For some reason, this zine arrived on my doorstep without a front cover, in a little baggie from the postal service that apologized for the damaged letter. It appears, from the small strip that's left from the postal mutilation, that there was content on the front cover, but (duh) I couldn't see enough of it to make out what it was. So, consider that your mystery surprise when you order this zine.

WillZine is a one-person show out of Exton, Pa. Issued once every ten months or so, as the mood strikes him, this zine is more text-heavy than the majority I've seen. Punctuating this content are a series of off-color cartoons by Dave Kocher of Led Balloons, which are exceedingly clever.

WZ #5 starts out very strong. There's a hilarious article called "Pee" about being stopped in Washington State for doing just that by the side of the road. His description of the trooper who stopped him and the narrative of what was going through his head were side-splitting. Same with his lengthy article on getting fired -- his co-workers are almost universal, and hilarious.

Will's article on the "Self Publishing Stigma" could be a college thesis in the making. It's a well-cited, well-organized article on how self-publishing has so much under-realized potential, and is incredibly inspiring to other zine publishers to do something ELSE, something out of the ordinary. (Despite this well-organized state, Will claims that by separating it into subsections, he's avoided having to polish the work itself. I found it to be great as-is.)

From there, though, it seemed to me that Will just wanted to get this issue done and to the printers. Things are funny, yes, but not in the way that the first few articles were. He seemed to go for the base humor to make up for any more content. There's a guest article by Barry the Perv about the chicks at work he'd like to bang, a strange e-mail conversation with someone the author decidedly doesn't like, and a rant about Tom Hanks that could qualify as microfiction, yet isn't listed in the table of contents.

This zine isn't for everyone. I think that if I was a guy, I might appreciate it more (I mean, c'mon ... porno tape reviews?), but as it is, I'm fair to middling about this zine. If it wasn't for the fabulous articles at the beginning, I wouldn't be able to recommend it at all, but Will's Self Publishing article is worth the $2 all on its own. Luckily, there's more than just that one article to keep you amused, and making this a relatively good value for the money you're shelling out to see it. Send $2 to WZ Headquarters at 321 N. Pottstown Pike, Exton, PA 19341.

[ by Elizabeth Badurina ]
Rambles: 27 October 2001