From Powells.com
Our favorite books of the year.
Synopses & Reviews
"One of the most gifted graphic novelists of our time." —Wired
Killing and Dying
is a stunning showcase of the possibilities of the graphic novel medium
and a wry exploration of loss, creative ambition, identity, and family
dynamics. With this work, Adrian Tomine (Shortcomings, Scenes from an Impending Marriage)
reaffirms his place not only as one of the most significant creators of
contemporary comics, but as one of the great voices of modern American
literature. His gift for capturing emotion and intellect resonates here:
the weight of love and its absence, the pride and disappointment of
family, the anxiety and hopefulness of being alive in the twenty-first
century.
“Amber Sweet” shows the disastrous impact of mistaken identity in a
hyper-connected world; “A Brief History of the Art Form Known as
Hortisculpture” details the invention and destruction of a vital new art
form in short comic strips; “Translated, from the Japanese,” is a lush,
full-color display of storytelling through still images; the title
story, "Killing and Dying", centers on parenthood, mortality, and
stand-up comedy. In six interconnected, darkly funny stories, Tomine
forms a quietly moving portrait of contemporary life.
Adrian Tomine is a master of the small gesture, equally deft at
signaling emotion via a subtle change of expression or writ large across
landscapes illustrated in full color. Killing and Dying is a fraught, realist masterpiece.
Review
"Graphically, Tomine excels at imbuing every figure — big or
small — with individualized traits (hands on hips, cocked shoulder),
giving the sense that the story's focus could shift deep into the
background and still find rich, full life. Achingly human and divinely
rendered." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"…there is some category confusion when it comes to a book like Adrian Tomine's Killing and Dying.
"Graphic short story" doesn't sound quite right, but how else to
describe the half-dozen vignettes in this collection, each one bristling
with acute observations and piquant ironies? These tales — pocket epics
of romantic, creative and social frustration set in recognizably drab,
drably picturesque American landscapes — certainly invite comparison to
the work of words-only short-form masters like Raymond Carver, Ann
Beattie and Mary Gaitskill, and for that matter O. Henry himself. You
can almost forget you're looking at drawings. Which is of course
testimony to the skill of the draftsman. Tomine's lines are so clean and
precise, his compositions so natural-looking, that it's easy to treat
his images as transparent vessels of meaning, the cellophane wrapper
enfolding the tart, bright candy of the plot. But even his smallest,
plainest panels are heavy with subtext, thick with unstated emotion and
full of the kind of information that can never quite be conveyed in
language." The New York Times Book Review