Read 103 of 2022. Our Colors by Gengoroh Tagame. Translated from the Japanese by Anne Ishii

Title: Our Colors
Author: Gengoroh Tagame
Translated from the Japanese by Anne Ishii Publisher: Pantheon
ISBN: 978-1524748562
Genre: Graphic novel, LGBTQIA
Pages: 528
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

I honestly wish I had a book such as Our Colors to read and understand myself better as I was growing up gay. It was not an easy time then, and maybe it isn’t now as well, but there is information, there are other people’s experiences, and I would like to think and believe that people communicate and speak with each other about being gay/queer/alternate or different sexuality/sexual identity a lot more now than what they used to, when I came out in the late 90s.

This book is also about friendship and the nature of empathy more than anything. Yes, it is about a 16-year-old’s coming out journey and it is also about identity confusion, of how the world works, of how it views people who are “different”, and what comes after that, but it is also about love, hope, friendship, and what it takes to be yourself.

Tagame’s explores the friendship of between Mr. Amamiya and Sora with so much grace, maturity, and emotion that I couldn’t help but also weep in some places. It was in a sense, that cathartic for me. Sometimes I wonder what would it be like had my father and I spoke about me being gay? How would have that turned out for me? What would it be like to speak with an older gay man as I was growing up? And that’s precisely what technology enables today – the freedom to speak with someone who has been there, but with caution.

Sora could be any teenager but he isn’t. There is something about him that Tagame shows the reader – the way he views the world in colours, of how he categorizes people that way as well, and how his emotions are also connected all with colours. It is beautiful how the entire manga is in black and white, and yet I could picture colour whenever Tagame mentioned it in the text.

The translation of the text by Anne Ishii is sparse, beautiful, and to the point. It is right in beat with Tagame’s illustrations and story-telling. Our Colors is a beautiful book that I encourage everyone to read, cis-het or not. It is wonderful and might even teach you how to view the world differently.

Princess Princess Ever After by Katie O’Neill

Title: Princess Princess Ever After Author: Katie O’Neill
Publisher: Oni Press 
ISBN: 978-1620103401
Genre: Graphic Novel, LGBTQIA, Fantasy Comics 
Pages: 56 
Source: Publisher 
Rating: 5/5 

This month started off with a great, short read, a one that warmed my heart big time (well, to put it that way). Princess Princess Ever After is a graphic fairy tale of two princesses saving each other, of them not needing any prince, of a prince who also needs saving, of empathy, and most of all to just be who you were always meant to.

Princess Princess Ever After is a very short graphic novel of love that transcends gender, and above all about what it feels like to come to your own. Amira isn’t here for heteronormativity and she’s learning how to be a hero. She is on the move to save people, riding her pink unicorn. Along the way she meets Sadie, a princess who needs to be saved from the abuse of her sister, and together they will find their way, along with an unlikely prince.

This in short is what this webcomic (now a book) is about. Princess Princess Ever After breaks all boundaries of storytelling, making us see other ways of being, living, and loving. Katie O’Neill breaks patriarchy one page after another. They do it with humour, fun, and lots of heart. Read this book this Pride. Read it anytime actually.

Heartstopper: Volume 1 by Alice Oseman

Title: Heartstopper: Volume 1
Author: Alice Oseman
Publisher: Hodder Children’s Books
ISBN: 9781444951387
Genre: Graphic Novel
Pages: 263
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5 stars

I’ve been waiting to read this one. Heartstopper is a story of two boys, Charlie and Nick, studying at the same school. Charlie is gay. Nick isn’t. They have started getting to know each other. They are great friends. Till, Charlie falls hard for Nick. Does Nick feel the same way? Heartstopper is a story of love – between two boys. One whom the school knows is gay and is bullied for it. One whom the school sees as this stud on the rugby team. The stereotypes are there for a reason. You will also see them break as you go through the book.

Heartstopper is the kind of book that should be read by everyone. It is the graphic novel that will make you understand relationships that beyond the heterosexual ones and just the thing that is needed in 2019. Just the thing that was needed way before.

I can’t wait for the second volume to reach me. Alice Oseman gets the vibe of the teenagers. The confusion, the heartbreak, the acceptance, and the bullying. The relationship between Nick and Charlie took me back to a time when I was in school and in love. It is the kind of book that will remind you of what it is to be young or what it was. A super book. I love it.

Books mentioned in Heartstopper: Volume 1

Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Bingo Love by Tee Franklin, Jenn St. Onge, Joy San, and Genevieve FT

Title: Bingo Love
Author: Tee Franklin
Illustrators: Jenn St. Onge, Joy San, and Genevieve FT
Publisher: Image Comics
ISBN: 978-1534307506
Genre: Comics, LGBT,
Pages: 88
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 3 stars

Maybe it was just me, but I was expecting a lot out of Bingo Love after reading so much about it online and it being included in almost every 2018 best book list. While it is a great book, it yet disappoints in some ways. I was very happy reading it, and that too month of Pride and all that, yet something felt less and not up to the mark. Wish there was more to it.

To cut to the chase, the story is about two women Hazel Johnson and Mari McCray, who meet as girls at a church bingo in 1963 and fall in love at the very first sight. They hesitate to tell each other and when they do, their families tear them apart. They then meet again, decades later, now in their mid-60s, once again at another church bingo (Loved this part by the way. It made me weep and how), and then the story begins from thereon.

What I love about the comic is of course that it is diverse, of course that it is about two women who love each other very deeply and the love is still alive and lit even after decades of changes taking place. What it didn’t work with me was the entire time thing – racing to 2030s and then 2050s I think, which wasn’t needed. Also, the book was too rushed to encompass or make the reader feel the love between Hazel and Mari.

I am elated that comics such as Bingo Love exist. I really am. I just feel that it should explore more, and not be dealt with in a rush. It left me wanting a lot more. But you must read it, to understand love is love. Give it to children, to young adults, and to adults who also need to understand that love is love.