The Comedian
07-24-2009, 11:13 AM
I'm always looking for graphic novels (comic books) that I can hand to my snobby elitist friends and other similarly open-minded individuals and say to them, "comics can really be this good". Then, after I tell them that, if they're ashamed to read the book publicly (for fear of the shame it would bring upon them), I recommend they read the book at home, behind closed doors in the quiet hours of the night (away from friends and family) when they might otherwise browse for free porn on the internet. This type of assurance often leads to acceptance. And they take the book.
Well, Alan's War: The Memories of G.I. Alan Cope by Emmanuel Guibert is not porn. It's a comic book that is created to parallel the conversations between the Guibert (who wrote and illustrated the text) and Cope about his experiences in World War II as an American serviceman.
But this book is not a Holocaust book, nor a "war" book really. Cope enters the war as it is ending, and he travels around Europe seeing the aftermath of the war and making numerous relationships with solders and war torn Europeans. Indeed, the narrative structure focuses not actions or events in the WWII time table, but on anecdotes about the people he met and friends he made there.
Guibert's ink-wash illustrations serve the "recalled" feeling perfectly, offering a hazy gray world that is both a reflection of the smokey remains Europe and the wispy structure of the memory on which the story is built.
In all, Alan's War is a book in which "nothing much happens [for a war novel]" to quote my wife. But we each found it incredibly difficult to put down.
8.8/10 artist's paint brushes!
Well, Alan's War: The Memories of G.I. Alan Cope by Emmanuel Guibert is not porn. It's a comic book that is created to parallel the conversations between the Guibert (who wrote and illustrated the text) and Cope about his experiences in World War II as an American serviceman.
But this book is not a Holocaust book, nor a "war" book really. Cope enters the war as it is ending, and he travels around Europe seeing the aftermath of the war and making numerous relationships with solders and war torn Europeans. Indeed, the narrative structure focuses not actions or events in the WWII time table, but on anecdotes about the people he met and friends he made there.
Guibert's ink-wash illustrations serve the "recalled" feeling perfectly, offering a hazy gray world that is both a reflection of the smokey remains Europe and the wispy structure of the memory on which the story is built.
In all, Alan's War is a book in which "nothing much happens [for a war novel]" to quote my wife. But we each found it incredibly difficult to put down.
8.8/10 artist's paint brushes!