Are You My Mother? by Alison Bechdel

Alison Bechdel's Fun Home might be my favourite book ever, so I was very excited to pick up her newest memoir in comic strip format, Are You My Mother?, when I was in Chicago last month for the Comics Philosophy and Practice conference.

Bechdel at conference in Chicago.
Background image from Fun Home.

Are You My Mother? is just as fabulous as Fun Home. With the same self-deprecating humour and poignancy that she used to examine her relationship with her father, Bechdel dissects her interactions with her mother. It is more complicated, partly because her mother is still alive. It is even more personally revealing than her previous work. Bechdel has spent her life wanting more from her mother than her mother is equipped to give. Her struggle is to come to terms with that fact, and to accept the gifts of strength and independence that she received from her mother.

Bechdel has a large fan base of lesbians who, like me, have followed her since her early Dykes to Watch Out For comic strips. With the release of her two memoirs, her readership has broadened and now people of all stripes are finding relevance in her work.

When I'm talking to folks who are new to graphic novels, I always say to go slow. It takes time to absorb visual information and to synthesize it with printed text. This advice especially holds true with Are You My Mother? The pages are dense and the narrative is layered. It makes for a rich experience that rewards re-reading. (My sweetie has read it twice already.)

Bechdel's artwork is highly controlled, yet expressive. In Chicago, she talked about her need for accuracy. This is reflected in her careful imagery. While she chooses her words skillfully as well -- and there is plenty of written text in Are You My Mother? -- Bechdel knows when pictures say it best. I love the way she depicts her response to her therapist's question about her religious beliefs:

from Are You My Mother, p 103

Very highly recommended. Readalike: Stitches by David Small.

Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

Writing about Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead yesterday reminded me of 2011's National Book Award-winning novel by Jesmyn Ward which I read awhile back but haven't yet mentioned here. Salvage the Bones takes place over a period of 12 days in a backwoods coastal town in Mississippi.

15-year-old Esch is the narrator, telling us about the simmering tensions in her dirt-poor family while hurricane Katrina is building off the Gulf of Mexico. She and her three brothers share a fierce love and loyalty, protecting each other from their alcoholic father's volatile temper. Her brothers' involvement in illegal dog fighting, a basketball game with a scholarship riding on it, and the coming storm all add to Esch's main concern. Her pregnancy is just starting to show and she hasn't talked to anyone about it yet.

Readalikes: We the Animals by Justin Torres and AD: New Orleans After the Deluge by Josh Neufeld.

Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead

Private eye Claire DeWitt has been solving mysteries since she was twelve. She's a gal who is willing to ingest pretty much anything. She's like a Nancy Drew who studied with Carlos Castaneda.

"A few months ago, after a hard case, I'd gone on a fast to purify myself from its ill effects. I stopped eating. I stopped sleeping. I did not stop using drugs. A week went by, then two, then a month. After fourteen days, I could see the codes in grocery receipts and billboards. After thirty days I could read clues in the wind, see signs in the clouds." Some hospital time follows.

The job that Claire thinks of as the Case of the Green Parrot takes place a year and a half after Hurricane Katrina. A man in New Orleans hires her to find out what happened to his uncle, who disappeared during the big storm. Claire tells her client that she is 42, even though she is 35, because "no one trusts a woman under forty."

Constance Darling taught Claire the finer points of detection. There was always something going on at her mansion in New Orleans. "The day before it had been Constance's meditation teacher, Dorje, in his saffron robes, making mushroom tea in the kitchen. The day before that we'd interviewed a German shepherd. Life was never dull with Constance." "She taught me to read fingerprints like tea leaves and eyes like maps."

Claire casts the I Ching for clues. A scrap of paper stuck to her shoe? Definitely important. Drug-addled dreams supply more clues. Mornings are hard: "I need food. But first I need to take a shower. In coffee." 

Strangers are often fearful of Claire, based on her appearance: "I'd dressed in a hurry and I wasn't at my visual best. I wore boots, jeans, two black sweaters, and a red vintage women's overcoat with an ermine collar that probably should have been retired. I was also suffering from an unfortunate homemade haircut/bleach job that had involved pinking shears." Claire has few friends... and even they won't take her calls.

Claire trusts that all will be revealed if she pays attention as she moves through a world of crime and corruption.

"The hardest thing about buying a gun in Louisiana was that there were so many options I hardly knew where to begin. I heard shots at least once a day. Half the men in the city wore clothes so big, they could carry an arsenal under them. Out of the sliver by the river, spent casings and shells crunched underfoot on the sidewalk like crack vials or fall leaves. The suburbs west of the city were lined with pawnshops that advertised $99 SPECIAL ON 9 MILLIMETER and HANDGUN SALE and SPECIAL ON UZIS."

"[T]his city knows how to tell a beautiful story. But if you're looking for a happy ending, you better be lookin' somewhere else." Author Sara Gran knows how to tell a spellbinding story. She has created an unforgettable character in Claire DeWitt and I sure hope to encounter her again.

