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readbookswitha's review
5.0
My heart was breaking throughout this story, it was so beautiful. The mixture of surrealism and magic realism worked brilliantly.
The illustrations were very simple, but it only added to the subtle nature of the book. I highly recommend this!
The illustrations were very simple, but it only added to the subtle nature of the book. I highly recommend this!
bluepigeon's review
5.0
A fantastic graphic novel with captivating art and a well developed, fully fleshed out story. Characters are vivid, the mood is a character on its own, the animals talk and are always up to something mischievous, and the experience of online dating is spot on. I'm a Rachel Ball fan now.
kittyg's review
4.0
This book is the first graphic novel by Rachael Ball and I have to say I really really enjoyed reading and consuming it. Ball is an author who clearly not only knows how to illustrate a story, but has decided to go for an emotional story about her own experiences with developing breast cancer and the troubles this brings to the life she once knew.
The main character of this story is called Iris and she's a middle-aged zoo-keeper who has a pretty okay life, but isn't really 'going anywhere' just now. She soon ends up going to the Dr for a diagnosis of two lumps she discovers and from that point on this becomes a really emotional story blended with elements of magical realism and you're never too sure what's real and what's exaggerated in her psyche.
The story itself has a lot of dry, dark humour and even often references and adapts poetry to give haunting melodies. I felt that this really, truly fit with how our character of Isis, a very normal and ordinary woman dealing with all of this in her normal and ordinary way (avoiding it, drinking, chatting about other things with other people, dating) was more natural and organic a way to describe the feelings.
The emotional roller-coaster Cancer must cause for suffers is something I can only begin to imagine and feel for, but I felt as though this book did a fantastic job of getting across in graphic from just how confusing and muddling this can be. I thought Ball did a great job showing stages of denial and distraction, whilst also showing some of the stages of treatment and diagnosis and everyday life. I really did get the feeling that the author had either done her homework or experienced this herself (in the acknowledgements she says she did experience this) and I can totally see the raw connection she has with the story and the true way she illustrated it.
This is all drawn in pencil drawn imagery which is beautiful in and of itself, but it also has some really wonderful typefaces (all hand-drawn/painted) which illustrated moments and feelings very well too. I found that I fell in love with the character of Isis pretty fast, especially since she's not the conventional stick-thin lady character, she's got a body and she's happy enough with it. She's also an animal lover and seeing her interact with the animals was lovely.
Overall I really sped through this, but the whole while I was sinking deeper into the wonders and horrors of this terrible disease and the issues and ideas it can cause. It felt like a very genuine storyline and one which I could connect with a lot. Fabulous, 4.5*s from me!
The main character of this story is called Iris and she's a middle-aged zoo-keeper who has a pretty okay life, but isn't really 'going anywhere' just now. She soon ends up going to the Dr for a diagnosis of two lumps she discovers and from that point on this becomes a really emotional story blended with elements of magical realism and you're never too sure what's real and what's exaggerated in her psyche.
The story itself has a lot of dry, dark humour and even often references and adapts poetry to give haunting melodies. I felt that this really, truly fit with how our character of Isis, a very normal and ordinary woman dealing with all of this in her normal and ordinary way (avoiding it, drinking, chatting about other things with other people, dating) was more natural and organic a way to describe the feelings.
The emotional roller-coaster Cancer must cause for suffers is something I can only begin to imagine and feel for, but I felt as though this book did a fantastic job of getting across in graphic from just how confusing and muddling this can be. I thought Ball did a great job showing stages of denial and distraction, whilst also showing some of the stages of treatment and diagnosis and everyday life. I really did get the feeling that the author had either done her homework or experienced this herself (in the acknowledgements she says she did experience this) and I can totally see the raw connection she has with the story and the true way she illustrated it.
This is all drawn in pencil drawn imagery which is beautiful in and of itself, but it also has some really wonderful typefaces (all hand-drawn/painted) which illustrated moments and feelings very well too. I found that I fell in love with the character of Isis pretty fast, especially since she's not the conventional stick-thin lady character, she's got a body and she's happy enough with it. She's also an animal lover and seeing her interact with the animals was lovely.
Overall I really sped through this, but the whole while I was sinking deeper into the wonders and horrors of this terrible disease and the issues and ideas it can cause. It felt like a very genuine storyline and one which I could connect with a lot. Fabulous, 4.5*s from me!
brandijanee's review
1.0
**1.5 stars**
This was such a strange story. I like some parts of the art style but this just wasn't the story for me.
This was such a strange story. I like some parts of the art style but this just wasn't the story for me.
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