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Night Fisher
by R. Kikuo Johnson

I had heard a lot of good buzz about this one and was really looking forward to it which perhaps set my expectations a bit high. The illustrations are beautiful and done in black and white. The Maui setting was fascinating for me having recently been there on vacation. Nuggets of local history are interspersed throughout the book quite effectively. Another great thing about this book is that it felt like a realistic high school coming of age story, as opposed to so much of the sugar-coated crud that is floating around these days. But somehow the ending felt unresolved to me. I know it is probably meant to feel this way, meant to be a metaphor to real life which isn’t ever resolved in neat little packages like mainstream pop culture would have us believe. But still, at the end of this book, I wanted more. And I guess that is a good thing in a way, but also quite frustrating in another. In any case, the book is definitely worth a read for any graphic novel fan and I look forward to seeing what Johnson does next.