In Sunny Spells, Jean-Jacques Sempé explores a wide range of topics, from troubled relationships and existential crises to office politics and doping scandals in the literary world. His cast of characters includes pious churchgoers, amateur painters and lovelorn palaeontologists, as well as psychiatrists, actors and football supporters. Sempés inimitable drawings and watercolours, accompanied by perfectly judged deadpan captions, are fresh, engaging and funny, and will be appreciated by cartoon connoisseurs and Francophiles as well as the general public.

Jean-Jacques Sempé (b.1932) is one of the world's most successful illustrators and cartoonists. He is the illustrator of the classic children's-book character, Nicholas, and author of a collection of some thirty albums of his cartoons and graphic novels, all published or to be published by Phaidon. His world-renowned illustrations and cartoons are featured on the cover of the New Yorker and in Paris Match.