A review by moto1480
My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf

dark sad medium-paced

4.0

My Friend Dahmer is an interesting real life story of Backderf's experiences growing up with Jeffrey Dahmer. It's well-written and quickly sucks you in. It would have been very easy for the author to pretend to have been closer to Dahmer than he was, but he's very clear about the high school friendship(?) that he had with him. The art is different and I'm not an huge fan of Backderf's style. It's sweaty MAD magazine-esque, if that makes sense. 

While Backderf says repeatedly that he didn't write this to engender sympathy for Dahmer, you can't help but wonder what could have been if anyone was paying attention to him before he killed for the first time. I actually think this graphic novel is Backderf's way of coming to terms with being unable to do anything for and about Dahmer. I enjoyed this immensely, though the end ran out of steam.

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