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The Girlfriend Trilogy #1
Fumlig: en roman
Fumlig är Jeffrey Browns kritikerrosade debut och den bitterljuva historien om ett ettårigt distansförhållande som sträcker sig över en halv kontinent. Jeffrey bor i Illinois och Theresa i Florida och trots avståndet kämpar de för att hålla kärleken vid liv. Men sakta men säkert börjar känslorna svalna. I Fumlig skildras på ett fullständigt ocyniskt sätt de små konflikter och små ögonblick av värme som utgör en kärleksrelation. Likt en tecknad popsång berättas historien genom utklipp ur Jeffrey och Theresas vardag, ritade i enkla och elegant naiva teckningar. Fumlig lämnar dig med minnena av smärtan och värmen från dina egna tidigare kärlekshistorier.
228 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
38 people are currently reading
4253 people want to read
About the author
Jeffrey Brown
189 books1,386 followersJeffrey Brown was born in 1975 in Grand Rapids, Michigan and grew up reading comic books with dreams of someday drawing them, only to abandon them and focus on becoming a 'fine artist.' While earning his MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Brown abandoned painting and began drawing comics with his first autobiographical book 'Clumsy' in 2001. Since then he's drawn a dozen books for publishers including TopShelf, Fantagraphics, Drawn & Quarterly, McSweeney's and Chronicle Books. Simon & Schuster published his latest graphic memoir 'Funny Misshapen Body.' In addition to directing an animated video for the band Death Cab For Cutie, Brown has had his work featured on NPR's 'This American Life' His art has been shown at galleries in New York, San Francisco, San Diego, Los Angeles and Paris. Jeffrey's work has also appeared in the Best American Comics series and received the Ignatz Award in 2003 for 'Outstanding Minicomic.'
He currently lives in Chicago with his wife Jennifer and their son Oscar.
He currently lives in Chicago with his wife Jennifer and their son Oscar.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 360 reviews
January 11, 2009
This book should come with the warning: Read this only if you have a lover and he/she is lying beside you (preferably holding you) or else you will feel like a tragic loser whose heart has just broken (again).
October 17, 2007
Yet more evidence that I have a heart of stone. The drawings are supposed to be movingly naive, but in fact they're just crap.
June 2, 2008
Jeffrey Brown's crude artistic style is certainly an acquired taste, and many may not get past his drawings. However, those willing to delve into his comics will find that his style coincides nicely with the intensely personal nature of his stories. Brown, in both his art and his writing, not only brings himself to a level at which the reader can relate to him (or even, perhaps, look down on him), but uses his unique storytelling style to offer what seems like a completely honest and exposed account of his relationship with, in this novel, a woman named Theresa.
The novel is dedicated to "everyone who has ever loved and lost," and Brown certainly doesn't hide much, either of the early thrill of meeting someone new or the devastation of losing that same someone to rather arbitrary factors of distance or simple boredom.
The relationship depicted here is one of young adults who have not yet fully left the nest--in a few scenes, Jeff and Theresa have sex in a hotel room adjoining the one in which Theresa's parents are staying--and the perspectives on relationships here are very much those of people in the early 20s. Some may find such a detailed reminder of the idiocy of young lovers grating, but there is no denying the openness and honesty of Brown's account. I found it rather charming and the characters somewhat pathetic, and Brown's artwork consistently underscores those aspects.
The novel is dedicated to "everyone who has ever loved and lost," and Brown certainly doesn't hide much, either of the early thrill of meeting someone new or the devastation of losing that same someone to rather arbitrary factors of distance or simple boredom.
The relationship depicted here is one of young adults who have not yet fully left the nest--in a few scenes, Jeff and Theresa have sex in a hotel room adjoining the one in which Theresa's parents are staying--and the perspectives on relationships here are very much those of people in the early 20s. Some may find such a detailed reminder of the idiocy of young lovers grating, but there is no denying the openness and honesty of Brown's account. I found it rather charming and the characters somewhat pathetic, and Brown's artwork consistently underscores those aspects.
