Cherise the Niece

If you cherish Edward Gorey, Charles Addams, and Tim Burton and have a bent for black humor, then Jim Benton is your man. His new collection of prose illustrated gore and more is in the tradition of  Edward Gorey?s The Gashlycrumb Tinies. These cleverly rhymed lines of wit is not exactly for kids under 14, and some adults will squirm.  These books are all in jest as are the previous insperation works of past cartoonists.  It’s great to see that Jim Benton is carrying the torch of a genre that teeters on the edge of horror and comedy.

 

She was orphaned quite young In a mysterious way, Her parents just up and vanished one day.

The bloody footprints leading out of Cherise?s bedroom are the first clue that perhaps the little darling with the bow in her hair is not an angel. As Cherise is shuttled from one aunt?s home to another, her aunts vanish, meeting inventive and hysterical ends. With a killer punch line on its final page, Jim Benton?s Cherise the Niece will leave readers laughing.