Firmly raises the bar for comics biographies.
An illustrated biography of Ernie Bushmiller (1905-1982), creator of the cult-favorite comic “Nancy.”
This book is a triumph because it not only recounts Bushmiller’s legacy, but communes with his inimitable spirit. Employing meticulous pen-inked crosshatch drawings, Griffith, the creator of “Zippy,” achieves wondrous results with an experimental approach to his source material. He demonstrates Bushmiller’s creative process and inner thoughts, interpolating original “Nancy” illustrations into his own narrative. Characters appear in daydreams, and strips take shape as Bushmiller ruminates on a gag. This collaged technique creates an ineffable sense of posthumous collaboration between Griffith and his subject. Griffith traces Bushmiller’s storied career at the New York World. At age 19, he was asked to take over the comic “Fritzi Ritz” after its creator quit. Nancy, the spiky-haired goofball whose innocent follies captured the nation’s heart, first appeared in “Fritzi,” and she became the star of her own strip in 1938. “Nancy” was eventually syndicated in nearly 900 papers, and Bushmiller drew daily comics until his death. He had idiosyncratic work habits: He would always begin with a goofy final panel (what he called the “snapper”) and work backward to find a path to his punchline, and he had four drawing tables set up in his studio so he could work on pages in tandem. Reading “Nancy” can be similarly dizzying. In a series of asides, Griffith attempts to introduce highbrow elements to the strip’s lowbrow humor and sparse composition. Perhaps Bushmiller’s strips are “calling our attention to the form comics take—panels, balloons, composition.” Yes, it’s all funny, but “the joke is on us if we fail to see what Bushmiller is up to, namely, taking apart the comic strip & putting it back together again!” Griffith quietly invites readers to explore his own biography in the same critical way. This book is not simply a charming history of a plucky cartoonist, but a formal marvel, pushing at the boundaries of its medium.
Firmly raises the bar for comics biographies.Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2023
ISBN: 9781683359432
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Abrams ComicArts
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
A timeless story of marriage, well-grounded in queer history. An absolute triumph.
Chronicling same-sex love in early New England.
This graphic biography by award-winning graphic novelist Walden (Spinning, 2017, and On a Sunbeam, 2018) takes its inspiration from the artifacts and archives of two women who lived together in rural Vermont for nearly half a century. Walden’s presentation of their story firmly insists that the reader engage directly with the daily lives of women in the early 1800s. As the book begins, Charity arrives in Weybridge, Vermont, evading rumors and judgment back in Massachusetts. Sylvia, a large family’s youngest daughter, cares ceaselessly for nieces and nephews while quietly seeking her own life. Soon after meeting, Charity asks Sylvia to share her rented room above a gristmill, and the pair become inseparable. They build a tailoring business, rent land, and construct a home together. They attend church, share life with Sylvia’s family, and actively participate in their community. That they remained partnered in a world where homosexuality was essentially unimaginable is played with such subtlety as to sometimes blur into insignificance. Yet, that normalcy reveals the book’s beating heart—existing resolutely as themselves in a circumscribed world is a resounding affirmation of queer love. But even life-long love has an end. The specter of mortality haunts nearly every page—the pair endure a litany of family deaths and spend much of their old age managing ailments, awaiting what lies beyond while holding fast to each other. This unrelenting passage of time is communicated in uniformly 12-panel pages filled with conversation and daily work. When Walden pushes against this format’s restrictions, her looser, almost ethereal imagery proves breathtaking. Walden also employs her particular gift for drawing simple faces that express innocence, excitement, devastation, and devotion in a few pen strokes—she brings Charity and Sylvia to life with tremendous tenderness and grace.
A timeless story of marriage, well-grounded in queer history. An absolute triumph.Pub Date: June 16, 2026
ISBN: 9781770468382
Page Count: 260
Publisher: Drawn & Quarterly
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
An accessible, informative journey through complex issues during turbulent times.
Immersion journalism in the form of a graphic narrative following a Syrian family on their immigration to America.
Originally published as a 22-part series in the New York Times that garnered a Pulitzer for editorial cartooning, the story of the Aldabaan family—first in exile in Jordan and then in New Haven, Connecticut—holds together well as a full-length book. Halpern and Sloan, who spent more than three years with the Aldabaans, movingly explore the family’s significant obstacles, paying special attention to teenage son Naji, whose desire for the ideal of the American dream was the strongest. While not minimizing the harshness of the repression that led them to journey to the U.S.—or the challenges they encountered after they arrived—the focus on the day-by-day adjustment of a typical teenager makes the narrative refreshingly tangible and free of political polemic. Still, the family arrived at New York’s JFK airport during extraordinarily political times: Nov. 8, 2016, the day that Donald Trump was elected. The plan had been for the entire extended family to move, but some had traveled while others awaited approval, a process that was hampered by Trump’s travel ban. The Aldabaans encountered the daunting odds that many immigrants face: find shelter and employment, become self-sustaining quickly, learn English, and adjust to a new culture and climate (Naji learned to shovel snow, which he had never seen). They also received anonymous death threats, and Naji wanted to buy a gun for protection. He asked himself, “Was this the great future you were talking about back in Jordan?” Yet with the assistance of selfless volunteers and a community of fellow immigrants, the Aldabaans persevered. The epilogue provides explanatory context and where-are-they-now accounts, and Sloan’s streamlined, uncluttered illustrations nicely complement the text, consistently emphasizing the humanity of each person.
An accessible, informative journey through complex issues during turbulent times.Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-30559-6
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Metropolitan/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2020
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