A lively, inspirational tale that will point young readers toward art, music, and resistance of their own.
A sometimes bitter and brittle, always heartfelt memoir of growing up as a Black punk rocker in rural California.
“Apple Valley, California, like most of small town America, sucks.” So writes Spooner in this probing graphic memoir. The high desert of the title is a place where “you can count on dirt, desolation, and despair.” As the author reveals, you can also count on the anomie that leads some kids to drugs, some to suicide, some to neo-Nazism. His White mother, “raising a black son on her own,” coped as best she could to protect the young man. There was plenty of harm to face, with an absence of role models and plenty of reasons to keep one’s head down to avoid the inevitable high school bullying. Spooner found solace in punk rock and its accouterments—mohawk haircut, combat boots, etc.—all of which only drew more attention to him. There weren’t many role models in punk, either, for a young man of color, even though bands like Black Flag had “two tone” and minority members—all good reason to found a punk band of his own. Spooner is a discerning student of his own past and the movement he joined. As he notes, punk was steeped in politics, especially of the intersectional sort that rejected racism, sexism, homophobia, and Reagan-era retrograde culture. “Punk positioned me to listen,” he writes. A sojourn in New York to visit his father, an award-winning professional bodybuilder from St. Lucia, occasioned an encounter with even more political punks, to say nothing of Joey Ramone, and helped him launch a number of zines as well as a record label. “This is what punk inspired,” he writes at the close of his eloquent latter-day rejoinder to Chuck Klosterman’s Fargo Rock City.
A lively, inspirational tale that will point young readers toward art, music, and resistance of their own.Pub Date: May 17, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-358-65911-2
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
A memoir for those who want to laugh through the free fall of their own emotional roller coaster.
A humorous take on dread.
In her amusing graphic memoir, cartoonist Correll turns her emotional roller coaster into a literal, visual experience with her own amusement park of worries that she calls Anxietyland. Within this playful framework, she guides readers through her lifelong struggle with severe anxiety—there are attractions like the “worry-go-round,” “booze cruise,” “downward spiral,” and more, all culminating in finding the help that not only helps her manage the anxiety, but pushes her to do the work in confronting and living with it. To her credit, Correll uses the amusement park concept to dissect points in her life where her anxiety was holding her hostage from leading a fulfilling life. One panel shows Correll’s whimsical approach, as when her cat, Oliver, goes missing. “Why hasn’t he come home?” she thinks, her eyes full of worry, her mouth downturned. “What if he’s dead?” The subsequent image shows her pet peeking into the panel; the accompanying text reads, “Oliver (very much alive).” It’s one thing to read a memoir that breaks down episodes with the benefit of time and knowledge; it’s a completely different experience to see someone living through their depression while hanging on for dear life in “anxie-tea” cups. Readers who hold season passes to Anxietyland will be able to laugh along with the author, but this book will also benefit those coming to terms with a new or future anxiety diagnosis. These readers may, for the first time, be able to put their swirling emotions into a tangible context that makes more sense to them and others. That’s the beauty of Correll’s memoir: The book provides a comical medium lens that can open doors to understanding—rather than a door to the house of horrors.
A memoir for those who want to laugh through the free fall of their own emotional roller coaster.Pub Date: April 28, 2026
ISBN: 9781668004159
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 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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