Synopses & Reviews
In her graphic memoirs, -best selling cartoonist Lucy Knisley paints a warts-and-all portrait of contemporary, twentysomething womanhood, like writer Lena Dunham (). In the next installment of her graphic travelogue series, , Knisley volunteers to watch over her ailing grandparents on a cruise. (The book's watercolors evoke the ocean that surrounds them.) In a book that is part graphic memoir, part travelogue, and part family history, Knisley not only tries to connect with her grandparents, but to reconcile their younger and older selves. She is aided in her quest by her grandfather's WWII memoir, which is excerpted. Readers will identify with Knisley's frustration, her fears, her compassion, and her attempts to come to terms with mortality, as she copes with the stress of travel complicated by her grandparents' frailty.
Review
"Knisley has a great eye for what makes travel fun: what's different, what's delicious, cool museums, cute kitties, history, even the strange inconveniences." Brian Heater Paper
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"Knisley is extraordinarily talented at journal comics, with clean-line, attractive figures and a good eye for summing up moments in scattered illustrations. ... The overall message, that caretaking for others is an incredibly difficult, exhausting task, should not be surprising, but Knisley's well-selected details brings it home in sympathetic pain, fatigue, and loneliness. It's horrific but important." J. Caleb Mozzocco Robot 6
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"[Knisley's] art is terrific and getting even better. ...[H]er craft and heart keep this volume from turning into a bummer and a disaster like her trip." Richard Pachter
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"In this sensitive graphic memoir, ...Knisley finds both the humor and the sadness in her grandparents' condition while also pointing out the loneliness of being the only one responsible for caregiving and the frustration she feels for how the elderly are feared and ignored in modern America. ... is a timely and mature work that pairs perfectly with other elder-care titles, such as Roz Chast's " The Miami Herald
Review
"A cruise with your elderly grandparents is probably not the most appealing prospect for a typical 20-something. But cartoonist Lucy Knisley turns this potentially joy-sapping experience into the funny and heartfelt graphic memoir . ... There's a sunniness to her sarcasm, even as she faces the reality of her grandparents' declining health." Snow Wildsmith Booklist
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"Knisley's able to achieve an impressive balance between humor and poignancy, juxtaposing observations on the bizarre line-up of nighttime entertainment and the strangeness of her fellow passengers with thoughtful observations on aging and excerpts from her grandfather's World War II journals." Tim O'Shea Robot 6
Review
"Each of Lucy Knisley's memoirs has been stronger than the last, and continues that rising arc. ... As Roz Chast did with her parents in , Knisley paints a true portrait of old age, never denying the unpleasant realities of illness and dementia but never letting her grandparents dwindle to just that. ...Knisley pays tribute to them by telling their story as well as her own." Gene Ambaum Unshelved
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"...[T]he book [transforms from] a chronicle of the humorous-in-retrospect hardships she faced into a sort of meditation on aging, of life as a whole thing incorporating past as well as present and Knisley's family story. ... Despite the many travails she faced on her travels, it ends up being a pretty positive experience for all involved...including, of course, the reader." Brigid Alverson Robot 6
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"...[T]he quality that's made
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"...[T]he quality that's made
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"Knisley volunteers to chaperone her ninety-year-old grandparents on their Caribbean cruise and ends up on another transformative journey, this time headlong into her fears about aging and death.
Review
"...[T]he quality that's made
Synopsis
In the latest volume of her graphic travelogue series, best selling cartoonist Lucy Knisley must care for her grandparents on a cruise.
About the Author
Lucy Knisley is a cartoonist and occasional puppeteer, ukulele player, and food/travel writer living in Chicago, IL. She is a graduate of The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Center for Cartoon Studies.