March 26, 2015
Story about a couple who have sex. And more sex. And then some more sex. Sex in the shower. Sex at the beach. They have sex everywhere and all the time. It lost its novelty almost from the beginning. There is only so much sex you can see, especially when the illustrations suck and the two people involved could both use a good wax job. Both are too clingy and emotionally needy of each other. If you're looking for plot, there's not much of one. If you're looking for sex scenes, there's an overload of them. However, if you think it's of the sexy kind, wrong book.
February 4, 2010
Polarized between trite and pervy, this cartoon failed to touch on anything in between. It holds very little value outside of the prurient interest of cartoon figures fucking. Here, simple is no more than stupid.
July 8, 2013
Truly a horrible experience.
As an avid connoisseur of all things comics, I can safely state that this is one of the worst comics I've ever read. I would only recommend it to people as an example of how to make the most atrocious book ever created.
The art is poor and is uninteresting to look at. It doesn't even strike me as "intentionally lousy", but rather a series of sketches that had no effort put into it.
*minor spoilers*
Story-wise, it is also completely unengaging and cringe-worthy. It's a sappy tale of a young adult who falls in love, goes through the motions, and experiences heartbreak. This is a typical story and could have been captivating had it been told from anyone but the narrator(selfish manchild)'s perspective. When reading, I never set out to actively hate any character, but this "book" gave me endless reasons to constantly hate the "protagonist". I felt like it gave me no reason to feel sympathetic to his heartbreak and actually took pleasure in seeing him unhappy. That was my only enjoyment I derived from this book.
Steer clear of anyone who recommends this book because they either hate you or like seeing you waste your valuable time and resources.
As an avid connoisseur of all things comics, I can safely state that this is one of the worst comics I've ever read. I would only recommend it to people as an example of how to make the most atrocious book ever created.
The art is poor and is uninteresting to look at. It doesn't even strike me as "intentionally lousy", but rather a series of sketches that had no effort put into it.
*minor spoilers*
Story-wise, it is also completely unengaging and cringe-worthy. It's a sappy tale of a young adult who falls in love, goes through the motions, and experiences heartbreak. This is a typical story and could have been captivating had it been told from anyone but the narrator(selfish manchild)'s perspective. When reading, I never set out to actively hate any character, but this "book" gave me endless reasons to constantly hate the "protagonist". I felt like it gave me no reason to feel sympathetic to his heartbreak and actually took pleasure in seeing him unhappy. That was my only enjoyment I derived from this book.
Steer clear of anyone who recommends this book because they either hate you or like seeing you waste your valuable time and resources.
October 19, 2016
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
The Chicago Public Library recently entered a partnership with online content provider Hoopla, which among other things means I suddenly have access to thousands of old comic books I've never read before, including most of the back catalog of Top Shelf, Dark Horse and Boom! Studios. And this also includes the first three published books by adored indie artist Jeffrey Brown, his so-called "Ex-Girlfriend Trilogy," so I've decided to take them on once a month from now until Christmas.
Now, admittedly, I've already read Brown's charming series of recent books exploring the adventures of new dad Darth Vader and his precocious children Luke and Leia, so I know already that he eventually learns as a comics artist to write actual coherent gags and to develop a professional drawing style; because otherwise, I probably would've been just as offended by the sloppy amateurism of his first book, 2003's Clumsy, as so many other angry, angry reviewers here at Goodreads are. And they have every right to be that angry, because it seems almost a crime against humanity that a cartoonist this bad should have racked up such a huge amount of accolades and fans at the beginning of his career; because to be clear, not only are the vignettes in Clumsy (all of them concerning a long-distance girlfriend he seems to have had in...college?) these non-narrative little pointless slice-of-life pieces, but they're not even particularly interesting slices of that life, in many cases seeming to be just literally some random afternoon that Brown happened to pluck out of his memory where absolutely nothing happened and there's no interesting story to relate.
