This fictional story is inspired by the lives of many Korean families who were separated when the country split into North and South. After seventy years, Gwija, now an elderly woman, still dreams of reconnecting with her lost son. Her daughter, Jina ponders the promise she made to help try and find him.

Alexandra Trese works with police and governments to uncover and solve mysterious crimes on the streets of the Philippines while also interacting with the gods and spirits of the mythological realm. Ending the panel on a humorous note, Nagata replied that she'd be “really happy if fans didn't expect too much” from her and that she's thankful for all the support behind her work. I saw this at the library and realized I had never read it, so reread the other two volumes in this series, which went viral in Japan. Why? It's a story of long term depression/anxiety from a woman who has for most of her life been paralyzed by her emotional condition. And then she began writing, serializing in very clear fashion her life story. I mainly read fiction series in manga, so imagine part of the response to this is the honesty in it. And the relatability to so many people, who responded online to her. Then the online manga got compiled as books. Told in memoir format, Kimiko Tobimatsu describes her experiences as a young, queer, mixed-race woman with no health problems who is suddenly diagnosed with breast cancer. Kimiko attempts to form a new life for herself while also building new boundaries and learning new ways to communicate with her family and her partner. Two political houses fight for control of the planet Arrakis. Paul, who has a messiah complex, and the desert people of the planet are at odds, and Paul and the opposing parties try to eliminate one another at every turn. There is constant espionage. Trust no one. A fantastic first volume adaptation of Dune.I'm not sure how good my sample is because I'm surrounded by like-minded friends (and I am after all a millennial; one of the older ones, but still a millennial) but from what I gather our thoughts and experiences reflect Nagata's more than what society expects our thoughts and experiences ought to be. Reading this and My Lesbian Experience is like that moment from The History Boys that often get quoted about books: it's like someone reached out and held your hand.

Having been taken on by multiple writers and artists over the years, however, its diversity has grown and spread, celebrating not only women but also queer people of all shapes and sizes. In the midst of the success of her first graphic memoir, My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness, Nagata Kabi is struggling with her mental health. She takes up drinking heavily to escape, but when she is hospitalized for severe stomach pains and is diagnosed with pancreatitis, she must learn to survive without it. This graphic memoir follows the creator through her experiences with seizures and memory loss due to a brain tumor.

MY LESBIAN EXPERIENCE WITH LONELINESS HC (MR)

In a world where cyclops are another group of human life, Cyclopedia Exotica circulates several stories of cyclops living in today’s modern world. Each character seeks the same things as the two-eyed community–finding love, navigating life and careers, and cultivating their communities as humans. Being queer — and, more specifically, being gender queer — means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. But most of us have struggled with our identity and how we outwardly project ourselves to others at some point or another. A fictionalized retelling of the “Karnegie Day” riot in Carnegie, Pennsylvania, when the KKK decided to storm a town of “undesirables.” Told from the point of view of an Italian immigrant, it focuses on the town’s resistance and how they drove the KKK out of their land. This book felt like it weighed like a hundred pounds when I put it down. It's hard to think about it without tearing up, because as I said, I do not relate to everything, but enough that it makes me have to take a deep breath. It's scary to see such dark feelings represented, but also comforting in a way to know that someone understands. Nagata Kabi, I hope that we both can survive. The funny, exuberant, inspiring antidote to body shame–a full-color graphic memoir celebrating the imperfections of the author’s female body in all its glory.