Spent: A Comic Novel

Brought to you by Penguin.

From her pygmy goat farm in Vermont, a cartoonist named Alison Bechdel wonders: Can she pull humanity out of its death spiral by writing a scathing memoir about her own greed and privilege?

But how can she just sit around writing a book when the world is hanging on a thread?

In this hilariously skewering comic novel, Alison is existentially pained by a climate-challenged world and a country on the brink of civil war.

Her first graphic memoir about growing up with her taxidermist father has been adapted into a highly successful TV series, Death and Taxidermy. It’s a phenomenon that makes Alison, formerly on the cultural margins, the envy of her friend group.

As the TV show racks up Emmy after Emmy, Alison’s own envy spirals. Surely writing her own wildly popular reality TV series wouldn’t be that hard? One that shows people how to free themselves from consumer capitalism and live a more ethical life?!

In Spent, the celebrated, bestselling author of the modern classic Fun Home presents a laugh-out-loud and passionately political work of autofiction, and once again proves that “nobody does it better” (New York Times) than the real Alison Bechdel.

'The funniest, most satirical cartoon she has ever written – as well as, perhaps, the most prescient' OBSERVER

© Alison Bechdel 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025