'Blankets,' at its core is a simple, timeless story (coming of age, first-love, alienation, anxiety, pursuit of spiritual identity, teen-angst) told thousands of times over the millenia (books, poems, songs, movies, television) but perfectly captured, perhaps for the first time, in comic-strip form. This book is exquisitely plotted, paced, written and drawn and by the end of it all one can't help but be left dazed at the sheer artistic excellence demonstrated by Thompson, from start to finish, through thousands of panels. Visually, the black and white artwork is a stunner but perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of all is Thompson's gift for prose with not a wasted word to be found in his minimalistic narrative that still manages to be filled with layer after layer of subtext.

This truly is a title not to be missed by anyone with an appreciation for the written word, not to mention the graphical novel format. The stylish cover design and paper quality also lends itself very well as a gift-giving item.


the graphic novel that's not afraid to be a novel   July 27, 2003
 49 out of 51 found this review helpful

Much has been made in recent years of how the graphic novel-and as a result, the comic book-has matured and come into its own. This is indeed, true, as subject matter and approach in the comics industry has become much more fluid. Yet, most stories were still serialized before they were printed in book form, and the ones that struck out on their own and did it in one-go (including some by my own company, Oni Press), were significant, but not yet reaching the full breadth that the word "novel" implied.

Enter Craig Thompson. Nearly five years ago, he released his first major work, GOODBYE CHUNKY RICE. It was an excellent piece of sequential fiction, but much like, say, the first album by Nirvana or Andi Watson's SKELETON KEY (or even THE COMPLETE GEISHA) or Todd Haynes' POISON, it was only a glimmer of what was to come. Since that time, Thompson has locked himself away and honed his first masterpiece-an ambitious narrative clocking in at nearly 600 pages. Sure, you can write it off as a coming of age story (a coming of age story in an art form that still is coming up with its standards for most literary genres, and thus still coming of age itself), but that would be to say THE BELL JAR is merely the story of a depressed poet or GOODFELLAS about a guy who gets an interesting job. BLANKETS is the story of an artist in a state of becoming, a boy walking down a road where people in the houses on either side are attempting to get him to stop and play in their yard. It's the tale of said boy figuring out how to stick to the middle, and stay true to himself.

Semi-autobiographical, BLANKETS outstrips the standard coming-of-age novel by giving it a perspective that only the comic book would allow him. Not even in movies could the story of an artist have that artist's vision so expertly rendered (think of how, in CRUMB, Zwigoff had to look over Crumb's shoulder to see what the illustrator saw). While the narrative thread of BLANKETS is straightforward, Thompson uses his pen to bend the world he portrays. Thus, you can step into an abstract world in the short span of a panel, see it as Thompson sees it himself. And there you get what makes the difference. The story of a boy discovering who he will be is also a book where an artist discovers a new form of expression.

And there we are, back to the beginning. This is a comic book that understands what a novel is, and a novel that has figured out how to be a comic book. There is going to be a lot of hype about this one, and the sorts of people who read and talk about "comix," needing the crooked letter to make them feel cooler, will likely come down on BLANKETS for not being cool enough, but ignore all that and trust yourself and trust the book. It's emotional and expressive and engrossing, and possibly the best thing you'll read this year-in any medium.


Not under my Christmas tree!   December 5, 2003
 24 out of 54 found this review helpful

This book gets so much praise, it makes me want to write a few words about it myself. I bought this after reading a lot of positive reviews, and had in mind of giving it away for Christmas present. There has got to be something good about a book that everybody gives best grades, right?

But when I read it, I think maybe it gets all this praise just because it is a graphic novel showing big amition. It is well drawn and very many pages. To people with a big interest in graphic novels, this is of course a big thing. Comics fans probably has been waiting for a book like this to come out. A big, well drawn book with an epic with depth and emotion, suitable to convincing non-belivers about the medium's greatness.

But I want to say, that it does not necessarily appeal to everyone. The story is a bit sentimental and predictable. What does the story tell us? That it is hard growing up, OK. Some people who likes Daniel Clowe's "Ghost World" and may find Thompson's version of teenage angst a bit naive and puppy eyed in comparison.

This is a pretty nice story, with neat artwork. I'm just trying to point out, that there is room for a lot of different tastes and directions in the art form of graphic novels. Nowadays I think many people doesn't have too much prejudice about comics - the media isn't the important thing, but the content is. Personally I like storys like Adrian Tomine's and Daniel Clowes', artists who may have more in common with film directors like Todd Solondz and Paul Thomas Anderson than with Craig Thompson. I'm not saying Clowes should be the measure to all new comics, but in comparison Thompson's story here reminds me more of some made for TV harmless drama.

