My Balls Are Killing Me, written by Chris Robinson, Illustrated by Andreas Hykade (Autographed copy)

Author: Chris Robinson

Illustrated by Andreas Hykade

Published: 2025

Dimensions: 5 x 8 inches 

Paperback

This copy is autographed by writer Chris Robinson!

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Part cancer log, part love wreck, part pinball machine. When a hard little marble shows up where it shouldn’t, our narrator—reluctant adult and world-class avoider—gets launched into an arcade of scans, surgery, and sleepless 3 a.m. bargains. Then the strangest guide arrives: Athena, the wisecracking guardian angel his removed testicle becomes, who refuses to let him hide. “Keep the ball in play,” she says—and the flippers start flying.

Hospitals morph into arenas; relationships tilt; denial runs out of tokens. Between chemo chairs, marital crosswinds, and surreal visitations, he learns to tell the messy truth—to doctors, to lovers, and finally to himself. Rude, tender, and weirdly uplifting, My Balls Are Killing Me is a screwball survival story with a punk heart—rooted in the author’s own run-in with testicular cancer and the aftershocks it sent through his body, marriage, and sense of self.

If you like memoirs that swerve from jet-black comedy to raw honesty, myth slipped under a hospital gown, and a finale that finds nerve when the nerves are shot, welcome to the game.

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Chris Robinson is a writer and author of Stole This from a Hockey Card: A Philosophy of Hockey, Doug Harvey, Identity and Booze, Estonian Animation: Between Genius and Utter Illiteracy, The Animation Pimp, Japanese Animation: Time Out of Mind, Earmarked for Collision: A Highly Biased Tour of Collage Animations etc.

He is also the artistic director of the Ottawa International Animation Festival (OIAF) and has received the 2020 Award for Outstanding Contribution to Animation Studies by the World Festival of Animated Film - Animafest Zagreb.

My Balls Are Killing Me is based on his experience with testicular cancer. 

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Andreas Hykade is an animation filmmaker. Combining distinctive minimalist design with moments of lavishly detailed, psychedelic-inspired imagery, his work deals with childhood memories, identity, love, desire, death, and addiction. His award-winning films include We Lived in Grass, Ring of Fire, The Rung, Love & Theft, Nuggets and Altötting.