Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life

I want to heap a ridiculous amount of praise on the little cartoon book to the right. "Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life" is the first volume of a proposed six volume series by Canadian author/illustrator Bryan Lee O'Malley, and it's great.

Rather than describe the series myself, I'll let Scott Pilgrim tell you about it:

"My name is Scott Pilgrim and I am Awesome!

I am the Hero of a Book! A Series of books, in fact. I'm 23 years old, I'm in a band (we're not very good though), I'm "between jobs", and I've been having girl troubles lately! See, I have this unfortunate tendency to get into fights. Not like the kind where you yell and scream and throw dishes or whatever. More like Street Fighter, I guess.

But hey! I'm pretty easygoing. I keep busy, and my friends keep me in check. I figure my life isn't really that interesting. It's just a couple little battles with my new girlfriend's Seven Evil Ex-Boyfriends. And maybe some other people are starting to get in on the action too. So what? Doesn't this stuff happen to everyone?"

Initially, I was put off by the manga style, but it turns out to be totally appropriate, and completely endearing. Scott is a great everyman type character, the jokes are laugh out loud funny, and the situations are over-the-top while still seeming totally normal.

I've seriously never read anything like this book. I liked it so much, I actually read it twice in a row last night.

Anyway, lucky you, after many delays, the second volume ("Scott Pilgrim vs. The World") has just been released. I haven't cracked it yet, but do yourself a favor, and pick up both volumes today.

Amazon has both volumes for $19. And go to ScottPilgrim.com for more info.