I have to admit, it makes for a maddening reading experience, and will inspire many to angrily shake their iPad and scream, "Jesus fucking Christ, Brown, won't you just write at least one goddamn story that I was actually glad I took the 60 seconds to read, for God's sake??!!" Thankfully, though, he seems to have finally gotten that message by here in the 2010s; so that will make it an interesting experience over the next few months to get caught up with all his books between then and now, and to see how this progression into actual readable comics displays itself over the course of fifteen years. I'll keep you apprised of the latest; but for now, I most decidedly do not recommend starting with this first book of his, which runs the risk of ruining your tolerance for him before you ever get even close to the good stuff.
The Chicago Public Library recently entered a partnership with online content provider Hoopla, which among other things means I suddenly have access to thousands of old comic books I've never read before, including most of the back catalog of Top Shelf, Dark Horse and Boom! Studios. And this also includes the first three published books by adored indie artist Jeffrey Brown, his so-called "Ex-Girlfriend Trilogy," so I've decided to take them on once a month from now until Christmas.
Now, admittedly, I've already read Brown's charming series of recent books exploring the adventures of new dad Darth Vader and his precocious children Luke and Leia, so I know already that he eventually learns as a comics artist to write actual coherent gags and to develop a professional drawing style; because otherwise, I probably would've been just as offended by the sloppy amateurism of his first book, 2003's Clumsy, as so many other angry, angry reviewers here at Goodreads are. And they have every right to be that angry, because it seems almost a crime against humanity that a cartoonist this bad should have racked up such a huge amount of accolades and fans at the beginning of his career; because to be clear, not only are the vignettes in Clumsy (all of them concerning a long-distance girlfriend he seems to have had in...college?) these non-narrative little pointless slice-of-life pieces, but they're not even particularly interesting slices of that life, in many cases seeming to be just literally some random afternoon that Brown happened to pluck out of his memory where absolutely nothing happened and there's no interesting story to relate.
I have to admit, it makes for a maddening reading experience, and will inspire many to angrily shake their iPad and scream, "Jesus fucking Christ, Brown, won't you just write at least one goddamn story that I was actually glad I took the 60 seconds to read, for God's sake??!!" Thankfully, though, he seems to have finally gotten that message by here in the 2010s; so that will make it an interesting experience over the next few months to get caught up with all his books between then and now, and to see how this progression into actual readable comics displays itself over the course of fifteen years. I'll keep you apprised of the latest; but for now, I most decidedly do not recommend starting with this first book of his, which runs the risk of ruining your tolerance for him before you ever get even close to the good stuff.
March 8, 2015
I just don't get it. Terribly drawn, terribly boring, terribly repetitive.
Take your long distance love story and shove it. I could not care less.
Take your long distance love story and shove it. I could not care less.
May 18, 2014
If there's High Church and Low Church for the graphics half of graphic novels, this book is the leaky shack of the First Antioch Free Will Baptist Church in BFE, Alabama. That's fine by me, I'm in this genre for the novel half, and I think I tend Low Church anyway.
The subject matter drew me in to reading this, as I enjoy reading about blossoming relationships going bad and sad, as one does. Melancholic Low Church then, sounds promising. But it's all really banal, there's little evidence of any insight into their personalities or relationship, and the breakup comes smack out of nowhere on about the last page. It's like the author had never heard of story arc.
Not really recommended.
The subject matter drew me in to reading this, as I enjoy reading about blossoming relationships going bad and sad, as one does. Melancholic Low Church then, sounds promising. But it's all really banal, there's little evidence of any insight into their personalities or relationship, and the breakup comes smack out of nowhere on about the last page. It's like the author had never heard of story arc.
Not really recommended.
June 9, 2007
I liked this book. The ending make me feel emotional.
A nice, calm book.
A nice, calm book.
December 3, 2013
Better than Brown's other sex obsessed story, Unlikely, I still couldn't shake the feeling that I'd want to break up with this guy at about, I dunno, page 15?
This should be required reading for most 14 year old boys as a primer on how NOT to act in a relationship: needy, clingy, mopey, passive-aggressive, co-dependent, Clumsy? Now I get it. I understand this is the story of his second relationship, but there's no insight that maturity might bring to some of the cringe worthy behavior. A little hindsight might have helped temper the total awkwardness.
