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aplecki2's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
relaxing
fast-paced
4.25
spenkevich's review
3.0
With equal parts humor and heartbreak, French artist and writer Pénélope Bagieu revisits scenes from across her childhood and into early adulthood in the warm and charming graphic memoir Layers (translated from the French by Montana Kane). Very episodic and bouncing back and forth along the coming-of-age timeline, the Eisner Award winning artist invites us along to experience the ups and downs of life, from first loves and losses, embarrassing experiences, hardships and successes, looking back to discover the tiny narrative arcs we can spot in our lives in hindsight. While this is a bit wandering it is also funny and often rather moving, and Bagieu shows stunning vulnerability and self-awareness here, making this an amusing reflection on the moments that amalgamate into the people we are as adults.
Layers is a quick read that manages to hit a wide variety of emotions along the way. Composed of rather short, episodic narratives, Bagieu’s rather reflective narration arranges the events into a sort of learning lesson for herself, though often one she didn’t realize at the time and can only see now. I really enjoyed the story about learning to ski and how much the bear pin she was given upon completing the class gave her incredible confidence to want to tackle other skills and be the best. She would later learn that it was a consolation pin given to the worst student in the class (everyone else got snowflake pins) but by then it was already a great lesson about believing in yourself: ‘It gave me permission to dare to do stuff.’ A lot of these stories have a similar tone, making the best out of bad situations or realizing later how much something meant that, at the time, hardly seemed significant (such as bad boyfriends showing major red flags).
Though not all the stories are funny, even the saddest of them are heartwarming. The story about the life of her first cat, which opens the book and is easily a highlight, for instance, or the death of her grandmother, are both handled in rather touching ways. On the flipside, some of the most uncomfortable ones like awkward relationships or going solo to a concert because she has a crush on the musician only to have to end up hanging out with his girlfriend, will have you laughing along. Bagieu can laugh at herself and it just makes you like her all the more, and this becomes a great little collection of stories on girlhood.
While I was reading this, I was told a patron complained and asked us to move this to the Adult collection instead of the Teen collection (the intended audience of the book). Interestingly enough, the complaint about a scene with nudity (very not-detailed cartoon boobs appearing on a tv screen) appears in a fairly funny bit about hypocrisy: the grandfather find the Bagieu and her sister looking at tampon instructions to be inappropriate but then watches a topless woman dance on tv (to which it is noted this was just…a normal thing on the French National News in the 80s). So in a way, the patron complaint just felt like an extension of this scene and also reminds me that the US is still very uptight about bodies in ways that just seem laughable.
Anyways, Layers is a rather delightful little graphic memoir. A quick read, with a loose art style that isn’t anything special but gets the story across quite efficiently, and one that I enjoyed quite a bit.
3.5/5
Layers is a quick read that manages to hit a wide variety of emotions along the way. Composed of rather short, episodic narratives, Bagieu’s rather reflective narration arranges the events into a sort of learning lesson for herself, though often one she didn’t realize at the time and can only see now. I really enjoyed the story about learning to ski and how much the bear pin she was given upon completing the class gave her incredible confidence to want to tackle other skills and be the best. She would later learn that it was a consolation pin given to the worst student in the class (everyone else got snowflake pins) but by then it was already a great lesson about believing in yourself: ‘It gave me permission to dare to do stuff.’ A lot of these stories have a similar tone, making the best out of bad situations or realizing later how much something meant that, at the time, hardly seemed significant (such as bad boyfriends showing major red flags).
Though not all the stories are funny, even the saddest of them are heartwarming. The story about the life of her first cat, which opens the book and is easily a highlight, for instance, or the death of her grandmother, are both handled in rather touching ways. On the flipside, some of the most uncomfortable ones like awkward relationships or going solo to a concert because she has a crush on the musician only to have to end up hanging out with his girlfriend, will have you laughing along. Bagieu can laugh at herself and it just makes you like her all the more, and this becomes a great little collection of stories on girlhood.
While I was reading this, I was told a patron complained and asked us to move this to the Adult collection instead of the Teen collection (the intended audience of the book). Interestingly enough, the complaint about a scene with nudity (very not-detailed cartoon boobs appearing on a tv screen) appears in a fairly funny bit about hypocrisy: the grandfather find the Bagieu and her sister looking at tampon instructions to be inappropriate but then watches a topless woman dance on tv (to which it is noted this was just…a normal thing on the French National News in the 80s). So in a way, the patron complaint just felt like an extension of this scene and also reminds me that the US is still very uptight about bodies in ways that just seem laughable.
Anyways, Layers is a rather delightful little graphic memoir. A quick read, with a loose art style that isn’t anything special but gets the story across quite efficiently, and one that I enjoyed quite a bit.
3.5/5
unhingedfemaleprotagonist's review
3.0
This was a cute read full of short stories that depict the awkwardness of growing up and funny stories about adolescence and young adulthood.
bookdrunkard78's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
relaxing
sad
fast-paced
3.5
zabcia's review
4.0
85%
A sweet snippet-based memoir; the stories aren't temporally in order, but rather exist on their own right. As a woman, many of them were relatable - those that weren't may be due to cultural differences, which was interesting in itself. I love her simple, yet expressive art style.
~Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.~
A sweet snippet-based memoir; the stories aren't temporally in order, but rather exist on their own right. As a woman, many of them were relatable - those that weren't may be due to cultural differences, which was interesting in itself. I love her simple, yet expressive art style.
~Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.~