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January 4th-February 28th 2021 |
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Persepolis - The Story of a Childhood
by Marjane Satrapi
In powerful black-and-white comic strip images, Satrapi tells the story of her life in Tehran from ages six to fourteen, years that saw the overthrow of the Shah’s regime, the triumph of the Islamic Revolution, and the devastating effects of war with Iraq. The intelligent and outspoken only child of committed Marxists and the great-granddaughter of one of Iran’s last emperors, Marjane bears witness to a childhood uniquely entwined with the history of her country.
Persepolis paints an unforgettable portrait of daily life in Iran and of the bewildering contradictions between home life and public life. Marjane’s child’s-eye view of dethroned emperors, state-sanctioned whippings, and heroes of the revolution allows us to learn as she does the history of this fascinating country and of her own extraordinary family. Intensely personal, profoundly political, and wholly original, Persepolis is at once a story of growing up and a reminder of the human cost of war and political repression. It shows how we carry on, with laughter and tears, in the face of absurdity. And, finally, it introduces us to an irresistible little girl with whom we cannot help but fall in loveBook Annotation
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Fun home : a family tragicomic
by Alison Bechdel
An unusual memoir done in the form of a graphic novel by a cult favorite comic artist offers a darkly funny family portrait that details her relationship with her father, a historic preservation expert dedicated to restoring the family's Victorian home, funeral home director, high-school English teacher, and closeted homosexual.
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March
by John Lewis
A multi-volume graphic account of the author's lifelong struggle for civil and human rights covers his youth in rural Alabama, his life-changing meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., and his involvement in the Freedom rides and the Selma to Montgomery march.
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Pittsburgh
by Frank Santoro
"Frank Santoro faces a simple but sad reality: His parents, once high-school sweethearts, now don't speak to each other--even though they work in the same building. Trying to understand, Santoro searches through his memories and builds a portrait of their lives together and apart, past and present. Using markers, pencils, scissors, and tape, drawing in vivid colors and exuberant lines, he brings to life the mundane and the extraordinary: his parents' wedding; his childhood mishaps; his father's trauma inVietnam; the rise and fall of his home city, Pittsburgh; even the exploits of his dog Pretzel. Santoro, the acclaimed author of Storeyville and Pompeii, has created a masterpiece. Pittsburgh is an extraordinary reimagining of the comics form to depict the processes of memory, and a powerful, searching account of how families take shape and fall apart"
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Freedom Hospital : A Syrian Story
by Hamid Sulaiman
"It is spring 2012 and 40,000 people have died since the start of the Syrian Arab Spring. In the wake of this, Yasmine has set up a clandestine hospital in the north of the country. Her town is controlled by Assad's brutal regime, but is relatively stable. However, as the months pass, the situation becomes increasingly complex and violent. Told in stark, beautiful black-and-white imagery, Freedom Hospital illuminates a complicated situation with gut-wrenching detail and very dark humor. The story of Syria is one of the most devastating narratives of our age and Freedom Hospital is an important and timely book from a new international talent."
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Black Panther : a nation under our feet. Book one
by Ta-Nehisi Coates
When a superhuman terrorist group called "The People" sparks a violent uprising, the land of Wakanda, famed for its incredible technology and proud warrior traditions, will be thrown into turmoil; but can its king, the Black Panther, save it from this fate? Collects Black Panther Nos. 1-4. Written by a MacArthur Genius and National Book Award-winning writer.
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Ms. Marvel : No Normal
by G. Willow Wilson
Kamala Khan, a Pakistani American girl from Jersey City who lives a conservative Muslim lifestyle with her family, suddenly acquires superhuman powers and, despite the pressures of school and home, tries to use her abilities to help her community.
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Park bench
by Chabouté
An exploration of a park bench traces the often ignored object from its creation to its use by lovers, strangers, old friends, and others With his masterful illustration style, bestselling French creator-storyteller Chabouté (Alone, Moby-Dick) explores community through a common, often ignored object: the park bench.
From its creation, to its witness to the fresh ardor of lovers, the drudgery of businessmen, the various hopes of the many who enter its orbit, the park bench weathers all seasons. Strangers meet at it for the first time. Paramours carve their initials into it. Old friends sit and chat upon it for hours. Others ignore the bench, or (attempt to) sleep on it at night, or simply anchor themselves on it and absorb the ebb and flow of the area and its people.
