From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Clowes (Ghost World) casts a harsh spotlight on the misfit dreamers who inhabit the small town of Ice Havenin this riveting graphic novel. Originally published in a somewhat different form as part of Clowes's occasional comic book Eightball, this piecefinds Clowes moving beyond the withering satire of his earlier works to a more nuanced style. Readers will wince even as they feel sympathy for the self-deluded characters who reside in Ice Haven. Take narrator Random Wilder, writer of doggerel poetry. One would think it'd be easy to be the best poet in a place like Ice Haven, but Wilder has a rival: Ida Wentz, an old woman who likes to bake cookies. Wilder spends his spare time plotting against her. Ida's visiting granddaughter, Vida, also has literary yearnings, despite having sold zero copies of her fanzine. These and other oddballs play out their stories against the mysterious disappearance of a little boy named David Goldberg, whose possible murder recalls the Leopold and Loeb case. Clowes unfolds the multifaceted story as a series of brief comics, some drawn in a wildly cartoony style, others in his well-known mid–20th-century look. Masterfully blending fact and fiction, this is a funny, sad, chilling and absurd work. (June)
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Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From School Library Journal
Grade 10 Up–Previously published in the independent comic-book series Eight Ball, this is a darkly comic romp through the small Midwestern town of Ice Haven. The basic story is pretty straightforward: a sad, quiet little boy named David Goldberg vanishes. But instead of delivering a pulp-inspired detective story, Clowes uses the child's tale mostly as a backdrop. His real interest is in the lives of the bizarre, yet all-too-real townsfolk. They include a lovesick teen, an irritable private detective, a poet, and a schoolyard bully. Although the characters are types, the author/illustrator embellishes them enough to make them unique and memorable. Through vignettes that jump perspective every few pages, readers witness their lives and individual reactions to David's disappearance. As the point of view shifts, so does the artwork. In showing how the event affects the boy's classmates, the panels take on a style inspired by Charles Schultz's Peanuts, but Clowes moves into satire with a bleakly funny schoolyard of kids talking quite openly about sex, drugs, and violence. Other vignettes pull from the motifs of detective strips, teen romances, and The Flintstones. While well-read comics fans will get most of the jokes, some references may frustrate or confuse readers. Overall, though, there is plenty here to enjoy.–Matthew L. Moffett, Northern Virginia Community College, Annandale
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
