Skip to product information
1 of 3

The Joy of Quiting

The Joy of Quiting

Regular price €25,00 EUR
Regular price Sale price €25,00 EUR
Sale Sold out
Tax included.

By Keiler Roberts. Published by Drawn & Quarterly.

Softcover, 264 pages, Colour, 2022. 

From toddler antics to doctor appointments, Keiler Roberts breathes humour and life into the fleeting present

Keiler Roberts affirms her status as one of the best autobiographical cartoonists working today with The Joy of Quitting, a work encompassing 8 years of hilarious moments in the author’s life, mined from the universal. It spans her frantic child-rearing, misfires in the workplace, and frustrating experiences with the medical system.

In one strip, the author and her daughter Xia have itchy scalps. Roberts asks her husband to check her hair and all she gets is the cursory remark that he just sees “a bunch of bugs.” In another, Xia describes her oddly shaped poop in precise detail. We then see Xia sitting at the breakfast table telling the family that she recently learned the word “nuisance” and everyone agrees it’s a good word for her to know. As Xia grows from toddler to big kid, the family evolves and its dynamics shift in subtle ways, changes that pass all too suddenly in real life captured forever with Roberts’s keen observational humour.

The Joy of Quitting is Roberts’ magnum opus of domestic comedy, highlighting how she continues to work within and expand the rich tradition of autobiographical comics. Again and again, Roberts shows us that most meaningful moments or gestures often don’t have any meaning at all.

Guardian Best Graphic Novels of 2022
New Yorker Best Books of 2022

"A diary in comics form, Roberts’s book collects snippets from eight years of her daily life, capturing exasperating and hysterical moments of mothering, friendship and more."—New York Times

"Anyone who’s squinted doubtfully at a parenting manual will relish The Joy of Quitting by Keiler Roberts, which skewers family life with merciless and very funny directness."—Guardian Best Graphic Novels of 2022

"Little is off-limits here as Roberts (literally, visually) bares all, certain to induce welcome nods of utter understanding from many readers."—Shelf Awareness

“I love the way… Keiler Roberts use[s] diary comics to endow small, throwaway moments with the dignity and weight of larger ones.”—Liana Finck, The New York Times

“Her work gives off a kind of radical stillness. It always lowers my blood pressure... Keiler Roberts is my new hero.”—Christopher Borrelli, The Chicago Tribune

“The Joy of Quitting is Roberts’ magnum opus of domestic comedy[...]she continues to work within and expand the rich tradition of autobiographical comics.”—Dean Simons, Comics Beat

View full details