Midweek cartoonist Di Batchelor is set to launch her first book dedicated to the adventures of Rachel.
Usually appearing on page two of each Midweek, Rachel is an arty and philosophical single frame cartoon and tends to spawn from Batchelor’s own alter ego.
Rachel enjoys friends, food, and dogs, and can never quite work out the cellphone or the chooks.
She is described by former Midweek editor Gerald Ford as a woman who “embodies a kind of fatalistic optimism”.
“She is capable of finding amusement and enlightenment in the strangest and in the most ordinary of places.”
Batchelor said she hopes her cartoons can help people recognise “the silly and embarrassing situations they get into and see that it’s not just them, and have a laugh”.
“I also hope my cartoons can promote peace and understanding through humour.
“You know when you think of those brilliant one-liners that would be great in a movie? I used to get that and write them down.”
She said she enjoyed creating a whole story in one panel, “imagining the past and the future of that captured moment in time.”
Batchelor’s book, Rachel Cartoonz: Book one, is to be launched on Friday September 29 at Hedley’s Bookshop from 5pm until 6pm.
It features more than 100 snippets of Rachel’s life.
Copies will be available at the Wairarapa Times-Age office from Monday October 2.
