A little less stylistically coherent than her later works, The Fart Party Vol. 2 nonetheless foreshadows Julia Wertz's future style by including architectural details of San Francisco as she gives the city a few last go-arounds before moving to Brooklyn. Anybody who's moved away from a city that they love can probably find something to relate to in this collection. ( )

Summary: The Fart Party is the unfortunately named but frequently hilarious autobiographical comic of twenty-something smartass San Franciscan (now New Yorker) Julia Wertz. Volume 2 takes up the fall-out from the end of Wertz's relationship with her boyfriend Oliver, and her subsequent decision to move to New York City. It includes fewer one-off comics but a lot of travel sketches.

Review: There's a marked shift in tone between Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. It's partly because Vol. 2 features fewer "finished" comics, and more quickly-drawn "sketchy" comics, done in the moment, which are obviously less polished but do have an energy that would have been lost if they were finished up after the fact. But it seems to me that, on the whole, the comics are a bit more serious and a bit less wildly inappropriate - just a bit, though, there's still plenty of drinkin' and cussin' to go around. Good stuff. 4 out of 5 stars. ( )