Notes for a War Story-- Gipi

It's a struggle describing the essence of a graphic novel in words, particularly one as abstract as Gipi's Notes for a War Story. It's a book about war, but not in the way you would expect-- only the occasional discussion of militias and bombings. Rather, this book's backdrop is protracted violence and civil unrest, with a focus on characters who profit from them.

The power of Notes for a War Story comes not from its protagonists (a group of archetypal outsiders who are supposed to be friends but show no signs of bonds between them) or its unique perspective ("war is ugly"), but from its haunting images. Rendered in monochromatic oils with a few penned-in details, there are ruined hotels with glassless windows, expanses of wasteland where villages used to be, and alley nightclubs with only a handful of patrons, all reminiscent of post-apocalyptic futurescapes. The headless figures that haunt the main character's dreams are equally chilling. The war itself is abstract-- a civil conflict in an unnamed European country, though the images and the artist's close proximity to the conflict in the former Yugoslavia suggest something more specific.

Fans of graphic novels might consider this for its visual merits, but the plot points are too diluted to stand on their own.

Kampung Boy/ Town Boy-- Lat

It seemed a little soon to spring into my next graphic novel, but I couldn't resist the playful illustrations on the cover of Lat's books.

Kampung Boy is set in a Malaysian village in the 1950s, where the author was born and spent his early childhood.

The illustrations of little Mat are so cute I couldn't help but grin. One of my favorite pictures of him playing hide-and-seek with his father; Mat is hidden under the edge of the rug with the perfect little-kid expression of "I'm-so-clever-he'll-never-find-me-here"-- you can practically hear the little giggle that will give his hiding spot away. I also like the picture of Mat rocking his baby sister to sleep.

The book gradually incorporates more serious themes. Mat realizes that his father has high expectations of him, and he starts to apply himself in school. Village life and the local rubber industry are displaced by the activities of a large tin company, which eventually buys the rubber plantation Mat was supposed to inherit. When Mat earns a place in the nearby town's boarding school, he says goodbye to the kampung and hopes that he will be able to return. Sadly, we already have the sense that there will be nothing to come back to.

I devoured Kampung Boy in short order and moved on directly to the sequel, Town Boy. While the second book lacks the coherent story of the first, the illustrations of town life are even more arresting. Town Boy is equally steeped in nostalgia, as Ipoh of the 1960s is as lost as the kampung of the 1950s.

I am categorizing these books as graphic novels due to the heavy use of illustration, but they are not told in comic form (that is, not in a picture sequence). This is more of a sophisticated picture book, where the drawings do most of the talking. It seems to me that these books don't fall within a certain age group-- the vocabulary is simple but loaded with cultural concepts that might be challenging for younger readers. At the same time, I think that the illustrations and themes in the books have mass appeal.

While Lat's work is extremely popular in Southeast Asia, these books are the first to be published in the United States. Given the excellent reception, I hope these books continue to gain an international following.

American Born Chinese-- Gene Luen Yang

I intended to post this book in honor of lunar new year. Oops. Happy Year of the Tiger!

American Born Chinese is one of my few re-reads planned for this year, but frankly it's so amazing that I can't keep quiet about it. At first, Yang's graphic novel appears to be three separate stories, influenced respectively by Chinese folk tales, memoir, and stereotypical sitcom. These individuals stories were enjoyable enough, but when they started to converge into a single story, that was it-- no one could have pried this book out of my hands. Some parts had me laughing; at other times, I felt like I'd been socked in the stomach.

An incredible book about coming to terms with identity.

Also, I had the opportunity to check out some of Yang's original drawings on a visit to this fantastic museum-- highly recommended for visitors to and (residents of) the Great Northwest!

P.S. It occurred to me later that the stereotypes in the "sitcom" narrative were familiar to me at this age, but I am not sure if I would have understood them when I was younger and I am not sure how dated these references are. I would be interested to know what young readers take away from that part of the book.