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brogan7's review
4.5
"Funny things autobiographies...you start out to record events in your life...and the process becomes an event in itself, capable of transforming your perceptions of those previous events and even your life, itself..." (p.115)
An autobiography of his life with spina bifida. (He was told he would never walk...but eventually did.) The learning-to-walk scenes are some of the most evocative sequences in this book, to me.
I also liked his confrontation of the Christian religion teacher.
Honest & raw and truthfully, some pages I didn't "get"...but it's a courageous story on many levels (he draws himself naked so many times!)--and such a history of people beating him up.
An autobiography of his life with spina bifida. (He was told he would never walk...but eventually did.) The learning-to-walk scenes are some of the most evocative sequences in this book, to me.
I also liked his confrontation of the Christian religion teacher.
Honest & raw and truthfully, some pages I didn't "get"...but it's a courageous story on many levels (he draws himself naked so many times!)--and such a history of people beating him up.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
mrsbooknerd's review
1.0
This book was recommended to me as being 'unique', an autobiography through drawing. That idea appealed to me greatly. I loved the idea of someone telling me their story through art. Unfortunately I didn't think it was as well done as it could have been.
The narrative was very abstract, chunks of time scattered throughout the book rather than a progressing 'story'. I actually kind of liked that contrast; segments where our author struggled to accept that he was different and the next section he was older, calmer and more at ease with his condition. Al wanted an explanation for his condition in a way that only a child can. I don't think this was 'self-pity' as another reviewer commented, but it is that black and white child's world. Why can she walk, but I can't? Give me an explanation. Tell me why that is fair and just..!
Unfortunately I found that it jumped around too much, and it wasn't entirely clear at which point we were in the overall timeline. I couldn't gauge his age based on the artwork either and so struggled to pinpoint his emotions based on the images alone.
The art work was a tad hard for me to discern, so I relied very heavily on the huge amounts of text. Sometimes I barely looked at the images, or did so as an after-thought. Unfortunately I found the text rather small and cramped, sometimes peering into the book with a terrible frown on my face to try to understand. Even the larger writing was sometimes difficult to read because it was rather scrawling.
In summary I would say I liked the idea behind this novel, but not necessarily the end-product.
The narrative was very abstract, chunks of time scattered throughout the book rather than a progressing 'story'. I actually kind of liked that contrast; segments where our author struggled to accept that he was different and the next section he was older, calmer and more at ease with his condition. Al wanted an explanation for his condition in a way that only a child can. I don't think this was 'self-pity' as another reviewer commented, but it is that black and white child's world. Why can she walk, but I can't? Give me an explanation. Tell me why that is fair and just..!
Unfortunately I found that it jumped around too much, and it wasn't entirely clear at which point we were in the overall timeline. I couldn't gauge his age based on the artwork either and so struggled to pinpoint his emotions based on the images alone.
The art work was a tad hard for me to discern, so I relied very heavily on the huge amounts of text. Sometimes I barely looked at the images, or did so as an after-thought. Unfortunately I found the text rather small and cramped, sometimes peering into the book with a terrible frown on my face to try to understand. Even the larger writing was sometimes difficult to read because it was rather scrawling.
In summary I would say I liked the idea behind this novel, but not necessarily the end-product.
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