Classics often pale in their retelling, but this homage to Ferrante’s epic shines with its own light.
Ferrante’s now-classic saga of an enduring yet complex female friendship shape-shifts once again, this time into a graphic novel.
In Lagani’s streamlined adaptation of the first of four Neapolitan novels, Ferrante’s original narrator, Lenù, does double duty as the (fictional) illustrator of the early years in her complicated lifelong friendship with Lila. “Her” drawings, maps, and illustrations trace the girls’ relationship from childhood through Lila’s marriage. Cerri, the actual illustrator, captures the girls’ environments and moods in gestural, atmospheric drawings that convey the menacing atmosphere of postwar Naples as well as the girls’ determination to move beyond the boundaries imposed on them by family, culture, and economic circumstance. This re-envisioned account necessarily telescopes some backstory and motivation but remains faithful to the broad outlines of the character development and Byzantine plot points found in the original. Readers unfamiliar with the works underlying this iteration of the story—Ferrante’s original books and the hit HBO miniseries from which Cerri drew visual inspiration—may find some incidents puzzling to parse, such as schoolgirl Lila’s apparent fall from an apartment window. (Ferrante’s legion of devoted fans will connect the dots between her father’s anger and Lila’s ejection from the window.) Aspects of the narrative that benefit from Cerri’s visual storytelling include the first episode of “dissolving boundaries” that will plague Lila throughout her life and Lenù’s competitive concerns about the differences between the girls’ maturing adolescent bodies. (Cerri previously illustrated Ferrante’s earlier “picture book,” the mordant The Beach at Night, but delivers less nightmarish visions here.) Goldstein, responsible for translating Ferrante’s prior works from Italian into English, continues that heroic undertaking with a sensitive translation of Lagani’s text consistent with the original.
Classics often pale in their retelling, but this homage to Ferrante’s epic shines with its own light.Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2023
ISBN: 9781609459468
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.
The sequel to It Ends With Us (2016) shows the aftermath of domestic violence through the eyes of a single mother.
Lily Bloom is still running a flower shop; her abusive ex-husband, Ryle Kincaid, is still a surgeon. But now they’re co-parenting a daughter, Emerson, who's almost a year old. Lily won’t send Emerson to her father’s house overnight until she’s old enough to talk—“So she can tell me if something happens”—but she doesn’t want to fight for full custody lest it become an expensive legal drama or, worse, a physical fight. When Lily runs into Atlas Corrigan, a childhood friend who also came from an abusive family, she hopes their friendship can blossom into love. (For new readers, their history unfolds in heartfelt diary entries that Lily addresses to Finding Nemo star Ellen DeGeneres as she considers how Atlas was a calming presence during her turbulent childhood.) Atlas, who is single and running a restaurant, feels the same way. But even though she’s divorced, Lily isn’t exactly free. Behind Ryle’s veneer of civility are his jealousy and resentment. Lily has to plan her dates carefully to avoid a confrontation. Meanwhile, Atlas’ mother returns with shocking news. In between, Lily and Atlas steal away for romantic moments that are even sweeter for their authenticity as Lily struggles with child care, breastfeeding, and running a business while trying to find time for herself.
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-668-00122-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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
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