Cover image for Menopause: A Comic Treatment Edited by MK Czerwiec

Menopause

A Comic Treatment

Edited by MK Czerwiec

Winner of the 2021 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards for Best Anthology and Best Short Story

A Booklist 2020 Best Graphic Novel for Adults

A New York Times Best Graphic Novel of 2020

“Playful and enjoyable indeed, as well as moving, affirming, and solidarity-sparking.”

buy

144 pages
8" × 10"
2021

Hot flashes. Vaginal atrophy. Social stigma. The comics in this unapologetic anthology prove that when it comes to menopause and its attendant symptoms, no one needs to sweat it alone.

Featuring works by comics luminaries such as Lynda Barry, Joyce Farmer, Ellen Forney, and Carol Tyler, Menopause is the perfect antidote to the simplistic, cheap-joke approach that treats menopause as a cultural taboo. This anthology challenges stereotypes with perspectives from a range of life experiences, ages, gender identities, ethnicities, and health conditions.

Other contributors include Maureen Burdock, Jennifer Camper, KC Councilor, MK Czerwiec, Leslie Ewing, Ann M. Fox, Keet Geniza, Roberta Gregory, Teva Harrison, Rachael House, Leah Jones, Monica Lalanda, Cathy Leamy, Ajuan Mance, Jessica Moran, Mimi Pond, Sharon Rosenzweig, Joyce Schachter, Susan Merrill Squier, Emily Steinberg, Nicola Streeten, A. K. Summers, Kimiko Tobimatsu, Shelley L. Wall, and Dana Walrath.

“Playful and enjoyable indeed, as well as moving, affirming, and solidarity-sparking.”
“Often informative, sometimes moving, and ambitious in its frank talk about what is oddly taboo: an inevitable experience for half of humanity.”
“The cartoons in Menopause: A Comic Treatment depict what is generally considered an unbecoming, if not humiliating, life event. This collection, edited by M.K. Czerwiec, joins the Graphic Medicine Series (Escaping Wars and Waves) in treating a complex topic with candor and creativity. Twenty-five comics represent diverse women and their experiences, in drawing styles as distinctive as the artists.”
“Shattering the silence and secrecy surrounding the ‘big change,’ Menopause: A Comic Treatment offers an unflinching look at an often stigmatized or taboo topic.”
“This is a new and unique offering for those interested in a humorous look at menopause transition. It serves as a sociocultural prism through which to view menopause and to see its diverse presentations and influences.”

MK Czerwiec is a nurse, cartoonist, educator, and co-founder of the field of Graphic Medicine. She is the creator of Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371 and a co-author of Graphic Medicine Manifesto. MK is also the comics editor for the journal Literature & Medicine. MK regularly teaches graphic medicine at Northwestern University’s Feinberg Medical School and the University of Chicago. She has served as a Senior Fellow of the George Washington School of Nursing Center for Health Policy and Media Engagement as well as a Will Eisner Fellow in Applied Cartooning at the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vermont. You can see more of her work at her website, www.comicnurse.com.