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Friday, March 29, 2019

Sabrina by Nick Drnaso

This book was long listed for the Booker prize this past year, which is of note because it is the first graphic novel to get the nod.  It didn't make the short list, but still, it is a start.
The world is a dangerous place we discover pretty quickly in this densely drawn novel.  It opens innocently enough, with a young woman cat-sitting for her parents. Her sister, Sandra, arrives for a brief visit, reminiscing about their parents, asking about her boyfriend, and soliciting some help with a crossword puzzle. Sandra mentions to her sister if she’d like to take a bicycle vacation along Lake Michigan later that summer. The two make a half-promise to do so and Sandra leaves. It will be the last time Sandra sees her sister.
From there, we are catapulted to a town in Colorado, where Calvin, an Air Force soldier, meets his childhood friend Teddy in the airport. He’s offering to put Teddy up for a while because, as we learn, Teddy’s girlfriend went missing a month before. Teddy, a quiet man-child who peers through shoulder-length blond hair, is shell-shocked and has little to say.  We go back and forth between the sad lives of each of the men, grappling with their problems in dysfunctional ways. 

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