Christophe Chabouté’s mastery of the visual medium turns this simple object into a thought-provoking and gorgeously wrought meditation on time, desire, and the life of communities all across the planet. This could be a bench in my hometown or yours—the people in this little drama are very much those we already recognize
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Blankets
by Craig Thompson
Blankets is the story of a young man coming of age and finding the confidence to express his creative voice. Craig Thompson's poignant graphic memoir plays out against the backdrop of a Midwestern winterscape: finely-hewn linework draws together a portrait of small town life, a rigorously fundamentalist Christian childhood, and a lonely, emotionally mixed-up adolescence.
Under an engulfing blanket of snow, Craig and Raina fall in love at winter church camp, revealing to one another their struggles with faith and their dreams of escape. Over time though, their personal demons resurface and their relationship falls apart. It's a universal story, and Thompson's vibrant brushstrokes and unique page designs make the familiar heartbreaking all over again.
This groundbreaking graphic novel, winner of two Eisner and three Harvey Awards, is an eloquent portrait of adolescent yearning; first love (and first heartache); faith in crisis; and the process of moving beyond all of that. Beautifully rendered in pen and ink, Thompson has created a love story that lasts.
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Dragonslippers : this is what an abusive relationship looks like
by Rosalind B. Penfold
A compelling and terrifying graphic memoir uses black-and-white drawings to chronicle the evolution of an abusive relationship, document her personal struggle for survival, and reveal the psychology of both the abuser and victim, the warning signs of abuse, and the need to seek help. Original.
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Through the woods : Stories
by Emily Carroll
Journey through the woods in this sinister, compellingly spooky collection that features four brand-new stories and one phenomenally popular tale in print for the first time. These are fairy tales gone seriously wrong, where you can travel to “Our Neighbor’s House”—though coming back might be a problem. Or find yourself a young bride in a house that holds a terrible secret in “A Lady’s Hands Are Cold.” You might try to figure out what is haunting “My Friend Janna,” or discover that your brother’s fiancée may not be what she seems in “The Nesting Place.” And of course you must revisit the horror of “His Face All Red,” the breakout webcomic hit that has been gorgeously translated to the printed page.
Already revered for her work online, award-winning comic creator Emily Carroll’s stunning visual style and impeccable pacing is on grand display in this entrancing anthology, her print debut."A collection of five spine-tingling short stories"
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The invention of Hugo Cabret : a novel in words and pictures
by Brian Selznick
Living in the walls of a busy Paris train station in 1931, clock keeper and orphan Hugo Cabret must constantly work to keep his secrets safe, but when an inquisitive girl and an old man who owns a toy store begin probing, he must do all he can to keep them at a safe distance.
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Blacksad : the collected stories
by Juan Díaz Canales
"Private Investigator John Blacksad has the unfortunate talent of getting into trouble wherever he goes. His enemies would say he can't help sticking his nose where it doesn't belong, but others would tell you that he is just a good cat trying to do the right thing in a bad world"
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Monstress. Book one
by Marjorie M Liu
Set in an alternate matriarchal 1900's Asia, in a richly imagined world of art deco-inflected steam punk, MONSTRESS tells the story of a teenage girl who is struggling to survive the trauma of war, and who shares a mysterious psychic link with a monster of tremendous power, a connection that will transform them both and make them the target of both human and otherworldly powers.
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Victor Lavalle's Destroyer
by Victor Lavalle
The legacy of Frankenstein’s monster collides with the sociopolitical tensions of the present-day United States.
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein beseeched his creator for love and companionship, but in 2017, the monster has long discarded any notions of peace or inclusion. He has become the Destroyer, his only goal to eliminate the scourge of humanity from the planet. In this goal, he initially finds a willing partner in Dr. Baker, a descendant of the Frankenstein family who has lost her teenage son after an encounter with the police. While two scientists, Percy and Byron, initially believe they’re brought to protect Dr. Baker from the monster, they soon realize they may have to protect the world from the monster and Dr. Baker’s wrath.
Written by lauded novelist Victor LaValle (The Devil In Silver, The Ballad of Black Tom), Destroyer is a harrowing tale exploring the legacies of love, loss, and vengeance placed firmly in the tense atmosphere and current events of the modern-day United States.
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Mis(h)adra
by Iasmin Omar Ata
An Arab-American college student struggles to live with epilepsy in this starkly colored and deeply-cutting graphic novel.
