Bound To Stay Bound

Booklist - 04/15/2014 *Starred Review* Mariko and Jillian Tamaki earned critical acclaim for Skim (2008), and they return here with another coming-of-age tale about the awkward transition from carefree childhood to jaded, self-conscious young adulthood. Rose and her parents spend every summer at their lakeside cabin in Awago, right down the path from Rose’s best friend, Windy, and her family. They spend lazy days collecting rocks on the beach, riding bikes, swimming, and having barbecues. But this summer, Rose’s parents are constantly fighting, and her mother seems resentful and sad. In that unspoken way kids pick up on their parents’ hardships, Rose starts lashing out at Windy and grasping at what she thinks of as adulthood—turning up her nose at silliness (at which Windy excels), watching gory horror movies, reading fashion magazines, and joining in the bullying of a local teenage girl who finds herself in a tough spot. Jillian Tamaki’s tender illustrations, all rendered in a deep purpley blue, depict roiling water, midnight skies, Windy’s frenetic sugar highs, and Rose’s mostly aloof but often poignantly distressed facial expressions with equal aplomb. With a light touch, the Tamakis capture the struggle of growing up in a patchwork of summer moments that lead to a conclusion notably absent of lessons. Wistful, touching, and perfectly bittersweet. - Copyright 2014 Booklist.

School Library Journal - 05/01/2014 Gr 8 Up—Every summer, Rose and her parents vacation at a lakeside cottage. The rest of the world fades away as Rose reunites with her friend Windy and delves into leisurely games of MASH, swimming, and the joy of digging giant holes in the sand—but this summer is different. Rose is on the cusp of adolescence; she's not ready to leave childhood behind but is fascinated by the drama of the local teens who are only a few years older, yet a universe apart in terms of experience. They drink, they smoke, they swear. As Rose and Windy dip their toes into the mysterious waters of teen life by experimenting with new vocabulary ("sluts!") and renting horror movies, her parents struggle with their own tensions that seem incomprehensible to Rose. Layers of story unfurl gradually as the narrative falls into the dreamlike rhythm of summer. Slice-of-life scenes are gracefully juxtaposed with a complex exploration of the fragile family dynamic after loss and Rose's ambivalence toward growing up. The mood throughout is thoughtful, quiet, almost meditative. The muted tones of the monochromatic blue-on-white illustrations are perfectly suited to the contemplative timbre, and the writing and images deserve multiple reads to absorb their subtleties. This captivating graphic novel presents a fully realized picture of a particular time in a young girl's life, an in-between summer filled with yearning and a sense of ephemerality. The story resolves with imperfect hope and will linger in readers' mind through changing seasons.—Allison Tran, Mission Viejo Library, CA - Copyright 2014 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Bulletin for the Center... - 06/01/2014 There is a developmental moment that young people don’t always spot when they are going through it, but they will often recognize it in retrospect—a specific incident or time period that marks the shift from childhood to adolescence. Of course, this is a blurred line, and a favorite younger friend might send you back to whooping across the beach, or you might have a specific moment of insight that hints at an adult level of maturity. This stellar graphic novel explores this crossing-over period in depth, examining the ways in which yearning forward and back can shape a person, even if she doesn’t perceive it at the time. In This One Summer, Rose returns to the family cabin at Awago Beach for the summer, and it’s clear things are changing. Rose doesn’t know exactly what is wrong, other than that her mother’s desire for a child seems to be causing her parents to fight constantly, and that the annual family trip isn’t going nearly as well as in years past. Her own move out of childhood is made clear especially by two things. First, she’s newly interested in the older teens who live year-round at Awago Beach, crushing on an older guy and obsessing over his relationship drama with his girlfriend. Second, she’s growing impatient with her younger best friend, Windy, with whom she has spent every previous summer blissfully doing kid things; this summer, Rose shifts mercurially between enjoying their old shared silliness and resenting its appearance just when she wants intensity. Rose is initially pretty short on empathy (for her grieving mother, for the teenage local girls who trade sex for attention, for her younger friend whose feelings are easily hurt), but she does grow significantly over the course of the summer, and indeed, empathy is one of the milestones that helps Rose find a way to channel her loneliness into independence and self-fulfillment. The story treats all its characters with tenderness and sympathy, adroitly paralleling Rose’s mother’s miscarriage (eventually revealed as the source of her sadness) with the accidental pregnancy of one of the teenaged girls, bringing the two together in a beautiful and redemptive moment. The illustrations effectively capture the piney smells, screen-door-slamming sounds, and quotidian details of a summer lake colony, yet they have a haunting quality. The art is executed entirely in shades of blue, and the monochromatic tones recall the cinematic trope of rendering flashbacks in black and white, suggesting something passing or already gone. The design and craftsmanship create a remarkable fluency, demonstrating graphic narrative at its best: the silences that pervade Rose’s life this summer are present in both the wordless spreads and between sharp verbal exchanges. Rose’s turning of her attention away from Windy shoves the latter’s speech balloon partly out of the frame, vividly depicting its sidelining; one summer day that is both fleeting and interminable is highlighted in nearly ten pages of mostly wordless snapshot illustrations, an evocation through visual pacing that text alone could never achieve. The book is poignant and melancholy, and it will be swiftly recognizable to those who only recently hovered at the cusp of adolescence, unsure sure whether they wanted to cross over even while knowing there was really no choice. Fans of the first graphic novel by this cousin duo, the similarly quiet, contemplative Skim (BCCB 5/08), will find this one to be equally compelling. As in most of life, not a lot actually happens, but a significant transformation takes place, one that’s conveyed with nuance, sympathy, and beauty. (Publication information appears on p. 544.) April Spisak, Reviewer - Copyright 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.