Many years ago, cartoonist Chad Carpenter had just a few syndicated clients. One of them was my then-employer, the Anchorage Daily News, so I actually know the guy. (Well, if “know” is the same as “I used to bug the crap out of him every chance I got.”) These days his daily strip is syndicated in just over 500 newspapers and other publications, mostly in the United States and Canada but in some other countries as well.
At first I wondered how some of the humor would translate to, say, a Norwegian or Jamaican audience. Then again, I guess jokes about outhouses, snowmen and the Grim Reaper are pretty universal.
Which is why I’m putting another Carpenter collection up for grabs — who wouldn’t snicker at a drawing of people being forced to wear life jackets while heading across the River Styx?
