Let's hear it for the Mountain View Public Library, who are starting to carry a great array of graphic novels. I've avoided reading this one, mostly because I couldn't justify the price for the quantity of content, but I'm glad that I was able to get it for free - it's fantastic.I'll be brief in description (since the book is brief in itself) and suggest that it's Daniel Clowes's homage to Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio. That is: a portrait of a town, with all of its dysfunction, for us all to enjoy.
What's perhaps most remarkable about this novel is that each character believes himself to be at the pinnacle (or, I suppose, depth) of despair, only to learn that actually others are much more pathetic than himself. Indeed, the most pathetic character (Random Walker) is perhaps the only character who fails to view himself as such.
Did I like this book? Let's just say I dug out my I-make-you-go-blind tiny book lamp to read this last night, while baby Peter and Kevin softly snored next to me. (Of course, I compensated by taking a nap today. But. I gave up sleep to read this.)
2 comments:
You've probably read it already, but I did the same thing (reading in the wee hours when I should have been sleeping) with Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis shortly after Stefan was born.
Ooh, yes, I loved it. It's being made into a movie, too!
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