Down and Bilbo Baggins from The Hobbit.

Perhaps most relevant for a collection of pandemic sketches: Day 22 - A Plague Doctor and Day 65 - Miss Havisham from Great Expectations, who 'knew how to stay at home'!

My only real quibble is why not include the 500 drawings the artist did, rather than the one year? I get that the "a year" is in the title, but it would have nice to have the entire collection, so to speak, the Complete Project.

I have two novels by the author that I am looking forward to reading relatively soon, and this book led me to believe I will probably enjoy them.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was a huge fan of Edward Carey’s Little. His black-and-white sketches kept turning up on my Twitter timeline throughout 2020. He sent the first, “A determined young man,” into the world on March 19, 2020, vowing to make a drawing a day until the pandemic was over. Perhaps a rash thing to agree to, and at times he regretted it, but he kept his promise for 500 days and wore out many a B pencil in the process.

This book covers the first 365 days of the project and also provides a rough recap of the turbulent year that was 2020. Carey’s subjects include politicians (his leanings are clear from his unflattering caricatures of Trump and other Republicans), writers, actors, birds and family members. Some were by request; others marked a public figure’s death. You can track the vaccine’s progress and outrage over the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other victims of institutional racism. As an Englishman in Texas, Carey feels he doesn’t understand the country he lives in (though he loves its wildlife) and finds himself missing London.

Carey’s style veers towards the grotesque, so is best suited to fictional characters and those with distinctive features. I particularly liked a drawing of Rudy Guiliani dripping hair dye, the two-part spread of Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve versus Christmas Day, and a farewell to 2020 as a wizened ogre opposite a hello to 2021 as a cheerful baby. I was also delighted to see a drawing of W.N.P. Barbellion to mark the inaugural Barbellion Prize. In general, though, I doubt the value of simple reproductions of well-known paintings and photographs. If the goal was lifelike versions of real people, some of these miss the mark; the features are simply off. And Carey is not always great at rendering non-white people.

The pleasure of this collection is in seeing the variety from one page to the next: a laughing Albert Einstein, William Shakespeare, a capybara, and so on. There are one to four of the drawings printed per page, with short reflections from Carey interspersed between sections. In these mini-essays he talks about his process, where he got his ideas, and lockdown life with his family (his wife is author Elizabeth McCracken; they have two children and a cat).

One day noses will be permissible again. And then there will be mouths, too. And chins, likewise, shall be popular. … I’m forgetting faces. I miss people, of course, terribly. Yet every day out of the window there are still people there. I see these individuals walking up and down the street. Can’t see their faces. Only their eyes and the top of their heads. Like a new breed of human, with no nose, no mouth, no chin. Who are they? Don’t get too close. Everyone’s keeping their distance.

The drawings were a way of marking time, so the book serves as a time capsule of sorts. The text is perhaps an afterthought, and yet the random assemblage of illustrations couldn’t stand without it (I tried to imagine them filling an exhibit, but extensive captioning would be required). I feel a bit uncharitable for criticizing the artwork, given the constraints and the fact that I couldn’t produce even one sketch of nearly this quality. This was a perfectly pleasant and quick read, just not one that will stay with me. I think the same is true of a number of the other Covid diaries I’ve read: they feel ephemeral. However, it’s an attractive small-format hardback that should make it into many a Christmas stocking this year.

Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.

[Karen Mace · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a fascinating, absorbing and beautiful way of looking back at a year in lockdown. All through the eyes and stunning pencil drawings of the Author, as he began a project in March 2020 to draw a picture a day and upload it to social media until the madness of Covid left us.... he soon found the project carried on a lot longer than he had planned!

But having that distraction helped him cope, and the fact that many people online would eagerly anticipate the daily drawings kept him going and it is wonderful to see them all together here in this beautiful book! The words too strike a chord with his reflections on a very weird time in our history - his hopes and fears for the future mirroring our own! And how the simple action of committing to this project to begin with helped him cope with the uncertainty that each day brought.


A lesson to us all really in finding something to distract ourselves and giving ourselves a different focus each day. I do something similar with photographs on Blipfoto, and just having that outlet each day is a great way of dealing with life and all it throws our way! And it's a wonderful way to look back over a period of time, as with these wonderful drawings that Edward Carey has put together. It reflects his mood on each day, those in the news, various historical figures,animals and memories and the attention to detail is so intricate and captivating.

I loved his honesty and frankness in the journalling side of this project. His yearnings to return home to London, and his experiences of lockdown in Texas and it just made for a wonderfully extraordinary piece of work for a year none of us will ever forget!

My thanks to the team at Gallic Press for a copy of the book in return for a fair and honest review.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A diary in pencil (Tombow Bs) sketches of the first year of the pandemic. Amazing portraits of writers, celebrities, politicians, news figures, birds, animals, self portraits and the artist's family.

[Linda Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

A series of illustrations completed during the Covid pandemic.

Before I begin my review proper, I’d just like to comment on the lovely physical quality of B: A Year in Plague and Pencils as it is the perfect size for holding in the hand and the hardbacked version I have is so robust and elegant that it would make a superb gift.