I'm defintely a fan of loveable losers -- the Bukowskis, Clowes, Pekars, ect. But Brown just struck me as adolescent and 'emo' for lack of a better term. No universal messages about the human condition can be found here - just a lot of self pity.
The supremely amatuerish drawing doesn't help much either - maybe it would have been tolerable with a guest illustrator. Naw, the story still would make me cringe.
This should be required reading for most 14 year old boys as a primer on how NOT to act in a relationship: needy, clingy, mopey, passive-aggressive, co-dependent, Clumsy? Now I get it. I understand this is the story of his second relationship, but there's no insight that maturity might bring to some of the cringe worthy behavior. A little hindsight might have helped temper the total awkwardness.
I'm defintely a fan of loveable losers -- the Bukowskis, Clowes, Pekars, ect. But Brown just struck me as adolescent and 'emo' for lack of a better term. No universal messages about the human condition can be found here - just a lot of self pity.
The supremely amatuerish drawing doesn't help much either - maybe it would have been tolerable with a guest illustrator. Naw, the story still would make me cringe.
August 30, 2022
My review as a poem:
Jeff is happy
Jeff is sad
Jeff is boring
Jeff is bad
Jeff is clumsy
half the time
the other half
his dick gets sucked.
It was ok.
Jeff is happy
Jeff is sad
Jeff is boring
Jeff is bad
Jeff is clumsy
half the time
the other half
his dick gets sucked.
It was ok.
October 16, 2022
The dude in this comic is so childish and petulant, he reminds me of so many guys I dated in my twenties and also of some of the reasons I no longer date guys…
January 19, 2018
I stopped reading after approximately the first thirty pages. Maybe I am not the proper audience for this kind of comics (although I should be able to connect because of the topic of long distance relationships), but the personal story did not catch me and the comics, while basically the same cute as some others (like for example Sarah Andersen's work), they did not seem that well paced (or maybe it was something else, but they just did not feel right).
January 31, 2023
3,25/5
This book is a good read for anyone who has been in a romantic relationship, especially a long-distance one. Even Brown dedicated his book "for everyone who has ever loved and lost."
It was an eye-opener, to think that somebody could let themselves be open and write so honestly. Lots of it made me laugh and some bits were shocking, but mainly because it was information you would usually hide.
This book is a good read for anyone who has been in a romantic relationship, especially a long-distance one. Even Brown dedicated his book "for everyone who has ever loved and lost."
It was an eye-opener, to think that somebody could let themselves be open and write so honestly. Lots of it made me laugh and some bits were shocking, but mainly because it was information you would usually hide.
December 3, 2018
Clumsy is a VERY cute graphic novel depicting short little segments of moments of a new relationship between Theresa and Jeff. The idea of this book reminded me a lot of Little Moments of Love by Catana Chetwynd or Soppy by Philippa Rice. And I loved both of those books! The only thing I didn't like so much about this one is that I thought because the drawings were more sketch like drawings, and his handwriting was kind of chicken scratchy lol, it was kind of hard to read. Sometimes I never ended up figuring out what a word said, but I just moved on and kept reading! I thought the stories were adorable though, and I do think the simplicity of the art makes this, if anything, a better graphic novel because the book really is just showing everyday, mundane activities but all in all, are so important and memorable when it's with somebody you love! This was adorable. I'm very thankful for the recommendation from my sister Alex!
August 20, 2022
I read this in my late teens and viewed it as a display of vulnerability and loss... but reading it as a 26 year old, fully developed, adult found out in actuality it it's more of a pretentious and sex obsessed memoir of sorts lamenting over Brown's former partner: which, naturally, is all her fault with no self awareness on his own impact on their relationship. And don't get me wrong, I am no prude nor am I bothered by depictions of sexuality, but it comes across as stalker-esque when you've illustrated page after page of sex with an ex partner (whom you refer to by name throughout the entire book). The entire thing feels like a self indulgent pity party at the expense of another human being, and it's gross. In all fairness, I will give credit where credit is due and admit that to this day I do find the art style very humanizing and and tender... but tenderness doesn't do much to soften the blow of manic-pixie-dream-girl-misogyny.
