Review: Ways To Kill My Mother's Lover (With Limited Pocket Money and Minimal Mess)

How about an autobiographical delve into family dynamics, examining the relationship of three generations of women at the centre of an unstable family, touching on emotional and physical abuse, presented in an enticing watercolour production of art? Pull up a chair for Ways To Kill My Mother's Lover (With Limited Pocket Money and Minimal Mess) by Judy Powell.

Judy Powell studied Fine Art and has exhibited across Ireland and the UK. 2021 saw her win the Rosalind Penfold Prize for her draft of Ways To Kill My Mother's Lover. Her previous work can be found in Lockdown Lowdown, Over Inked and DECAF 2024 printing prize winner Keeping Secrets.

This is the third book to come out of Quindrie Press and the Quindrie Press 2025 collection, alongside "Estrela d'Oeste" and "I Let Love Destroy Me and All I Got Was This Stupid Comic". Quindrie Press is the multi-award-nominated Scottish micropublisher based in Edinburgh and helmed by the incredibly talented Eve Greenwood who does great work providing creators the opportunity to publish passion project comics. They also do wonderful charity work, donating a portion of all PDF sales to different charities and organisations that support marginalised communities in Scotland. Prestigious artists of talent formally introduced its review time.

So, let's start with the art. Judy gifts art with traditional values and charismatic beauty in presentation. The loose ink lines are full of unique character and charm and deliver solid depictions. There's a hint of children's story illustration that comes with this style that captures the childhood memories on offer and adds weight to the emotional impact that occurs in the narrative. It's a beautiful dualistic quality of childhood idealism visuals and emotionally charged adult understandings.

All of it is bolstered by an enthralling watercolour palette that elevates everything into a really strong package. There's something about watercolours that, for me, feels intrinsically connected to the visuals of childhood memory and, in this case, adds even more gravitas to the serious implications of the story's darker moments and the emotional charge that surges through others. Disarming, delightful, playful visuals that are sure to entrance. Story time then.

Ways To Kill My Mother's Lover (With Limited Pocket Money and Minimal Mess) is a heart-wrenching story of young Judy navigating the matriarchal dysfunctional dynamics of her family life. The presence of outside influence in the form of Judy's mother's lover, Beryl, is a catalyst for action in the need to protect the family, in the belief that this influence is indeed the instigator.

What becomes apparent is the larger scale of the dysfunction and its true root cause that offers Judy the opportunity to appraise these moments with unflinching, unfiltered honesty that I believe could have incredible means of catharsis and revelatory introspection.

With the aforementioned childlike qualities of the visuals, narratively, things follow the same motif, with the innocence driving the dialogue, while the narrator adds that important adult context. While things remain firmly non-explicit it's the implications and consequences that are so heartaching. There's an undercurrent of sadness that runs through this one that, for me, grew into admiration for surviving these experiences well enough to at least channel it into something positive. The strongest sadness comes from the frankness in the delivery of this one. It's a toxic air of "this is just how it was", which I found quite emotional.

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For fans of autobiographical comics, matriarchal figures, family life, navigating the dysfunctional dynamics of a difficult to manage mother that makes you question why some people became mothers in the first place, delightful grannies, scheming, siblings and art that will charm your socks off with a beautiful watercolour palette then try Ways To Kill My Mothers Lover.

To get your copy, it's the Kickstarter for Quindrie Press 2025 Collection here. For more Judy, check this out here.

Review: 5/5