Scan barcode
A review by chantaal
Palimpsest: Documents from a Korean Adoption by Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
4.0
Palimpsest is the type of memoir that I'm not always comfortable assigning a rating, because it's such a deeply personal accounting of someone's life. I will go with a 4 star simply because I had some issues with the art. At its heart, this is the story of Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom's search for the truth behind her adoption, and the depth of emotion and confusion that comes with that search.
I grabbed this from the library on a whim, and I had no real idea what to expect. I suppose I thought it would just be a memoir about an adoptee's life story, but it ended up being SO much more than that. Surprisingly, Lisa's search began to unearth the somewhat shady practices of international adoption, focusing heavily on the fact that she can never find any documents or truth to support anything she's told about it. She and her husband hit brick wall after brick wall of poorly maintained files, and even agencies hiding documents from her to protect themselves. Because "things were done differently back then," don't you know.
The art is very simple, the color palette an almost off-putting drab brown. But in the end the simplicity worked for me. I do wonder if graphic novel format was the best for this...there is so much text, that I think the information could have been given just as easily and just as emotionally in a written memoir. The art itself didn't do much to support the emotion or action taking place, as it is very simple.
Sjöblom does much to try to balance her own emotional journey with the journey of her adoption, and despite there being a ton of text to work though, I think it comes together nicely.
I certainly had no idea of adoption stories like this beyond horror stories that seem so disconnected from my own day to day life that they could be ripped from movie or TV storylines. Palimpsest does great work as an emotional anecdotal story, while also being educational at the same time.
I grabbed this from the library on a whim, and I had no real idea what to expect. I suppose I thought it would just be a memoir about an adoptee's life story, but it ended up being SO much more than that. Surprisingly, Lisa's search began to unearth the somewhat shady practices of international adoption, focusing heavily on the fact that she can never find any documents or truth to support anything she's told about it. She and her husband hit brick wall after brick wall of poorly maintained files, and even agencies hiding documents from her to protect themselves. Because "things were done differently back then," don't you know.
The art is very simple, the color palette an almost off-putting drab brown. But in the end the simplicity worked for me. I do wonder if graphic novel format was the best for this...there is so much text, that I think the information could have been given just as easily and just as emotionally in a written memoir. The art itself didn't do much to support the emotion or action taking place, as it is very simple.
Sjöblom does much to try to balance her own emotional journey with the journey of her adoption, and despite there being a ton of text to work though, I think it comes together nicely.
I certainly had no idea of adoption stories like this beyond horror stories that seem so disconnected from my own day to day life that they could be ripped from movie or TV storylines. Palimpsest does great work as an emotional anecdotal story, while also being educational at the same time.