This novel is a love letter to comics, but it’s a clear-eyed one that doesn’t gloss over the rough edges of its history or imagine the “good old days” as perfect. What does come through is an absolute love of the medium and the ways in which sometimes, as the saying goes, comics (and the people in it) will break your heart. If you’re a sucker for the depiction of a publisher or newsroom, you’ll truly eat this up—I had flashbacks to my college paste-up days at the paper. And the novel’s New York feels so lived in, so utterly convincing. I was transported to this time and place, though Carmen’s specific lens. Did I mention you also get comics pages of the Lynx interspersed occasionally, tying into the main plot? This whole book is a treat.