Isaac wants nothing more than to be a functional college student—but managing his epilepsy is an exhausting battle to survive. He attempts to maintain a balancing act between his seizure triggers and his day-to-day schedule, but he finds that nothing—not even his medication—seems to work. The doctors won’t listen, the schoolwork keeps piling up, his family is in denial about his condition, and his social life falls apart as he feels more and more isolated by his illness. Even with an unexpected new friend by his side, so much is up against him that Isaac is starting to think his epilepsy might be unbeatable.
Based on the author’s own experiences as an epileptic, Mis(h)adra is a boldly visual depiction of the daily struggles of living with a misunderstood condition in today’s hectic and uninformed work.
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It was the war of the trenches
by Jacques Tardi
A dark examination of World War I delves into the human cost of the war and the insanity of war by focusing on the doughboys on their day-to-day missions rather than the causes of the war, the politics, the strategies or the battles.
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Year of the rabbit
by Tian
Recounts the experiences of the author's family's exodus from Phnom Penh during the Khmer Rouge takeover, surviving in a work camp until they were able to escape Cambodia and become refugees.
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The best we could do : An Illustrated Memoir
by Thi Bui
The author describes her experiences as a young Vietnamese immigrant, highlighting her family's move from their war-torn home to the United States in graphic novel format.
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Oak Flat : a fight for sacred land in the American west
by Lauren Redniss
Three generations of an Apache family of activists race against time in a legal and cultural battle to protect sacred land from corrupt government officials and a multinational mining corporation. By the National Book Award finalist author of Radioactive. Illustrations.
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I will judge you by your bookshelf
by Grant Snider
"It's no secret, but we are judged by our bookshelves. We learn to read at an early age, and as we grow older we shed our beloved books for new ones. But some of us surround ourselves with books. We collect them, decorate with them, are inspired by them,and treat our books as sacred objects. In this lighthearted collection of one- and two-page comics, writer-artist Grant Snider explores bookishness in all its forms, and the love of writing and reading, building on the beloved literary comics featured onhis website, Incidental Comics."
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Hark! a Vagrant
by Kate Beaton
Hark! A Vagrant is an uproarious romp through history and literature seen through the sharp, contemporary lens of New Yorker cartoonist and comics sensation Kate Beaton. No era or tome emerges unscathed as Beaton rightly skewers the Western world's revolutionaries, leaders, sycophants, and suffragists while equally honing her wit on the hapless heroes, heroines, and villains of the best-loved fiction. She deftly points out what really happened when Brahms fell asleep listening to Liszt, that the world's first hipsters were obviously the Incroyables and the Merveilleuses from eighteenth-century France, that Susan B. Anthony is, of course, a "Samantha," and that the polite banality of Canadian culture never gets old. Hark! A Vagrant features sexy Batman, the true stories behind classic Nancy Drew covers, and Queen Elizabeth doing the albatross. As the 500,000 unique monthly visitors to harkavagrant.com already know, no one turns the ironic absurdities of history and literature into comedic fodder as hilariously as Beaton.
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The one hundred nights of hero : a graphic novel
by Isabel Greenberg
A sumptuously illustrated tapestry of folktales and myths about the secret legacy of female storytellers in an imagined medieval world follows the story of two women who turn the tables on two wicked men who would manipulate them for a wager.
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Relish : my life in the kitchen
by Lucy Knisley
A graphically illustrated, recipe-complemented memoir by the indie cartoonist author of French Milk describes her food-enriched youth as the daughter of a chef and a gourmet, key memories that were marked by special meals and the ways in which cooking has imparted valuable life lessons. Original.
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The Harlem Hellfighters
by Max Brooks
This fictionalized account of the first African-American regiment, called the Harlem Hellfighters by their enemies, to fight in World War I relates the heroic journey these soldiers undertook for a chance to fight for America.
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Unterzakhn
by Leela Corman
A mesmerizing, heartbreaking graphic novel of immigrant life on New York’s Lower East Side at the turn of the twentieth century, as seen through the eyes of twin sisters whose lives take radically and tragically different paths.
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Octavia Butler's Kindred : A Graphic Novel Adaptation
by Damian Duffy
Inexplicably pulled back in time to the antebellum South, a contemporary Black woman, raised in the age of Civil Rights and Black Power, must confront the harsh realities of Black history in America.
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Boundless
by Jillian Tamaki
Collects a series of comics that explore the virtual and real life world of contemporary women.
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