davramlocke's Reviews (777)

Empire State is unique, as far as graphic novels go, not so much in tone or story, but because it does some interesting, if simple, things with color.

The story is about a 25 year old Asian guy named Jimmy living in Oakland. He has prospects of becoming a web designer of sorts, but seems stuck in a life not suited for such ambitious pursuits. He's actually very easy to relate to because the entire story has a post-college lull feel to it that has become so common in the post-college generation. He has a friend named Sara who he is in love with. When she moves to New York, he decided to travel to the "Empire State..." and visit her.

This is where the color patterns become interesting because every time we're sent to the past, Shiga colors the entire page with a sort of red theme, and every time we're pushed into the present, it's blue. This may not seem like such a big deal when you consider how many graphic novels are published in full color, but it makes reading an otherwise black and white comic slightly more interesting because you can immediately know at what time period the story takes place just by looking at the color. This also allows Shiga to jump around however he likes, which maybe improves the written narrative.

The story itself is subtle but charming, and as funny as anything I've read in recent memory. Jimmy himself, without realizing it, is a born comedian. The strangest thing I found while reading the story of these two characters was how unappealing Sara was, and I suppose this could be refreshing because it doesn't thrust her into the role of manic pixie dream girl or muse to Jimmy. She's boring and unattractive and doesn't necessarily treat him all that nicely, but he likes her anyway. His naivety is realistic and sad and completely believable.

I think Empire State, and probably Shiga in general, would appeal to fans of the Scott Pilgrim series. Though O'Malley has a more fantastical approach to his storytelling, the styles are quite similar.

I feel like Feed could have been a better book, even though it was in fact, a very good book. The story tells a potential future of consumerism and digital reliance. People have chips embedded in their brains that basically give them a constant connection to a futuristic version of our own internet. It's an obvious criticism of the times we live in and our own internet addictions. Too obvious, in fact.

The perspective is that of a teenage boy who acts and thinks, for the most part, like teenage boys do. He has rowdy friends and teenage thoughts. He meets a girl who had her "feed" implanted later in life than most, and because of this she is different. The book is a pseudo-love story, or at least it might have been if the main character wasn't so incredibly un-likable. But that's the paradox of Feed. It's trying so hard to get across this message that being hooked in will destroy society that it can't, at the same time, be a real story. I never grew to like the narrator, he never really changes, and in the end I'm wishing I could have seen the story through the female love interest's eyes (name: Violet).

I think maybe my problem with this criticism of how we Americans live is the assumption that we're all doomed, that we all just continue to plod along, unthinking, uncaring, and content to be duped into buying and consuming all that we see before us. Perhaps for many, this is true, but I find myself continually made aware of all the negative effects the "machine" and made aware in a much less obvious and blunt ways than Anderson puts across with Feed.

At the same time, I think this is maybe an important book to read, particularly for a younger audience (which is why it's aptly called a Young Adult book). Some of us may wake up to the perils of an "American" lifestyle early, but the majority probably need this hammer of a reminder that is Feed. Thus, I can not blame Anderson for not creating a great story because he's created something important regardless.

This might be the best graphic novel I've ever read, and possibly one of the best books. The writing is fluid and melodic, the sketches are expressive and charming, and the story itself is genuine and witty as only a biography can be.

Fun Home is both a story about Alison Bechdel's childhood home, and about her father, who died of a rumored suicide during her first years at college. It's broken up into seven chapters, but the timeline isn't as sequential as one might expect from the story of someone's life. Instead, each chapter is themed, and Bechdel manages to jump around within her life without ever losing the narrative thread of each theme. In one chapter she'll let us peek into the window of her father's business, a funeral home. In another, she'll show us the bond of their shared love of literature and how it, despite their strange relationship, brought them together. It's remarkable that she's able to weave in and out of time so deftly without losing the reader, and I've never seen it done as well in or out of the graphic novel genre.

And when I say that her relationship with her father is strange, I suppose I'm not giving full credit to it. Early in the first chapter, we learn that Alison's father slept with younger men and had been doing so for years. It's never implied that he is gay necessarily, but that he isn't completely straight, and not even Alison knows in the end whether he preferred men, women, or a healthy mix of the two. The three children fathered would suggest the latter, despite a rocky marriage. The way Bechdel describes her father is familiar. There is anger in it, and love, and confusion, and even a margin of respect. It's how many of us might describe our dads, and goes to show that even in the murkiest of circumstances that humans are all quite connected.

Also central to the plot and narrative of Bechdel's life is the realization that she is a lesbian that comes during her college years and not long before her father's death. The book isn't about Bechdel's sexual preference, at least not completely. It's a driving force, and we see her transform from someone shy about her beliefs and desires into someone comfortable with them. Perhaps more interesting is the dynamic this creates with her father, someone who never was comfortable with his own desires and choices, and the strain of communication that she tries to breach with him.

You could easily say that this book isn't so much a biography about Alison Bechdel as it is a biography about Bruce Bechdel, but really it's the story of a family, and growing up, and the relationship between a father and a daughter who probably never got the time they needed to really know one another. And where most graphic novels might steal a reader's imagination and fill in some blanks for them, this autobiographical look into the Bechdel household only further cements the charm and oddity of a strange confluence of lives. It's a beautiful experience.