Carol Lay
Birth date1952 (age 74–75)
Birth placeWhittier, California
Cartoonisty
Notable worksWay Lay
Good Girls
The Big Skinny
Illiteracy
AwardsInkpot Award (1997)[1]
Websitehttp://www.carollay.com

Carol Lay (born 1952) is an American alternative cartoonist best known for her weekly comic strip, Story Minute (later to evolve into the strip Way Lay), which ran for almost 20 years in such US papers as the LA Weekly, the NY Press, and on Salon. Lay has been drawing professionally for over 30 years. Based in Los Angeles, Lay's strips and illustrations have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, Mad, Newsweek, Worth Magazine, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Yorker.

Biography

Early life

Lay was born in Whittier, California.[2] In 1975 she graduated with a B.F.A. in Fine Arts from UCLA.[3]

Career

After graduating from UCLA, Lay entered the comics industry at DC Comics, Western Publishing, and Eclipse Comics, while simultaneously writing and drawing underground comics for titles such as Weirdo and her own Good Girls #1–6.[3]

Lay's work, including "Story Minute" appeared in alternative newsweeklies during the 1990s.

She is the author of Mythos, a prose novel featuring Wonder Woman (DC/Pocket Books, 2003),[4] Goodnight, Irene: The Collected Stories of Irene Van de Kamp (Last Gasp, 2007), and The Big Skinny: How I Changed My Fattitude, a Memoir (Villard, 2008).[5]

From 2010 to 2013, Lay wrote and drew Simpsons stories for Bongo Comics.

In 2013, Lay created Murderville #1: "A Farewell to Armories", a self-published, small-print-run, Kickstarter-funded comic featuring twenty-four pages of story plus four front & back, outside & inside cover pages.

On January 26, 2015, Carol Lay's Lay Lines page began on GoComics with a week-long serialization of her story "The Thing Under the Futon" (January 26–30, 2015), followed by serializations of "Now, Endsville" (February 3–10, 2015) and "Invisible City" (April 12–June 26, 2015). Lay Lines has also reprinted pages from Lay's weekly newspaper comic Story Minutes, in color for the first time. New Lay Lines comics feature followups to Murderville.[6]

