Hometown

Hometown is a riveting, gorgeous, and moving book. It is about a girl who appears human and lives on a world populated with with otherworldly beings and creatures. Her mother takes her out collecting, and her father and she build animals and machines. She also has five siblings:

Although all of the scenes and beings seem alien to me, to her they are commonplace and the only people, things, and places she has known. One day, a strange thing falls from the sky that makes her question everything she knows, and it wants to take her back to the place where she is from. Thus, she has to make a potentially difficult choice.

I do not want to spoil things about the plot, but I found so much of this book emotionally compelling. She feels such joy in her hometown and the questions she poses are profound and human. I found myself concerned, charmed, frightened, and tickled multiple times over the course of reading this book, and when I read it with my seven-year-old, she was rapt as well. And to think that I have not even mentioned the sumptuous artwork, done with a combination of colored pencils and watercolors. The result is a surreal phantasmagoria that is unique though calls to my mind effects reminiscent of artists like Frida Kahlo, H.R. Giger, Chris Van Allsburg, and Jim Woodring. It also has so many subtle details, some of which are funny or cute and others secret plot points. Go read this book!

Hometown was written and drawn by Shaun Tan, an artist and filmmaker who is best known for The Arrival. He has drawn multiple books that have been published internationally and can be read by people of all ages. He has also won an Academy Award for the animated short film The Lost Thing, the prestigious Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in Sweden, and the Kate Greenaway Medal in the UK. He speaks about his work on Hometown in this interview.

This book has been very well reviewed. In a starred review, Publishers Weekly called it "a luminous and ethereal work about home and identity." April Spisak wrote, "There are so many extravagantly surreal moments within the immersive illustrations that it may take a few repeat readings for the profound messages to take root; it is to Tan's enormous credit that each time through will yield new details, both artistic and emotional." Peter Dabbene called it "a masterful graphic novel."

Hometown was published by Levine Querido, and they offer a preview and more about it here. 

Thank you to Tracy van Straaten for the review copy!

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States: A Graphic Interpretation

I got this book for Fathers Day this year, and reading it has been a moving ordeal. I have not read the source material for this adaptation, but this graphic interpretation is structured in a way that features its author, scholar and activist Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, as its narrator delivering a grand lecture. As lectures go, this one is engaging and chock full of information. It runs from a time 10,000 years ago when agricultural communities were being established around corn until protests and political actions very near our present day. In between is a vast channel of history, from the governmental and social structures of various tribes in North America to the ruling principles of European countries that eventually crossed the ocean in search of trade routes and treasures, only to conquer, enslave, and slaughter the people who already lived here.

This book is encyclopedic with historical figures such as Tecumseh and Andrew Jackson, events such as the Wounded Knee Massacre and the Trail of Tears, and (sadly) influential publications such as Last of the Mohicans. But this is no dry account, and what I appreciate about it most is how it explores historical concepts and expounds on how specific ideologies were formed and propagated and how large-scale murder and theft were made to look heroic and just. It covers the idea of Manifest Destiny and how a campaign of mass genocide was pitched as a moral crusade, and it also touches on how policies such as the Homestead Acts and economic happenings like the California gold rush mightily and swiftly led to native peoples losing land and rights. There is much to think about here that pertains to current events, propaganda, and modern history, questions and critiques that are worth pursuing to make a more equitable and just world. This book is the best sort, one that leaves the reader changed after putting it down.

One critique I do have is that the book features many large blocks of text, which can be dense, but I feel that it also scaffolds them well with detailed artwork that conveys not only images of the past but also a good amount of emotion and drama. The artwork well suits the prose, providing much needed context that supports and promotes comprehension of the big ideas within.

Pulling off the large feat of adapting this book was Paul Peart-Smith. He is a British artist who has been making comics for over three decades, drawing stories for 2000 AD and many other publishers, including a graphic adaptation of W.E.B. Du Bois's The Souls of Black Folks. Both he and Dunbar-Ortiz speak about this adaptation of Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States in this interview.

I was not able to find many reviews of this book online, but I very much agree with Brian Cronin who wrote, "This is a book that is very worth reading for anyone who wants to challenge what they think about American history."

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States was published by Beacon Press, and they offer more information about it here.

House of Women

Originally published as a series of mini-comics, House of Women is a gorgeous and thought-provoking science fiction story that I found somewhat unsettling. I think that such discomfort is a perfect response to have to a book like this, as it tackles some pretty large issues while also spinning a suspenseful yarn about space exploration. The premise of this book is that a group of female missionaries have been assigned by the Empire to a backwater planet in order to educate and study the local inhabitants while also converting them to their belief and political systems.

There are a few complications to their mission, of course. First, the last group of emissaries from the Empire mysteriously vanished, and they are searching for clues to what may have happened to them. Second, they can only work with the female creatures, as they are open to education, whereas the males are hostile and violent. Third, the planet appears to be an Edenic paradise in some ways, but there are also wild and savage features that offer some peril. Fourth, there is a mysterious male guide who offers them help from a distance, though he is from another planet and has his own (shady?) motivations for being there. Finally, the women are a varied bunch, and they all have their various reasons for their work. Some have more virtuous intentions than others, and some are more out for themselves than for supporting the group.

Overall, I have to say that this book is excellent. It is extraordinarily drawn, with beautiful black and white images that resemble woodcuts and feature clean, geometric images. The story and subplots are well-woven together, and I feel that the characters are strong and complex. And perhaps what makes this book work most is that it has a constant undercurrent of anxiety, fear, and violence just beneath the surface. This book is an exquisite work of scifi and horror that will make you jump while also making you think.

House of Women is another impressive graphic novel from the Ignatz Award winning Sophie Goldstein. She has published a couple of graphic novels prior, Darwin Carmichael is Going to Hell, a fun, myth-based webcomic collaboration with writer Jenn Jordan, and The Oven, which was also a provocative sci-fi tale. She speaks extensively about her work on HoW in this interview with the Comics Alternative.

All  of the reviews I have read heaped acclaim on this book. Publishers Weekly praised it in a starred review as "another remarkable graphic novel from a creator whose approach to SF consistently defies expectations." Laura McKinley wrote in a starred review for Library Journal that Goldstein "offers readers much to reflect on in this sexually visceral tour de force, filled with intense black-and-white imagery and exploring what it means to “civilize” people without first weighing the consequences." John Seven called it "extraordinary, smart, beautiful." Oliver Sava wrote, "It’s a gorgeous hardcover, and the elegance of its trade dress makes it stand out while informing the interior contents, which are similarly refined."

House of Women was published by Fantagraphics, and they offer a preview and more about it here. In addition to its serious, adult themes this book also features nudity, sex, and violence, so it is suggested for readers mature enough to handle such things.