Review by Booklist Review
This new work from Gipi (aka Gianni Pacinotti, author/illustrator of Notes for a War Story, 2007) follows two brothers trying to survive in a postapocalyptic landscape. Raised by a father who doesn't believe in teaching the boys compassion, the boys grow up cold and distrustful. Along with the daily struggle of staying alive, both boys are fixated on one object: their father's journal. Having not been taught to read or write, they believe that their father's mysterious scribbles contain the secrets of the universe, or, worse, his true feelings about them. The blunt savagery in this novel is often juxtaposed with subtle compassion, acting as a foil to the boys' misdeeds and the cruelty of their world. Gipi's rough sketches magnify the desolation and brutality and have a classic cinematic quality. Land of the Sons critiques and investigates familial relationships and masculinity, but it ultimately raises significantly more questions than answers. Regardless, this evocative, thought-provoking graphic novel will be sure to linger in the reader's mind long after the last page is turned.--McMahon, Fiona Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this meditative graphic novel, two teenage brothers scavenge in a swampy wasteland after an undefined global disaster, bringing food and trade items home to their father. There are a few other people near the lake where they live, including a distrustful fellow scavenger and a "witch" who was once a doctor, but the boys are forbidden to explore further afield. Deliberately raised without education or affection so they can focus on survival, the brothers become resentful under their father's gruff authority and curious about his diary, which they are unable to read. Then a mishap forces them into the outside world, which the reader discovers right along with them. This unusual postapocalyptic story is often grim and violent, but by channeling the story through the brothers' limited, cockeyed perspective, Gipi develops a naturalism and human quality often missing from SF survival fantasies. The loose, limber black-and-white artwork is a marvel; the figure drawings balance careful realism with cartoon expression, and details of the natural world-rain, water, weeds-are sketched in quick, powerful lines. Above all, the art reveals a credible vast alternative landscape of mud, water, reedy islands, makeshift boats, and strange and hostile patched-together colonies. It's a strikingly envisioned imaginary world. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In a postapocalyptic world ravaged by deadly disease and blight, two brothers scavenge for survival. Their father, a pitiless and withholding man, is consumed with eradicating any weakness in his sons, punishing them for even daring to utter the word love. Following his death, and obsessed with what secrets might be held in his diary, the illiterate duo set out in search of someone who can read it to them. Award winner -Gipi's (Notes for a War Story) deceptively simple, scratchy illustrations make all the more disturbing the brutality the brothers encounter on their ensuing grim, violent adventure across a fallen realm inhabited by mutants and horrific marauders. While this might sound fairly boilerplate for the current dystopia genre, Gipi's attention to psychological detail sets his story apart, as does what is ultimately an achingly poignant climax guaranteed to bring a tear or two to the eyes of even the most jaded readers. -VERDICT Gipi (aka Gianni Pacinotti) is already a fan favorite, but this, his most fully realized and mature work to date, might be the breakout hit that garners him a much larger readership.-TB © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
