Jaclyn is a brave woman. Since having been diagnosed with the disease lupus a year or so ago, she has decided to answer the demise of her previous zine, Sour Grapes, with a zine that focuses on lupus — not that she wants to be identified as nothing other than a girl with, as she puts it, “a dread disease”. No, the admirable goal of this zine is to help others learn more about Lupus and to put the friends of people with lupus more at ease. So this zine is for her “friends… and for kids with lupus.” But even a project that large doesn’t satisfy Jaclyn, who also says that the zine is for kids without lupus, because much of it also has to do with body image which is a concern for everybody. So, this is an extremely admirable project, but many zines set themselves daunting tasks. We must look, then, to see how she goes about her undertaking. The first spread of pages offer a lupus reading list with comments about each book. Facing that page, as if Jaclyn wants to make the point of her editorial asap, there is a list of novels she is “completely in love with.” These include Girl Interrupted by Susanna Kayson and Minus Time by Catherine Bush which she gives a glowing recommendation of. Next two pages, a similar juxtaposition is offered. The page entitled Stay Out of the sun, Lupus Girl! faces a full page collage which rhetorically asks the question, “Why are girls so obsessed with their body image?” Rhetorically, because the collage is made up of glamour babe pics and words like sex, sexier and diet. The next two pages are a longer narrative called Don’t Feed the Girl. Here Jaclyn less overtly combines her two goals in a narrative about body weight fluctuations as a result of taking the drug predisone. The simple essay is very readable and honest — basically, it gets the job done. So, this first issue lives up to its intentions, and, perhaps, even exceeds them. The vaunted project even has an interview with Johnny Marr. Jaclyn mixes advocacy and entertainment in a way that might serve as a lesson to many other publishers. As well, she has put together an invaluable zine for any young adult suffering from lupus. We look forward to many more issues.
zine / #1 / main creator: Jaclyn Law / $1 or stamps / 46 Canmore Blvd, Scarborough ON, M1C 3W2 email: [email protected]