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Small Press Spotlight: French Milk

By | April 6th, 2010
Posted in Columns | % Comments

This week on our Small Press Spotlight series, I’m taking a look at Lucy Knisley’s French Milk. This title was released by Touchstone Books in October 2008 and brought Knisley a lot of publicity and critical acclaim. However, I didn’t get the chance to read it until I came across it one day in the library. Knisley’s artistic style drew me in, and since reading Craig Thompson’s Carnet de Voyage I’ve found travelogue comics to be appealing.

So what did I think of this journal that follows Knisley’s journey to Paris with her mother in January of 2007? Find out after the jump.

Travelogues are a difficult type of publication to review, if only because there is no story tension and no real storytelling necessary from the visuals. There are events that transpire and the art is used to design pages that represent the day-to-day minutiae of travel, but nothing that is interconnected and unfolds in a story like fashion. Realistically, the genre is just a journal of events…a different way to look back at an adventure you once had.

That Lucy Knisley’s trip to Paris to celebrate her 22nd birthday and to celebrate her mother’s 50th birthday was actually published is a heck of an achievement in itself. That it’s good speaks volumes of Knisley’s talent, as she manages to take her experiences and convey much with just a pen and paper.

Those that are looking for a trip filled with revelations (“I saw the Eiffel Tower and realized it’s women for me here on out!” is not something you’ll come across) will be sorely disappointed. This is all about the experiences Knisley had. The delicious foods of Paris (THE FOOD!), the transcendant moment of kissing Oscar Wilde’s elaborate tombstone, the yearning for her boyfriend distance made her feel, the relief she feels when she comes across other people besides her mother who are American…nothing too elaborate, but it is a charming and realistic compendium of her experiences.

Knisley even is fiercely truthful, revealing all of her tantrums and illness in equal light to the savory treats she’d eat and the handsome French men who would fawn over her. She has a keen and unflinching observational eye, never hiding from a moment that would make her look bad. That honesty adds value to the experience, and makes the whole exercise a far more inviting one.

Once again though, this is not a travelogue that will really give us analysis into life changes she went through or any deep seeded emotional moments that resonated as particularly haunting. It isn’t designed as such, and for some that may not give this effort any proper weight. To me, it worked very well in that it gave me another’s perspective on a city that I love and a slice of life look at a fish out of water experience.

Knisley, I must admit, is just a delightful cartoonist. Her work reminds me a lot of the aforementioned Thompson, and it is a charming and inviting style that makes the read a far more enticing one. Blending in photographs she took on the journey in with her illustrations gave the reader a nice reference point for her visuals, and it aided the experience overall and gave the book a very unique look and feel. She’s a budding master of the visual aspect of the medium assuredly, and you can really tell that here even with the limits the exercise may shackle her style with.

Overall, this is a very enjoyable read. Knisley is clearly a very talented cartoonist and someone who has a bright future. I know I’m way behind on her, but that’s the fun about these Small Press Spotlights: they aren’t designed for those that already read these titles. They are designed to help the average comic fan realize that there is a lot of depth and beauty in the world of comics that they are not aware of. For those that love Paris or idealize it, or just enjoy reading and looking at absurdly brilliant food, check out Lucy Knisley’s French Milk.


//TAGS | Off the Cape

David Harper

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