Unbalanced narrative but striking art—best for fans of minutiae.
Gil's graphic novel provides a detailed look at a massive World War II operation, from the planning and logistics to the blood and guts required to see it through.
British spy John Hewson has gathered crucial intelligence that could help turn the tide of the war, but delivering it from behind enemy lines won’t be easy, even with the Nazis preoccupied by Operation Market Garden, an immense Allied effort to break the stalemate on the European front and bring the war to a close. Gil gives us pulse-pounding escapes from the Germans’ tightening noose, stealthy assassinations of enemy combatants, and explosive firefights that test a soldier’s mettle. He also gives us pages of dense exposition that situate the dramatic moments in the larger context of the war but also bring the narrative to a crawl as the reader slogs through panels plastered with text. The book presents itself as Hewson's story, but muddying that focus and robbing some personal moments of their punch are frequent shifts in perspective—from Hewson to the Germans chasing him to a company of British soldiers to Dwight D. Eisenhower himself, not to mention periodic jumps to omniscient narration that fill in backstory and detail troop movements and tactics. One wishes Gil could’ve woven the history and context more naturally into the narrative rather than inserting the recurring infodumps. The art is compellingly realistic, with excellent attention given to facial expressions and anatomy as well as to the machinery of war. The colors and lines have a thick, clumpy quality that, combined with the realism of the images, lends the work a digital, rotoscoped feel. The action is intense and the violence is brutal without being gory.
Unbalanced narrative but striking art—best for fans of minutiae.Pub Date: May 19, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-68247-463-1
Page Count: 152
Publisher: Dead Reckoning/Naval Institute Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
A clever and timely conversation on reclaiming identity and acknowledging one’s full worth.
Superman confronts racism and learns to accept himself with the help of new friends.
In this graphic-novel adaptation of the 1940s storyline entitled “The Clan of the Fiery Cross” from The Adventures of Superman radio show, readers are reintroduced to the hero who regularly saves the day but is unsure of himself and his origins. The story also focuses on Roberta Lee, a young Chinese girl. She and her family have just moved from Chinatown to Metropolis proper, and mixed feelings abound. Jimmy Olsen, Lois Lane’s colleague from the Daily Planet, takes a larger role here, befriending his new neighbors, the Lees. An altercation following racial slurs directed at Roberta’s brother after he joins the local baseball team escalates into an act of terrorism by the Klan of the Fiery Kross. What starts off as a run-of-the-mill superhero story then becomes a nuanced and personal exploration of the immigrant experience and blatant and internalized racism. Other main characters are White, but Black police inspector William Henderson fights his own battles against prejudice. Clean lines, less-saturated coloring, and character designs reminiscent of vintage comics help set the tone of this period piece while the varied panel cuts and action scenes give it a more modern sensibility. Cantonese dialogue is indicated through red speech bubbles; alien speech is in green.
A clever and timely conversation on reclaiming identity and acknowledging one’s full worth. (author’s note, bibliography) (Graphic fiction. 13-adult)Pub Date: May 12, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-77950-421-0
Page Count: 240
Publisher: DC
Review Posted Online: Feb. 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
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