Welcome to Litsy!

So beautiful and sorrowful and immersive and self-aware. Covers so many topics but weaves them together beautifully. Kind of bleak, especially the ending, but almost in a transcendental way. Like nothing matters, but that's what's so cool. Love this author.

Black and white illustration is the perfect medium to convey a memoir of a young woman struggling with grief, trying to find purpose, exploring ruins in the search for meaning. As often happens with graphic memoirs, I think the story told is of more cathartic benefit to the author than the reader, but I admire the vulnerability it takes to explore personal life on the page.

Can't quite figure out why this stark pseudo-photo-realistic illustration style is captivating me. Maybe dirt and rot and ruin central to the story messing up the crisp lines, my kind of contrast.

It's always interesting reading memoirs from people so young. There were some interesting ideas here, and I think the pros outweighed the cons. Still, a lot of it reminded me of thoughts that occupied college-aged me and I wonder how long these thoughts will stay with Radtke. My college thoughts didn't stay with me, but our choices change what we value most.

Part memoir, part nonfiction about abandoned cities.

In Kristin‘s family there‘s a rare heart disease. She looks into this disease and how it effects her family.

She also looks at abandoned cities. Her fascination starts after a visit to Gary.

Through all this she is looking at loss, love, grief and loneliness.

So beautiful and sorrowful and immersive and self-aware. Covers so many topics but weaves them together beautifully. Kind of bleak, especially the ending, but almost in a transcendental way. Like nothing matters, but that's what's so cool. Love this author.

#Pantone2022 Spun Sugar :)

A graphic memoir that was fairly well done. It‘s a soft pick for me, but I enjoyed reading it. After the past two downers, though, I really need the next book to be uplifting and/or funny!

I have read enough graphic memoirs by now to know what I am looking for & Radtke's checks all of the boxes & more! Kristen's beloved uncle Dan dies while she's in college at the same time that she has become progressively more interested in ruins & urban exploration. What initially appeared to be a straightforward grief memoir morphs into a reflection on the power of art during times of loss & ends with some of the most powerful final pages👇

This book!

My very first graphic memoir, and I devoured it in one sitting. Stunning. Can‘t wait to revisit it again soon once I‘ve had a chance to think about it.

it took two years but finally reading Kristen Radtke‘s graphic novel & i am so immersed in it! this moment where she reflects on how society views ruins & the idea behind her brother‘s video game 🎮 caught my attention because i believe there are so many RPGs that w/a good storyline can bring attention to ideas through the characters the player interacts with & kids are not even aware of it until they look back & go, ohh 😮 also illustrations 💯

Fake Deep: The Graphic Novel. I‘m sure this was interesting for someone but I thought it was a giant fart.

#MonthOfMemoirs

https://wellreadneck.wordpress.com/2018/08/23/imagine-wanting-only-this-kristen-...

I REALLLLLLY wanted to read this book. Really. But I was disappointed with it.
Physically, it‘s perfect. But story-wise, it‘s just all over the place. Disjointed is the kindest word for it. Lacking depth is another fair description. I can‘t say I got nothing out of it. But not as much as I expected. And mostly because I dug it out of the book 😕

Staycation Day #2 ❤️

It took a bit for this book to grow on me, but I ended up really liking it, especially the part about the Peshtigo fire. #comics #womenauthors #graphicnovels #memoir

During my planning periods I get up and out of my classroom and always end up in the library. Knowing I‘m trying to get out of my comfort zone I picked up this graphic novel memoir! Haven‘t read a graphic novel on my own, only because I‘ve used them to teach.

Morning read with whoopie pie.

Been in a bit of a reading slump this month and decided to try to remedy it by requesting 14 graphic novels from the local library system. Also a way to pump up my numbers for my reading challenge.

Ugh, I hated this so much I couldn‘t even finish it. I thought it would be an exploration of dying cities, but found something completely different. More of an artist‘s exploration of self, ennui, grief, and decaying buildings. It‘s an odd mix that never feels as deep as she presents herself. Rather than intelligent introspection, I found shallow naval-gazing. Plus the business of stealing photos from someone‘s memorial and showing no remorse. 😡

Much heavier than I was expecting. I guess I just like cheerier things. Parts were fascinating, like the Peshtigo fire and its roll in the making of napalm. And all the parts about her uncle were good. But then again, it‘s a book about an obsession with ruins—how could I not expect a downer?

