Audio By Carbonatix
Keep Dallas Observer Free
We’re aiming to raise $10,000 by April 26. Your support ensures Dallas Observer can continue watching out for you and our community. No paywall. Always accessible. Daily online and weekly in print.
Shortly after the Dallas Observer launched in 1980, Marian Henley‘s comic strip Maxine became a weekly feature, almost as popular as the personals. The Dallas native’s strip, featuring her alternately giddy and neurotic alter-ego, wound up becoming a national hit: In time it would spread to the LA Weekly and Glamour, among myriad publications, and even spawn till Henley retired the strip in 2003 following publication of a best-of compilation.
Which isn’t to suggest she’s stopped writing: This month will see the publication of her “graphic memoir” The Shiniest Jewel: A Family Love Story, about her decision to adopt a 6-month-old Russian boy and the impact it had on her relationship with a longtime, long-distance boyfriend. And on the day of its release, September 15, Henley will read from and sign copies of The Shiniest Jewel at the Barnes & Noble in Lincoln Park, beginning at 7 p.m. It even comes with the endorsement of fellow former Dallas cartoonist Dan Piraro, who logrolls, “An artfully told story of love, death, birth, and bureaucracy.” –Robert Wilonsky
