Brooklyn, ink

Park Slope, Brooklyn, our city’s breeding ground for upscale couples, is often bypassed by those heading to grittier, artier ’hoods like Williamsburg. But comic-book writer Brian Wood has just put Park Slope on the hipster map. The neighborhood stars in the most recent edition of Wood’s indie comic, Local, which sets each of its 12 issues in a different American city. Wood, a longtime New Yorker, came up with the idea during recent a sojourn to the West Coast. “I was homesick and thinking a lot about how where you live gives you your identity,” he says.

The stories focus on an itinerant loner named Megan McKeenan, who gains a year in age (and several more in experience) with each issue. In Local No. 6, 24-year-old Megan moves to Brooklyn and immediately faces a familiar urban initiation rite: the crazy roommate. Wood and his partner, Minnesota artist Ryan Kelly, usually rely on photos and descriptions from friends to bring cities such as Portland, Oregon, or Richmond to life with genuine details like cafés and cinemas. But since Wood lives in Park Slope, he knew he had to include Great Lakes (“That was my bar”), Music Matters (“My wife and I are regulars”) and the F train (“The slowest and smelliest train in the system”). However, sharp readers will spot only two examples of another Slope mainstay: strollers. “I wonder why Ryan didn’t put more in there,” says Wood. “He just had twins.”—Corrie Pikul