Montreal-born Julie Doucet is an internationally renowned comics artist, part of a renaissance that emerged in North America in the 1980s and ’90s that recognized comics as a subtle and effective storytelling medium. Although she’s best known for her provocative underground comics series Dirty Plotte, Doucet’s original art has also been exhibited in galleries from New York to Berlin, and her illustrations have appeared in such publications as The Village Voice and L.A. Weekly. Long Time Relationship is her fifth book, but her first collection consisting solely of sketchbook drawings and prints.

Much of the subject matter is voyeuristic: colour caricatures conjured up from personal ads in The Village Voice; comical interpretations of astrological signs; lino-cuts based on photographs taken from a stranger’s garbage unsettlingly juxtaposed with the corresponding photos. Doucet’s raunchy yet whimsical upside-down sensibility is on full display here – she leaves in the errant hairs, nicks and cuts, the jagged teeth, details of genitalia, little truths we normally try to ignore. The lack of context, commentary, or page numbers contributes to the book’s sketchbook feel, but it may alienate those not already familiar with her work.