02 Nov / Nineteen by Ancco, translated by Janet Hong [in Booklist]
*STARRED REVIEW
Introduced to Western audiences with the internationally awarded Bad Friends (2018), Ancco returns with a five-years-in-the-making collection she wrote in her early 20s, originally published more than a decade ago in her native Korea. Translated by prize-winning Canadian Janet Hong, these 13 stories are largely autobiographical, especially those featuring Ancco’s late grandmother, whose final year was lost to dementia in a nursing home. In the process of preparing the manuscript for this English-language publication, Ancco poignantly reveals, “I was glad to meet my healthy grandmother once more … it felt as if she’d come back to life.”
Ancco memorializes her childhood adoration for her “real grandma,” whose arms were always open to her, in “grandma”; later, she confesses her young-adult neglect and abandonment in “wild roses.”
The titular “nineteen” reads like a preview of Bad Friends, revealing the restless teenage debauchery that results in horrific abusive consequences. In “mom,” three generations of women struggle to care for each other despite irresponsible decisions. Numerous panel-less, very short short comics interrupt the family drama, including stories about a haircut gone awry in “i’m sorry,” a day in the life of a comics artist in “school of kyung-jin,” and a wannabe musician in “me and my guitar.”
Presented in stark black-and-white pages, the stories feature a mixture of meticulously detailed panels and truncated sketches. In these rebellious, irreverent, and raw accounts, Ancco observes, remembers, shocks, and most of all, lives.
Review: “Graphic Novels,” Booklist, October 15, 2020
Readers: Young Adult, Adult
Published: 2020