What I mean is, just try to forget about the medium, and what you have here is a predictable and sweet, traditional and quite nice story about growing up, that doesn't say anything new unless you haven't read to many stories about growing up.Or, of course, if you're about to grow up yourself. If I wanted to persuade any of my friends that graphic novels are't nessecarily boring, this is actually not my choice of book to give them.


A comic book--sorry, "graphic novel"--for people with low expectations   September 4, 2007
 14 out of 38 found this review helpful

That Blankets is an "illustrated novel" read mostly by people who never read comics says a lot about why it is so revered. It garnered recognition for its use of serious subject matter in what is generally perceived as a children's medium. Its popularity puts it in the hands of librarians whose conception of comics is fantasy superhero books for kids, so of course they think: how clever to use an unlikely and underappreciated medium like comics to a tell a coming-of-age story.

But Blankets' coming-of-age story is trite and overreaching, not to mention painfully earnest. It strives to speak for a generation of losers and loners by being as bland and overly earnest as possible. The type of reader who loves this is also the type of reader wont to call it "achingly beautiful."

Look, I grew up a wimp in the Midwest, too. But I don't need to read yet another self-indulgent auto-bio comic about it just to validate my existence. EVERYONE has loved and lost, and stories about love can be sharp and powerful. But Craig Thompson offers only cliched sentimentality and manipulative heartstring-tugging, not one original insight on adolescence or lost love.

Why not read some Daniel Clowes, a much sharper observer of adolescent angst (and I'm not just talking about Ghost World)? Or try Peter Bagge, whose Hate comics start off as a goofy case study of nineties suspended adolescence slackers then evolves into a terrifically insightful depiction of truly growing up. Or Lynda Barry's many illuminating examinations of childhood. And then why not wash the earnestness out of your mouth with Johnny Ryan's gloriously nihilistic Angry Youth Comix?


Teen angsty love, part II   January 12, 2006
 13 out of 16 found this review helpful

Craig Thompson, Blankets (Top Shelf, 2005)

Blankets is a book that has gotten so much good press over the past year that it seems almost superfluous to write anything else about it if you've got a single good word to say. And for the record, it is a good book. I'm just not sure if it's all that and a bag of Fritos.

Another entry in the "graphic novel memoir" category, Blankets is Thompson's exploration of his own childhood-- specifically, falling in love for the first time, but there is a great deal of other stuff that goes along with that and takes us through his whole childhood. There's a lot of material to cover here (which shouldn't be surprising given the book's almost-six-hundred-page doorstop status), and perhaps the most impressive thing about Blankets is how unobtrusively Thompson is able to cover it all within the scope of the main storyline he pursues; there are a lot of flashbacks to his childhood, some of which cover some pretty thorny ground (and kudos to Thompson, doubly, for not overplaying some scenes that most authors would have made the central events of their books), but Thompson never allows them to grow far enough in importance to sidetrack his story. Structurally, the book's a marvel of restraint, and for that reason alone, not only graphic novelists, but writers of all stripes, should be using Blankets as a textbook for how to present emotional sucker-punches for maximum effect.

The downside to this structural mastery (there's always a downside, isn't there?) is that it exposes Thompson's powers of emotional manipulation. And, again to his credit, Thompson eschews the normal American emotional shortcuts so prevalent in our books, movies, and other media; Thompson's building of character and relationship is almost Japanese in its simplicity and willingness to simply let the actors' actions telegraph their emotions. This is all too rare in American letters, and it is welcomed with open arms.

Oddly, despite myself, I seem to be writing a rave review of a book which, in the final analysis, I enjoyed, but wasn't really taken in by. I think the reason for this is, ultimately, just like it was with Chester Brown's I Never Liked You (which covers much the same ground, but without anything approaching this sort of scope and majesty), it's nothing we haven't seen before many, many times. Blankets is deliriously popular with the emo-kid set because it covers much the same ground as all those same-sounding bands they listen to-- coming of age, falling in love, blah blah blah. And the messages to be found here are no different than the ones you're going to hear in any random Hawthorn Heights or Fall Out Boy song you care to listen to/endure. My hope, however, is that some of the devotees of this book will realize the subtle differences in quality that turn it from basic teen-angsty emo dreck into something literary, understand them, and (when said devotees inevitably do) wander off to create their own poetry, music, graphic novels, whatever, will think about those differences and use them to raise the benchmark, however slightly, for the quality of teen angst art. Lord knows it could use some benchmark raising. ***