August 10, 2016
Not dreadful. Maybe Brown has given us an accurate picture of young love. It reminded me quite a bit of my own first serious "relationship." Even so, i was not entertained in any way except for a couple vignettes that were surprisingly sexy despite their surface ugliness. I can't appreciate the drawings until somebody teaches me how. A cover blurb by Robert Kochalka (i think) says something like the frailty of Brown's lines perfectly represents the frailty of love. I would say instead that the emptiness of every figure perfectly represents the hollowness of immature love. Is this just a case of me seeing the glass as half empty and Kochalka seeing it half full?
September 11, 2015
The illustrations are by no means beautiful in the traditional sense, but beautiful because they are so artless and lack technique (or maybe that is his technique), which was deliberate, and it adds to the charm and authenticity of the book. I was amused, I felt awkward (Jeffrey Brown doesn't shy away from drawing unattractive people doing unattractive things; hairy legs, flabby middles and all). His honesty is very brave, and I enjoyed this book a lot. I would've laughed if I weren't at the bookstore (so I just bought it to read it at home). It doesn't try too hard and isn't very sentimental, which I love. For that, it gets 4 stars from me.
January 17, 2016
This is pretty much a diary without the incognizant revelation. Lots of tiny scenes depicting a young couple having such a true-to-life relationship that there's no real narrative or development. They go out to eat and have sex and can't sleep and on and on.
The characters are so one-dimensional that their eventual, hard-telegraphed breakup left me feeling cold, like they were strangers. Jeff is kind of a normal sad boy and Theresa is just a fairly standard girl. That's about all we get. Their relationship is hard because of distance and health and age. The art can't help develop the characters because it's so rough that subtlety is impossible.
This book is human to a fault.
The characters are so one-dimensional that their eventual, hard-telegraphed breakup left me feeling cold, like they were strangers. Jeff is kind of a normal sad boy and Theresa is just a fairly standard girl. That's about all we get. Their relationship is hard because of distance and health and age. The art can't help develop the characters because it's so rough that subtlety is impossible.
This book is human to a fault.
February 22, 2008
Clumsy is baldly intimate in a way that should be embarassing, but somehow isn't. It's the autobiographical story of a long-distance relationship, told in comic-style vignettes. Brown's artwork is both crude and nuanced; sometimes his drawings are barely better than stick figures, but their body language and faces are expressive nonetheless. He captures the bittersweetness of a failed relationship perfectly; I think everyone who reads this book finds something in it that is intensely familiar.
March 3, 2015
A bit more than 200 hundred pages detailing a relationship in all its bland, trite drama. He has low selfesteem and is a pathetic worm, and she has slightly higher selfesteem and eventually frees herself from his clammy wormy wrap, hence the extent of the drama. The scenes intend to caress the heart's emotion bone came off as vapid sentimentality, so obvious that the flutter in the chest bespoke disgust rather than sympathy. And while Brown's style is intentionally crude, I cannot help but see a (causal-?) correlation between his infantile graphics and his immature shmaltz.
February 14, 2009
What started out as really cute turned into a nightmarishly whiny and complainy bitch-fest! Yes, even I could sympathize or even see myself in some of the stories herein (granted it was a much younger me that was so needy and worrisome); and yet, even I was never as bad as Brown seems to have been. And Theresa, his girlfriend through the book, isn't without blame herself - putting up with his shit and also adding a bit of her own selfishness from time to time. Such is life, I suppose.
May 25, 2017
It was confusing at first with all of the jumping around, but as soon as you get to know Jeff and Theresa you'll understand their little love story. If I could rename the novel I'd call it Distance or Far not Clumsy. I didn't feel like anyone was clumsy, but they were cute and honest and I guess I rooted for them.
July 21, 2014
*Spoiler Alert*. So is it really terrible that I was really happy when the whiny, clingy, insecure, and completely immature lead finally got dumped?
June 14, 2016
Overall crappy. Terrible, terrible drawing.
How did this get printed in the first place?
ugh!
How did this get printed in the first place?
ugh!