I confess I hadn’t even got to the foreword by Max Porter before I was captivated by B: A Year in Plague and Pencils. The dedication in the front and the Shakespearean quotation at the beginning felt so apt and so attuned to what we’ve all been experiencing that I felt an instant emotional connection. Add in the superb eloquence of Max Porter in introducing Edward Carey’s work and B: A Year in Plague and Pencils feels less like a book of illustrations and more like the recreation of human connection. I loved it.

Edward Carey’s commentary on his drawings is wonderful. He manages to articulate exactly how so many of us have felt in recent times, whilst providing us with the escapism he knows we have all missed. His own sense of displacement, marooned in Texas but yearning for the UK, feels utterly identifiable making B: A Year in Plague and Pencils a microcosm of the pandemic world. However, at the same time, the book affords the reader the opportunity to meet new people, recall forgotten memories and to travel through time and space vicariously. Edward Carey’s illustrations led me to research the unfamiliar, so that the book has an existence beyond its pages that adds value to the reading. And, indeed there is reading as well as the visual delights to be found in B: A Year in Plague and Pencils so that I finished the book feeling as if I’d been introduced to a new friend and that I had been given a privileged insight into Edward Carey’s personal life.

There’s incredible variety in the illustrations from my favourite poet John Donne to a tardigrade so that absolutely anyone of any age picking up B: A Year in Plague and Pencils will find a connection, a relevance and something they can relate to. The progression (or should that be decline) of ‘A determined young man’ throughout the book is so good. But then so are all the illustrations covering categories from art to nature, literature to history, making this boom an absolute joy. It’s fascinating, sometimes disturbing, but always totally absorbing and entertaining. As someone who has no artistic talent whatsoever, I found myself in awe of the way Edward Carey depicted everything from the instantly recognisable hair of Albert Einstein to the scales on a pangolin.

B: A Year in Plague and Pencils is a book that immortalises perhaps the most challenging year in modern history, but it does so with humanity, respect and an intensity of emotion in the illustrations that have given me limitless respect for Edward Carey. I loved B: A Year in Plague and Pencils.

[Claire (Silver Linings and Pages) · Rating 4 out of 5]

B: A Year in Plagues and Pencils is a little gem of a book, and if you enjoyed Edward Carey’s award winning novel, Little, you’re bound to appreciate this.

When the pandemic hit in March 2020 and much of the world went into lockdown, the artist and author posted a sketch on Twitter. Thinking - like many of us - that lockdown would be over after a few weeks, he committed to doing this daily. It was his way of practicing self care in creatively channelling his deep worries and fears, and it became a powerful journal of social commentary. From George Floyd and Breanna Taylor, to plague doctors to stags and swallows and Stone Henge, his subjects are diverse and pertinent.

My favourite illustration is a vibrant Anne Frank, but I also love how Charlotte Brontë and Medusa appear on the same page! Edward Carey is a sensitive, eccentric and compassionate writer who eloquently expresses introspective, pandemic thoughts that resonate with me, but ultimately delivers hope.

“Certainly I saw it. A naked nose. I was collecting groceries and the msn who was delivering them had an I’ll-fitting mask that kept slipping down. Put that nose away. I winced each time I saw it. I told him I could see his nose and he apologised for nose-flashing and quickly put his nose away. But soon the mask slipped and there it was again: a nose. I mustn’t see your nose. Noses are forbidden. One day there will be noses outside again, but for now noses are private. It troubled me to see this young man’s nose. It disturbed me. One day noses will be permissible again. And then there will be mouths, too. And chins, likewise shall be popular.”

Thank you Gallic books for the PR review copy of this charming book.

[Corey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is full of marvels. It came about this way: Edward Carey vowed to do a drawing a day for as long as the pandemic lasted, and post each drawing to his Twitter account. What emerged from his isolation and despair, and fear that the world had been lost, is actually a preservation of that world. Pencil sketches of famous people, fictional people, animals, fantastical creatures—the book is chockful of a rich miscellany. The drawings are often whimsical, often dark, always finely observed and sometimes they recall the best and worst moments of the past three years. And the book’s anodyne effect on readers who lived through the shut-down is remarkable, or was, at least, for this reader. I was comforted by Carey’s honesty, vulnerability, humaneness, and keen vision. Edward Carey has always been one of my favorite writers (if you haven’t read ‘Little,’ or ‘Observatory Mansions,’ do yourself a favor and get them) and now is one of my favorite artists. Weary of the bad news that makes it seem like the world has gone mad? This might be the antidote. Plagues and Pencils is a treasure.

[Janina · Rating 5 out of 5]

AH I LOVED THIS VERY MUCH. Read in one sitting. I adore Carey's writing style and his drawing style; they have a similar tone and atmosphere. Strange but lovely, unique and a bit bizarre. Such a good archive of the first pandemic year. A second homerun for me, after The Swallowed Man. I will definitely buy another one of his soon. I love the way his work makes me feel and hope it continues onwards in his other works. So great! <3

tw/cw: pandemic, illness, death, politics, war, police brutality, death, murder, racism, discrimination

[Rik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Purchased primarily due to the sketches, the writing was a pleasant surprise. Poignant, personable and often quite amusing, it was just the right amount to break up the multitude of pencil drawings (or maybe the drawings were there to intersperse the writing?) Either way, enjoyable, though probably best enjoyed before too much time has passed.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

A small thing of wonder, this book.

