So I think to myself: if he's already made the kind of comics I'm trying to make, then I can go on to other projects.
We get in touch pretty quickly. I trade him: some issues from my Lives of the Saints series for his graphic novel.
I'm napping after a night shift at the hospital when my copy of the graphic novel comes in the mail. My wife shoves it in my face, and says she's been trying to keep it away from the kids for the past few hours. I flip through the book quickly. My first sleep deprived comment: “Wow! Look at the eyeballs!” I read it that evening. One thing is for certain: this graphic novel is nothing like the one on which I am working.
And, in a certain sense, that's good news. It means a whole year's worth of my writing and drawing is not all for naught. I continue my comics making. I relinquish my copy Our Lady of Fatima the graphic novel to be abused by my book loving children.
So, what is Our Lady of Fatima the graphic novel about? The website summary isn't super helpful. But, here's what Google books says:
“When a little boy stops in to see Sister Lucia on his way to Catechism Class, she tells him the amazing story of Fatima. As the boy's eyes fill with wonder, so too will readers respond to the appearance of The Virgin Mary to Lucia and her cousins as little children.”
I'll start my critique of the book with its title. With a page count of 52 pages, it begs the question: how long does a comic have to be in order to be called a graphic novel? Dave Sim, most famous for his independently published comic, Cerebus, posited that any comic less than 100 pages cannot be called a graphic novel. This statement makes sense. You wouldn't call a prose piece that's less than 100 pages a novel, so why would you call a comic less than 100 pages a novel? So, I don't totally agree with the title choice. But that's not too big of a deal.
The book is written and illustrated anonymously. Based on subsequent publications by this company, I assume this is the work of Sam Estrada.
The visual style strikes me as digitally created and highly manga influenced. The faces are especially manga flavored. Big eyes, button noses, tiny vs. giant mouths. Even more indicative of this is a bead of sweat on a face on page 31. In Manga, this is meant to express embarrassment. It could also represent literal sweat or any other number of things in manga. It's interesting that, in this book, it is rendered to look three dimensional, which breaks the flat graphic usually seen with this manga convention. But, that being said, maybe this is done in manga more than I am aware.
The colorist deserves a good amount of credit for how this book looks, overall. It's easy to see that, without the colorist’s contribution, the visuals on this book fall flat. Perhaps the illustrator would have compensated in some other way. It's hard to tell.
The story moves pretty well. It's a framed story that alternates between Sr. Lucia telling the story of Fatima to a child and her conversations with the child. There are catechism pieces included in their conversation that don't seem too tacked on, which is good. There are many moments that are either included for cuteness appeal or are part of the cartoonist’s natural style.
The idea of including cuteness appeal in Catholic art is something worth discussing. I will use this review as a springboard to discuss the utilization of cuteness in Catholic art.
Cuteness exists in God's creation, I imagine, as a defense mechanism. It has a visceral appeal to women, girls and young boys. And, since mothers often purchase Catholic art, cute art often sells well.
The appeal of cute art to boys usually wanes when around ages of 7 -10 years old. It is at that point that boys want little or nothing to do with cute art. So, cute Catholic art will have little to no appeal to an older boy. Because of this, much of the Catholic art that is made these days has a limited effect on boys. Will they put aside The Faith along with the cute art? Hopefully not. But I definitely think that more Catholic art needs to be made to engage boys at the crucial ages of 7 and up.
OK, enough of that. Back to 2017:
Our Lady of Fatima the graphic novel is best suited for younger readers.
I figure this out the first evening that I read it.
In the long run, my book, Lives of the Saints (and people who lived saintly lives) presents: OUR LADY OF FATIMA!, takes six more years to finish, but it's worth it. The story deserves a more thorough comics treatment. In the end, the reader has to decide if I succeeded in creating something worthwhile.
Our Lady of Fatima the graphic novel is available here
My book: Lives of the Saints (and people who lived saintly lives) presents: OUR LADY OF FATIMA! is available here
-George Tautkus
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