Back in the Middle East

After Marjane Satrapi, who had told his Iranian youth in Persepolis, Riad Sattouf undertakes to put in pictures of their own memories Libya and Syria. This first volume of what should be a trilogy ends in 1984, while the author has 6 years.

While I appreciated greatly the work already Riad Sattouf in comics like cinema, I put this book above all his previous productions. As funny (and tragic) that the Secret Life of young people, with a dash more polished, this work seems the fruit of a long maturation: the narrative, although consisting mainly of anecdotes, retains a unity and a strong pace; the narrative uses the perspective of the child with a good mix of "voice" in order not to lose the reader; to better identify during the wanderings of the family, each country is characterized by a different color ... Behind the apparent simplicity, everything has been thought and weighed.

Less moving than the story of Satrapi, less poetic, too, the book of Sattouf catches up with his humor, though as usual with him, laughter is mixed with dread. Unlike his colleague, Riad Sattouf is the product of two cultures, Breton and his mother being his Syrian father, which, combined with unconventional sense of observation, allows him to wear a detached view on people's morals which surround it, without that one has the impression that advocates for any reason, or that he afraid of anyone.

A smart comic, fun and informative, recommend to everyone, without reservation.