Rolling Blackouts: Dispatches from Turkey, Syria, and Iraq

(Hardback)

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Description

Cartoonist Sarah Glidden follows up her acclaimed debut, How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less, with Rolling Blackouts, which details her two-month long journey through Turkey, Iraq, and Syria. Glidden accompanies her two friends - reporters and founders of the journalistic non-profit The Seattle Globalist - as they research stories on the Iraq War's effect on the Middle East and, specifically, the war's refugees. Joining them is a former Marine and childhood friend of one of the journalists whose deployment to Iraq in 2007 adds an unexpected and sometimes unwelcome viewpoint, both to the people they come across and perhaps even themselves. The crew works their way through the region with the goal of asking civilians, refugees, and officials: 'who are you' Everyone has a story to tell: the Iranian blogger, the United Nations Refugee administrator, a taxi driver, the Iraqi refugee deported from the US, the Iraqis seeking refuge in Syria, and even the American Marine. The journalists struggle equally with how to tell these stories and with how to market them into articles people will want to read. Glidden records all that she encounters with a sympathetic and searching eye - What is journalism What is its purpose What is honesty Painted in her trademark soft muted watercolours and written with self-effacing humour, Rolling Blackouts cements Glidden's place as one of comics's most original nonfiction voices.

Reviews

Amid it all, Glidden the storyteller exudes intimacy and warmth both in her tube watercolours and her sometimes confessional persona. And Glidden the knowledge-seeker thinks in much the same way as she paints: forever toward the light. Washington Post. A graphic nonfiction novel of subtlety and understated wit. Entertainment Weekly

Author Bio

Sarah Glidden's debut book, How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less landed on several best of the year lists, including Entertainment Weekly; earned a YALSA Great Graphic Novels for Teens distinction; and won an Ignatz Award. A graduate of Boston University, she now lives in Seattle.