[Emi Yoshida · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know how it happened but I suddenly realized I have accumulated about 5 books by Edward Carey, and hadn't finished reading any of them. I have been trying to read Alva & Irva for many months and had come to the sad realization that I don't much like his fiction. But then I was given B: A Year in Plagues and Pencils and tore through it, happily! Carey is an incredibly talented illustrator, I love the drawings on their own, but the way he describes his choices for the day's subject is fascinating and I love this collection of flora, fauna, and figureheads of literature, politics, fantasy et al. I also loved reading about Carey's bicultural family and cringe imagining them settling in Texas. I feel like I came for the pictures, but left with a fondness for his words as well. I'll set Alva & Irva aside for now and give Little a chance next.

[Joanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed leafing through this book and I do feel that it is a book which needs to be enjoyed in its physical form. In the pieces of writing interspersed throughout the book, the author refers to his illustrations by number and it makes sense to be able to turn to the relevant drawing at the appropriate point.

There is almost a strange sense of nostalgia when reading this book, looking back at what has happened over the part 20 months or so. Although, as the author acknowledges, it most certainly is not over. Many of the drawings will evoke memories, such as the goats in a Welsh town or the everyday wildlife which so many people rediscovered during their short walks outside. The literary heroes of lockdown made me laugh such as Lady MacBeth, “who knew how to keep her hands clean”. There’s a common lived experience which will resonate with many of us. A few of the drawings bring a lump to the throat as we remember the passing of notable figures such as Captain Tom Moore, Olivia de Havilland, Christopher Plummer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Other significant events are marked such as Joe Biden’s election, the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, a winter storm in Texas, the impeachment of Donald Trump.

This book is an unusual way of chronicling a most remarkable time in our recent history. When Edward Carey casually said he’d do a drawing each day until this was all over, he would have had no idea of just how many drawings that would mean! Or how many of his beloved Tombow B pencils – the Goldilocks pencils – he would go through. The illustrations are excellent and many inspired me to go and find out more about the person or creature depicted. The writing was equally compelling and though I have to confess that I haven’t read anything by this author before, I now intend to rectify that.

B: A Year In Plagues & Pencils is a unique book which will be relatable to so many people. I certainly appreciated the talent of the author both with his words and his illustrations. The hardback edition of the book would make a beautiful addition to any book shelf as a Christmas gift but you may just want to buy an extra copy and savour it yourself.

[Susannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

In March 2020 Edward Carey said he would draw a picture everyday and posted them on social media, he drew for 500 days and this is a book of the first 365 days. I really loved reading thins and looking at all of the brilliant drawings, Carey is very talented. Max Porter has written and brilliant introduction and the drawings are interspersed with reflections of Carey’s experience of lockdown and provide an insight into why he decided to draw certain things in certain days, some were requested and some were based on current affairs, some are people who in the past had lived in some kind of lockdown or solitude and some plague related drawings. These are so detailed they are a joy to look at. I would highly recommend this. I especially liked how the determined young man becomes more disheveled looking with each time he is drawn.

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here we are somewhere in the 5-years-later times. 5 years after the plague. 5 years since the covid lockdown. I had followed Carey on Twitter as he created these drawings. I'm glad I picked up this published collection afterwards. I did set it aside until now on purpose. I wasn't ready when it was all too fresh, and I was celebrating release and return to normal. I appreciated both the drawings and his words today. I shall keep this to be revisited again. It is good to remember.

[Rosanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Drawings were impeccable. Attitude horrible and judgemental.

Concept and drawings - 4/5.

Attitude, judging others - 2/5 (examples - "idiots in maga hats", & "a moron (wearing a mask) on the day Texas governor ended the statewide mask mandate).

Gave the book a total of 3/5.

[Bookmarkthatuk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review to follow.

[Madeline · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have enjoyed Edward Carey’s stories and drawings for many years.

This non-fiction Pencil journal is just a copy of his private drawings during the pandemic.

[Lone Star Literary Life]

Chris Manno for Lone Star Literary Life

[Tracy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A year of daily sketches, wow was this the book for me! I love the drawings and the essays of year 1 of the pandemic. So glad he published this.

[Charline · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best Covid year book I have read so far. Light reading with simple but fun pencil drawings.

[James Flynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a nice little book of drawings that is somewhat ruined by the fact that the author felt a need to inject his political opinions into it.

The drawings are from 2020-2021 when the author was stuck indoors during the Covid lockdown, and that was, admittedly, quite a political time, but I still think that the political slant was unneccessary.

Putting that aside, the drawings are pretty good and Edward Carey is certainly a talented writer. I'm currently reading Observatory Mansions for the second time, the book which led me onto this book.

[Gos · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would give this 6 stars if I could. Absolutely amazing.

[Lisa of Hopewell]

I learned of this book via this post: https://fromfirstpagetolast.com/2022/...