My last finished book of 2017 (which makes 201 books)!

This is a moving and thought provoking graphic memoir about a young woman‘s meditation on permanence and memory. What determines how a place is remembered as it decays into picturesque ruins or a rotted blight? What are we, as impermanent residents of this earth, supposed to leave behind? Radtke‘s journey in this book through ruins both physical and metaphorical is riveting.

These two sentences perfectly capture my life up until now.

Wow.

Next up

#unpopularopinion I'm surprised she doesn't see her spine, she's gazing so hard at her navel. I think what really just set me off was her pathetic attempt at mic drop against people who don't like ruin porn and just her overall crap behavior. Also, as someone who suffers from anxiety and depression, I have tried to sympathize with the white privileged girl trying to find herself memoirs...and there are some good ones but I just can't tonight.

This graphic memoir chronicles growing up, traveling, grieving and finding one's place. I really enjoyed it.

I read this last night all in one sitting. The art was OK, but the story didn‘t seem to fit together very well. Was it about her uncle or the man whose memorial they found? Was it about the decay of middle America or mining towns out West? The family history about the woman who saved people from the Peshtigo Fire? All of these are interesting on their own, but she didn‘t get them to fit together into a cohesive narrative.

Loving this graphic memoir

Unlike most, I *really* did not like this book. I did like this page though! And the #midwestern focus #graphicnovels #SFPL

Sobering read, but excellent #Saturdayreading

Graphic novel fans, you'll definitely want to check this out. It's not a cheerful book, but it's personal and heart felt. 👍

Arrived at the state library association board meeting early, so now I get to read some more of this wonderful graphic novel! 🙌

The artwork is great, no, fabulous. Radtke's story of trying to discover who she is as a young woman held my interest except for that little area about bombs and weapons. I have no interest in those. Beauty in decay? Yes! I love that! History? Yes to that too! 💜

An eloquent, marvellous and melancholy study of senescence, presented in meticulous art with minimal text. People, relationships, and the things created by humans—all will crumble to nothing in the end. What Radtke manages to do, with clear-eyed compassion, is to allow us to see the beauty in the inevitable.

Radtke's controlled linework and attention to photographic detail reminds me of Alison Bechdel's art.

Mother: One of our ancestors was a nun and she's probably going to become a saint! The bishop just approved the apparition and classified it as a miracle. It's the first Marian apparition in America that they made official.
Daughter: [googles "Marian apparition"]

I would have googled that too.

I've learned from this book that "ruin porn" is a thing.

Yesterday I saw the Wonder Woman movie, in which chemical warfare is an important plot point. Later, in Kristen Radke's comics-format memoir, I read about US military testing of nerve gas in the 1940s in Utah. The gas killed 6,400 grazing sheep in 2 days. Humans are the worst.

Beautiful Graphic Memoir about love, loss and figuring how to come into your own. I really did not want to put it down.

I have had this on deck every Sunday for the past four weeks. Instead of saving for late in the day, I am going to start this right now.

???
A haunting, melancholic graphic memoir reflecting on permanence, mortality, and grief. Told through grayscale, layered, photorealistic illustrations of abandoned places and punctuated by the thoughts of a restless young woman trying to make sense of the life she is making.
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Fulfills the "read a book with a person on the cover" challenge for the 2017 #booktubeathon ?
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#btat2017

It's not like I needed to replenish my TBR, but hey, why not? #readingaddict

As a fellow native of northern Wisconsin (and thus, as Radtke references, one of the few-ish people to grow up learning about the Peshtigo Fire in school) and as the mom of a kiddo with a heart condition (which runs deep in her family), I had to read this graphic memoir, and I'm glad I did. It felt a bit all-over-the-place, but I think intentionally so, as she's had an all-over-the-place (geographically/intellectually/emotionally) life so far.

#LostLoves #JubilantJuly

Beautiful graphic memoir exploring grief and the writer's attachment to abandoned places.

Finally got to reading this, and it is indeed as good as advertised. Impermanence and change, and our desire to be anywhere but here, all wrapped in the memoir of loss and restlessness.