It's very important to emphasize here that Frank Stack's artwork is not "sloppy" or "crude" in any sense. He and Bill Griffith probably have the strongest straight-art chops of anybody doing comics now. But Stack isn't just technically accomplished. Once you learn to follow his deceptively simple lines, he's profoundly expressive in his impressionist manner. Especially dealing with the tough stuff in this story, he finds the exact unsentimental tone. If he was a more prolific storyteller (or had just a bit more vivid sense of humor) his work would be mentioned right with Griffith, Crumb, Sheldon, Williams, Woodring -- the likes of those. Barbner and Pekar's single finest stroke may have been choose Stack to do the art for "Our Cancer Year."