Blankets by Craig Thompson Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Blankets
Book Review: A coming of age story sure to tug on your heartstrings.
Summary: 5 Stars
In Blankets, Craig Thompson presents a personal story that many people who grew up as "outcasts" in the rural heartland of America will find hard not to relate with. With art that is both simplistic and beautiful, the story of a young Craig coming to terms with his place in life, his first love, and his problems with religion as he ages is a tale sure to tug on your heartstrings. Anyone who has ever been in love will find something here that is tragically beautiful: young love, with all it's passion and angst.Book Review: A deeply personal story that should resonate with us all
Summary: 5 Stars
How much of it is true? Who knows?Who cares? Well, one person, perhaps two... and their parents.. possibly the people they grew up to marry.
Read this and think about the Raina in your life. How lovely it is to be someone's Raina. If you calculate the hours, it's not so very many, but how precious that handful is...
I was very moved by the reverent way the beloved is depicted. The frame where the two soon-to-be young lovers each tuck their long hair behind their ears is unspeakably lovely.
The abruptness of their parting is lovely too... or will seem so to readers who've passed a certaon shelf life into a grey area of bitterseetness, appreciaton and regret.
The drawing board hours alone are testament to the power of young love, the kind that is rarely destined to survive these days.
Lovely beyond compare.
Book Review: A familiar story told exceedingly well
Summary: 4 Stars
The other reviews here provide a good description of the kind of story you will find in the pages of Blankets: isolation and longing, religion vs. desire, the joy of a first love, the despondency of long-distance relationships, post-adolescent reconnection with family, and the pivotal moment in your life when you make your first adult decision and accept all consequences.
This is one of the better graphic novels I have read, but I knew the ending far in advance. The story is told wonderfully, making good use of the medium, but I'm not sure the story HAD to be told this way; it could easily have been a text novel. Craig Thompson doesn't make ground-breaking choices, but he uses familiar devices expertly: De-populating panels in order to show loss and loneliness, crowding panels with people to show discomfort and awkwardness, and spilling panels into one another when the protagonist has a new and exciting emotion or experience. I don't want to make it seem like I didn't enjoy this book, because I did. I definitely recommend Blankets.
Book Review: A glorious book.
Summary: 5 Stars
The day this arrived, I figured I'd be able to ration it out,a few hundred pages a day. This book must be read in one sitting, as I soon found out. I stayed up late into the night, and it was well worth it. This book will make your heart cry softly, and get warm fuzzies, sometimes all at once. The artwork only helps to bring this story to life even more.Book Review: A great graphic novel
Summary: 4 Stars
On paper, Blankets doesn't sound that promising. It is essentially a love story in comic form, and my mind immediately imagined every sad and lovesick high school kid looking to express himself through his art. Basically, it sounded like it would be heartfelt but helplessly naive.
But much to Thompson's credit, the book takes this simple premise and turns it into a minor triumph. The core story itself is quite simple: alienated boy meets girl, falls in love with girl, complications arise. However, the book boldly includes some decidedly unromantic elements, namely Christian self-doubt and the difficulties of caring for the mentally handicapped. Rather than serving as gimmicks or just as means of showing the benevolence of characters, these elements produce all too real difficulties in relationships. In general, I find that many graphic novel stories would simply not be interesting or creative had they been written as prose, but Thompson's story (or autobiography) is on the whole unique, quite touching, and believably real.
Thompson is also a wonderful illustrator. His style may not be the most distinctive, but he certainly takes advantage of his medium, with wonderful dream like sequences that say more than any words could. He may not be as bold as Chris Ware or Art Spiegelman, but Thompson's book can be breathtaking at times. Overall, the story may be a bit cheesy or overly earnest, but I was very impressed with Thompson's work and couldn't put it down.