Bibliography

  • "Pontiac Tempura". unknown publisher. July 1980.
  • Binswanger, Lee and LeMieux, Kathryn (eds.) (March 1983). "Wimmen's Comix". No. 8. Last Gasp
  • Bagge, Peter (ed.) (Summer 1984). "Weirdo". No. 10. Last Gasp.
  • Gilbert, Erick (ed.) (1986). "Cannibal Romances". No. 1. Last Gasp.
  • Thomas, Roy (ed.) (January 1986). "The Oz-Wonderland Wars". No. 1. DC Comics
  • Thomas, Roy (ed.) (February 1986). "The Oz-Wonderland Wars". No. 2. DC Comics.
  • Thomas, Roy (ed.) (March 1986). "The Oz-Wonderland Wars". No. 3. DC Comics.
  • "Good Girls". No. 1. Fantagraphics Books. April 1987.
  • Groth, Gary (ed.) (May 1987). "Anything Goes!". No. 4. The Comics Journal
  • "Good Girls". No. 2. Fantagraphics Books. October 1987.
  • "Good Girls". No. 3. Fantagraphics Books. May 1988.
  • "Good Girls". No. 4. Fantagraphics Books. February 1989.
  • Kominsky-Crumb, Aline (ed.) (Spring 1990). "Weirdo". No. 27. Last Gasp.
  • "Good Girls". No. 5. Fantagraphics Books. January 1991.
  • "Good Girls". No. 6. Rip Off Press. 1991.
  • Kinney, Jay (ed.) (1993). "Young Lust". No. 8. Last Gasp.
  • Schreiner, Dave (ed.) (November 1993). "Now, Endsville". Kitchen Sink Press. ISBN 0-87816-235-6.
  • Amara, Phil (ed.) (January 1996). "Joy Ride". Kitchen Sink Press. ISBN 0-87816-398-0.
  • Couch, Christopher (ed.) (September 1998). "Strip Joint". Kitchen Sink Press. ISBN 0-87816-578-9.
  • Wonder Woman: Mythos, Pocket Star, 2003. ISBN 978-0-7434-1711-2. (prose novel)
  • Goodnight, Irene: The Collected Stories of Irene Van de Kamp, Last Gasp, 2007. ISBN 978-0-86719-659-7. (collects the Irene Van de Camp stories from Good Girls plus a cover gallery and "About Face" (2006), a new 18-page story drawn for the collection)
  • The Big Skinny: How I Changed My Fattitude, A Memoir, Random House, 2008. ISBN 978-0-345-50404-3. (graphic novel/memoir/diet book, with recipes)
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (February 2010). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 52. Bongo Comics
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (April 2010). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 53. Bongo Comics.
  • Simpsons Comics Get Some Fancy Book Learnin', Bongo Entertainment, 2010. ISBN 978-1-892849-30-4. (5-page story, new for the collection, Lisa and Maggie Simpson in "Pandora, Jr.")
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (May 2010). "The Simpsons Summer Shindig". No. 4. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (June 2010). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 54. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (August 2010). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 55. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (September 2010). "Simpsons Comics". No. 170. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (December 2010). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 57. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (February 2011). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 58. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (April 2011). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 59. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (May 2011). "The Simpsons Summer Shindig". No. 5. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (June 2011). "Simpsons Comics". No. 179. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (July 2011). "Simpsons Comics Presents Bart Simpson". No. 61. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (January 2012). "The Simpsons Winter Wingding". No. 6. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (February 2012). "Ralph Wiggum One-Shot". No. 1. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (May 2012). "Simpsons Comics". No. 190. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (June 2012). "Simpsons Summer Shindig". No. 6. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (June 2012). "Bart Simpson". No. 72. Bongo Comics.
  • Morrison, Bill (ed.) (July 2012). "Bart Simpson". No. 73. Bongo Comics.
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (August 2012). "Li'l Homer". No. 1. Bongo Comics.
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (August 2012). "Bart Simpson". No. 74. Bongo Comics.
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (October 2012). "Maggie". No. 1. Bongo Comics.
  • CAROL LAY'S ILLITERATURE: STORY MINUTES Volume One, Boom! Town, 2012. ISBN 978-1-60886-282-5. (Contains 103 STORY MINUTE strips from 1997 to 1999, plus an Introduction by Kim Deitch.)
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (February 2013). "Bart Simpson". No. 80. Bongo Comics.
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (March 2013). "Bart Simpson". No. 81. Bongo Comics.
  • Kane, Nathan (ed.) (April 2013). "Simpsons Comics". No. 201. Bongo Comics.
  • Lay, Carol (ed.) (September 2013). "MURDERVILLE". No. 1 -- 24 story pages + 4 front & back cover pages -- Kickstarter-funded, self-published. Carol Lay.
  • BART SIMPSON TO THE RESCUE, Harper, 2014. ISBN 978-0-06-230183-3. (Includes reprints of Carol Lay's SIMPSONS stories "The Mystery of the Pesky Desk", "Fortunate Son", "A Tomb With a View", and "Pranks a Lot".)
  • BART SIMPSON BLASTOFF, Harper, 2015. ISBN 978-0-06-236061-8. (Includes reprints of Carol Lay's SIMPSONS stories "Sleepless in Springfield", "The Princess Principle", and "The Planet of the Plants".)
  • SIMPSONS COMIC CLUBHOUSE, Harper, 2015, ISBN 978-0-06-236060-1. (Includes reprints of Carol Lay's SIMPSONS stories "Dirty Laundry", and "Fur 'n' Hate 451".)

References

  1. ^ Inkpot Award
  2. ^ "Carol Lay : About". www.carollay.com. Archived from the original on 2016-03-08. Retrieved 2017-03-11.
  3. ^ "Talking to Carol Lay - Irene and More" Archived 2007-06-23 at archive.today. Newsarama. July 19, 2007
  4. ^ "Carol Lay Wonder Woman: Mythos". Pulse News. Comicon.com. May 15, 2003. Archived 2011-06-05 at the Wayback Machine.
  5. ^ "The Carol Lay Interview". Comics Waiting Room. Archived 2016-01-10 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved July 12, 2011.
  6. ^ Hoffmann, Curtis. "Lay Lines". GoComics List. Retrieved April 12, 2016. Continually updated.

Interviews