March 25, 2021
N.B.: For Mature Audiences
Clumsy is a graphic novel written and illustrated by Jeffrey Brown. It is an autobiographical graphic novel of Brown's exploration of his first relationship – a long-distance one. It is the first book in The Girlfriend Trilogy.
Jeffrey Brown is a cartoonist born in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Brown explores the relationship with his first girlfriend – a bittersweet story of a year-long, long distance relationship. It is a reflective story of a failed relationship and has copious sex in between, which makes the narrative a tad repetitive.
Clumsy is written and constructed rather unsatisfactory. The book is constructed as a composition of several different vignettes that are more like snapshots of this relationship rather than a chronological narrative, which could be confusing at times. Brown pretty much doesn't hold back – he lets you see the good and the bad of both himself and his partners. The artwork in this book is very simple, scratchy and unrefined, but charming nevertheless.
All in all, Clumsy is written and constructed rather unsatisfactory and is a worrisome beginning to what would hopefully be a wonderful series, which I plan to continue in the very near future.
Clumsy is a graphic novel written and illustrated by Jeffrey Brown. It is an autobiographical graphic novel of Brown's exploration of his first relationship – a long-distance one. It is the first book in The Girlfriend Trilogy.
Jeffrey Brown is a cartoonist born in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Brown explores the relationship with his first girlfriend – a bittersweet story of a year-long, long distance relationship. It is a reflective story of a failed relationship and has copious sex in between, which makes the narrative a tad repetitive.
Clumsy is written and constructed rather unsatisfactory. The book is constructed as a composition of several different vignettes that are more like snapshots of this relationship rather than a chronological narrative, which could be confusing at times. Brown pretty much doesn't hold back – he lets you see the good and the bad of both himself and his partners. The artwork in this book is very simple, scratchy and unrefined, but charming nevertheless.
All in all, Clumsy is written and constructed rather unsatisfactory and is a worrisome beginning to what would hopefully be a wonderful series, which I plan to continue in the very near future.
May 15, 2021
These appear to be the worst drawings in history for a published graphic novel — arms look like scarves or linguini and the fingers, when there are any, look like the frayed ends of scarves. But as you spend more time with these 6-panel, 1- to 3-page vignettes, you can see that the crude drawings mask technique, as when one of his girlfriends dunks herself under the water while taking a bath and you see the surface ripples and her body beneath.
As for the stories here, they felt very Zen. Each is a moment in time capturing the giddiness, sorrow, awkwardness, self-pity, humor, and joi de vivre of young relationships. In this case, they depict events that occurred between July 3, 2000 and June 27, 2001 when Jeff meets and dates Theresa. I became addicted to these and am glad there are two more volumes in "The Girlfriend Trilogy."
As for the stories here, they felt very Zen. Each is a moment in time capturing the giddiness, sorrow, awkwardness, self-pity, humor, and joi de vivre of young relationships. In this case, they depict events that occurred between July 3, 2000 and June 27, 2001 when Jeff meets and dates Theresa. I became addicted to these and am glad there are two more volumes in "The Girlfriend Trilogy."
December 15, 2021
There's something sweet about this as it's his Uni project and I know the full background of it... but honestly can't find anything that interesting about Jeffrey Brown as a autobiographical protagonist. I really tried and can see the merit of what he's doing, and it's quite sweet but for whatever reason it doesn't really chime with me.
August 10, 2022
[updated]
after reading people's very harsh reviews of this comic, i started to like it more than i thought.
implying that Brown's repetitive depiction of sex is "crude" or "pervy" is frankly rich coming from people I assume, perhaps naively, have had sex before.
the art style may not be for everyone but it is the readers own fault if they choose to turn a blind eye to the sweet and real insight into the relationship between Jeffrey and Theresa.
after reading people's very harsh reviews of this comic, i started to like it more than i thought.
implying that Brown's repetitive depiction of sex is "crude" or "pervy" is frankly rich coming from people I assume, perhaps naively, have had sex before.
the art style may not be for everyone but it is the readers own fault if they choose to turn a blind eye to the sweet and real insight into the relationship between Jeffrey and Theresa.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 360 reviews