Title: Killing and Dying: Six Stories
Author: Adrian Tomine
Publisher: Faber and Faber
ISBN: 978-0571325146
Genre: Graphic Novel
Pages: 128
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5
A good graphic novel always seems to take away the blues. Well, most of the time that is if you aren’t reading one by Adrian Tomine. It will add to your blues. It will make you a bit melancholic and it will also make you never want to read it again. But it will also make you aware. It will make you realize your surroundings and the people in them and perhaps look at the world differently.
Adrian Tomine’s graphic works make you think so much more that it is sometimes unbelievable that graphic novels have that kind of power. “Killing and Dying” his latest offering is just that. It is a collection of six graphic stories. These slice of life stories depict life the way it is without any sugar coating. These stories are something which we have all experienced – ranging in themes from loneliness to body image issues to severe angst.
My favourite story in the entire collection is “Translated” which is about a Japanese mother and her child and their reconnection with the husband and the father. It is tender, funny and groundbreaking in the sense that none of the characters’ faces are shown.
“Killing and Dying” is perhaps one of the best comic books I’ve read this year. It is brief and full of small moments of sadness and joy. It is the kind of graphic book which everyone must read. Tomine does a stellar job of portraying his characters and makes the reader see the view that they would not have otherwise seen it. I would highly recommend this one.
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