You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
cosbrarian 's review for:
Baby's in Black: Astrid Kirchherr, Stuart Sutcliffe and The Beatles
by Arne Bellstorf
I was pretty excited to pick up this graphic novel about Stuart Sutcliffe "The Fifth Beatle", and his relationship with photographer Astrid Kirchherr. I, like almost every single other person on god's green earth, love The Beatles, and I liked the looks of the artwork. It has a very cute '60s feel, but is also very dark - probably partly in part to Astrid's love of the color black. The darkness also fits the sort of 1960s beatnik Germany setting.
What made the book fall flat for me, unfortunately, was the lack of clarity in the artwork. The male characters are very difficult to distinguish from each other, particularly Sutcliffe and Klause. It's hard to follow when we change settings and zoom forward in time. The writing is simple, and that's fine - but the ending is incredibly abrupt (I think readers need closure from things as well as the people who actually experience said things! haha)
(since it's a true story about a very famous band, I feel a little funny having just been vague about the circumstances of the ending, but I actually didn't know that was how things turned out so I won't spoil it for anyone else who only knows some of the Beatles story.)
Big Beatles fans might really enjoy this book, but I think it is hard to follow, and was a little disappointed.
What made the book fall flat for me, unfortunately, was the lack of clarity in the artwork. The male characters are very difficult to distinguish from each other, particularly Sutcliffe and Klause. It's hard to follow when we change settings and zoom forward in time. The writing is simple, and that's fine - but the ending is incredibly abrupt (I think readers need closure from things as well as the people who actually experience said things! haha)
(since it's a true story about a very famous band, I feel a little funny having just been vague about the circumstances of the ending, but I actually didn't know that was how things turned out so I won't spoil it for anyone else who only knows some of the Beatles story.)
Big Beatles fans might really enjoy this book, but I think it is hard to follow, and was a little disappointed.