The Short Years

"The Days are Long but the Years are Short." - A parent whose kids are grown.

After her highly acclaimed graphic memoirs about travelling the north McCreesh turns her uncompromising lens to the domestic everyday work of parenting three small children. Combining gag humour and individually moving comic strips McCreesh gives an insider's perspective. Guided by those existential questions that kids ponder so well, the comics touch on universal themes of death, love, gender, art, aging, as well as childhood milestones like the heartbreak about family friends moving away. More than that though, there's something deeper that comes from these comics spanning over seven years. The kids are simultaneously changing AND remaining themselves, as their personalities develop and become more defined. The family dynamics evolve. The adults lurch around like the exhausted millennial parents that they are, navigating the simultaneous intense love and extreme annoyance that comes with living with small kids. A good mix of fuzzies, feelings, and laugh-out-loud humour, all of which confirm that these years are indeed short - and very long.

Author: Alison McCreesh
Publisher: Conundrum Press
Published: 05/05/2026
Pages: 200
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.62lbs
Size: 6.60h x 5.00w x 0.70d
ISBN: 9781772621211


Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 01/26/2026

About the Author

Over the past fifteen years, Alison McCreesh has extensively travelled around the Arctic and sub-Arctic and contemporary day-to-day life in the North is a theme that carries through her creative work. Alison currently lives in Yellowknife where she creates comics and illustrations surrounded by her two dogs and three small children. Alison's past books include the award-winning graphic novel Ramshackle: A Yellowknife Story, as well as the travelogue Norths, Two Suitcases and a Stroller around the Circumpolar World. Her latest graphic memoir Degrees of Separation: A Decade North of 60 was nominated for an Eisner Award.