Readalikes that match the noir crime aspect where the difference between the good guys and bad is unclear, because everyone is both, plus stylish writing and some humour: The Monkey's Mask by Dorothy Porter; and pretty much anything by James Sallis or Walter Mosley. I was also reminded of the Micky Knight lesbian detective series by J.M. Redmann (beginning with Death by the Riverside) because of the female sleuth in one dangerous situation after another in New Orleans.

What makes Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead so crazy good is how unusual it is. For readers like me who are attracted to the new and different, not necessarily noir, try: Please Ignore Vera Dietz (A.S. King); or The Many Revenges of Kip Flynn (Sean Dixon).

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Erin Morgenstern's Victorian-era fantasy, The Night Circus, has already received much attention. Two old magicians each train a student from early childhood in order to use them as pawns in their game. The competition takes the form of a fabulous circus and lasts for many years. The entirely black-and-white circus contains marvels of every kind. The conceit that circus goers remain totally ignorant of the fact that magic makes it all happen seems pretty far-fetched, however.

As often happens with something that I've been meaning to read for ages, it was the audiobook that propelled the story from TBR to reading underway. The incomparable Jim Dale is the narrator for the Random House edition [13.5 hours]. Morgenstern's broad cast of characters are all pretty much placeholders to move the action forward, but Dale imbues each person with vitality and a distinct voice. I don't know if I would have persevered with the printed book but I enjoyed being immersed via audio. The circus itself is the star of the novel.

I would recommend this to readers who enjoy historical fiction imbued with magic and a touch of romance.

Learning to Swim by Sara J. Henry

While riding on a ferry, Troy Chance happens to see something fall from the rear deck of the opposite ferry. "It could have been a bundle of trash; it could have been a child-sized doll. Either was more likely than what I thought I saw: a small wide-eyed human face, in one tiny frozen moment as it plummeted toward the water."

Without stopping to think, Troy dives into Lake Champlain and she rescues the child. This is the story of what happens next. Troy, a freelance sportswriter living in Lake Placid, encounters the dangerous world of kidnapping and murder. She also finds herself attracted to two new men that she meets as a result of saving the boy, but loving either of them presents more than the usual risks.

I was grateful that the plot kept me turning pages because there was far more romancey stuff in the middle than I usually tolerate. I would recommend this especially to readers who enjoy romantic suspense that moves at a sedate pace.

Neuromancer by William Gibson

Neuromancer was first published 28 years ago, but William Gibson's classic story about sentient computers still feels fresh. It is compelling, inventive and suspenseful. As with all the best science fiction, it combines physical and intellectual adventure in a complex world. It won all three of the major science fiction awards: the Nebula, the Hugo and the Philip K. Dick.

I've been meaning to read this book for years and recently listened to the Random House audiobook 20th anniversary edition [10.5 hours], read by Robertson Dean. It includes an introduction by the author and a lengthy afterword by Jack Womack.

I expected it to be bleak, but it was almost upbeat... considering that Case, the central character, is a drug-addicted, suicidal computer hacker. He and a ninja-like mercenary named Molly are hired to steal some well-protected code. Molly has had extensive body modifications, including lightning-quick responses, mirrored implants over her eyes, and claws made of 4-inch blades that retract under her fingernails. The story is set in an unspecified near-future on Earth; that there isn't a date perhaps helps it to remain relevant today. Case ventures into a cyberspace world that could have been imagined under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs. It's a wild ride from gritty start to bittersweet finish. Wow.

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne / P. Craig Russell / Jill Thompson

I was 12 years old when I read Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, so naturally I had forgotten many of the details. Reading When She Woke prompted me to pick up the Classics Illustrated comics edition of The Scarlet Letter, adapted by P. Craig Russell and Jill Thompson. It was enjoyable to find more correlations between Hillary Jordan's and Hawthorne's work than I had remembered, like the red rose at the prison door, Hester's/Hannah's needlework, and the baby named Pearl.

Memories of experiencing this text as my younger self came back as I read the Puritan dialogue: "Goodwives, if only we women of virtue should have the handle of such as this Hester Prynne, would she come off with such a merciful sentence? Marry, I trow not!"

These adult women of the 17th century were as mean and intolerant as some of the girls I knew at school. I admired Hester's integrity and wept at the injustice of her situation. My youngest aunt was 16 and unmarried when she had a child; that happened a few years before I read The Scarlet Letter. Her baby's father remained a mystery, but my aunt and little cousin were treated well by everyone, as far as I could tell. I was very thankful that we didn't live in the time and place I discovered in that book. As an adult reader, I can see that this whole tale is an allegory, but that was totally above my head 40 years ago.

Hawthorne's lush prose is much abbreviated in the comics edition, of course, but the flavour remains. The art suits the story well. Watercolour illustrations are in muted shades of blue, green, red and brown. The layout features many interesting shifts in perspective. Very nicely done.