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Summary
Summary
In her graphic memoirs, New York Times-best selling cartoonist Lucy Knisley paints a warts-and-all portrait of contemporary, twentysomething womanhood, like writer Lena Dunham (Girls). In the next installment of her graphic travelogue series, Displacement, Knisley volunteers to watch over her ailing grandparents on a cruise. (The bookâe(tm)s watercolors evoke the ocean that surrounds them.) In a book that is part graphic memoir, part travelogue, and part family history, Knisley not only tries to connect with her grandparents, but to reconcile their younger and older selves. She is aided in her quest by her grandfatherâe(tm)s WWII memoir, which is excerpted. Readers will identify with Knisleyâe(tm)s frustration, her fears, her compassion, and her attempts to come to terms with mortality, as she copes with the stress of travel complicated by her grandparentsâe(tm) frailty.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
After her acclaimed travelogues French Milk and An Age of License, Knisley returns with a new travel memoir, this one focusing on duty rather than adventure. Lucy accompanies her aging grandparents on a Caribbean cruise. She ends up dealing with more than she expected, however, as her grandparents are no longer very mobile and have high demands on her attention. Her grandmother is dipping into dementia, packing numerous toothbrushes and combs, and insisting on buying even more at the ship's store. Not a seasoned caretaker, Lucy struggles with cleaning up her grandfather's soiled pants and guarding her grandparents' cabin door so they don't wander off. She brings her grandfather's World War II memoir along with her, and segments of the memoir are interspersed within the text, giving us a glimpse into her grandfather's young life. His observations are insightful and detailed-even more could have been mixed into the book. Lucy's own private journey about being confused, lost, and lonely for love at her stage of life is balanced with the humorous mishaps and heartbreaking deterioration of her grandparents, all told with a mix of comics, illustrations without text, and hand-lettered journal entries. Knisley's experiences are a reminder of the fragility of age and fleeting nature of youth, but there's no real knockout revelation here. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
A 20-something cartoonist with a unique sense of humor sets off on a cruise to the Caribbean with her nonagenarian grandparents.In this follow-up to her graphic memoir An Age of License (2014), the talented Knisley offers a pointed juxtaposition to her earlier travelogue set in Europe. When her grandparents Phyllis and Allen decided to take a cruise ship to the Caribbean, the author (recovering from a recent breakup) accompanied them on the 10-day journey. And she worrieda lot. Among Knisley's concerns were her grandparents' progressive dementia, their physical limitations, the potential for norovirus ("puking/pooping virus"), her own insomnia and anxiety, and the virulent rudeness of the thousands of other passengers. "This is not at all like my last trip," writes the author. "I traveled around Europe on my own, drinking wine, learning languages, and having a passionate love affair. That trip was about independence, sex, youth, and adventure. This trip is about patience, care, mortality, respect, sympathy and love." In between her amusing drawings depicting life on the ship and the strange comedy that came with taking care of her elders, Knisley offers excerpts from her grandfather's World War II memoir. This inclusion lends the book an interesting contrast between her grandparents' worldview when they were her age and Knisley's frenetic, impatient, all-too-busy inner self. It's also worth noting that the narrative storytelling is delightful, combining easy-to-follow layouts with the artist's unique visual style, vivid watercolors and quirky sense of humor. The result is an impressive high-wire act that balances observational humor and a highly tuned sense of self with a moving portrait of the ways compassion can affect even the most self-aware among us. Knisley says these books lock into place a certain time in her memory. Readers are fortunate she brought her notebooks with her on these unusual journeys. A moving but also very funny meditation on time, age and grace. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Twentysomething Knisley, eager to spend time having adventures, volunteers to accompany her 90-something-year-old grandparents on a cruise to the Caribbean. She knows they are frail, but she isn't fully prepared for the rigors of elder care. In this sensitive graphic memoir, she talks frankly about the problems she faces, such as navigating airports, keeping track of her grandmother (whose dementia causes her to wander), and arranging activities for her taciturn and weak relatives. Knisley finds both the humor and the sadness in her grandparents' condition while also pointing out the loneliness of being the only one responsible for caregiving and the frustration she feels for how the elderly are feared and ignored in modern America. Using delicate watercolor drawings, Knisley illustrates both life onboard ship and her grandfather's experiences during WWII as told in his self-published memoirs, drawing a comparison between the two that comes full circle by the end of the work. Whereas Knisley's previous travel memoirs speak more to the young adult experience, Displacement is a timely and mature work that pairs perfectly with other elder-care titles, such as Roz Chast's Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant? (2014).--Wildsmith, Snow Copyright 2015 Booklist
Library Journal Review
"Displacement," often meaning the water pushed aside by a boat's hull, here alludes to lives pushed aside by aging and senescence, as well as a traveler's dislocation. When her beloved ninetysomething grandparents sign up for a cruise, twentysomething Knisley (Relish; An Age of License) signs on as caretaker. The sobering and eye-opening experience includes washing the "accidents" out of grandfather's pants, keeping her dementia-stricken grandmother on track, coordinating multiple medications, and shepherding the pair through complicated routines such as airport security. Although feeling overwhelmed and hiding her terror and heartbreak, Knisley admires the couple's spunk and determines to give them a good time despite their limitations and the simple-minded shipboard entertainments. Her limpid watercolors convey the tropical light, undulating ocean, and superficial gaiety of cruise ambiance, serving as ironic counterpoint to the gravity of her responsibilities and emotions. In one panel, a nasty toothed gremlin representing the horror of infirmity and death sits on her shoulder. VERDICT This poignant, sensitive account stresses the importance of connections throughout life's entire journey. Knisley's contemporaries who have enjoyed her other memoirs will learn much from this one.-M.C. © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.