HEY, WAIT

A heart-rending look at childhood and the moments that define our lives

By Arnold T. Blumberg     October 29, 2001

Life isn't like a comic book. There are no neatly ordered panels, no superheroic last minute rescues. Life is messy, disordered, and occasionally marked by tragedy that can't be solved in 32 pages or undone in next month's issue. In the new one-shot mini-graphic novel from Fantagraphics Books, HEY, WAIT, one young boy is about to learn the worst lesson in life when tragedy mars his otherwise idyllic existence and sets him on a dark path to a fate he did not anticipate. What are the events that shape our lives? When do we make those irreversible choices that forever determine our destinies? Can anything be done about the mistakes we make? HEY, WAIT dares to ask these questions in a very unique and irresistible way.

HEY, WAIT has been compared favorably to Art Spiegelman's MAUS, in that it also employs the conceit of casting its characters as animals while maintaining a very real and almost painful level of intense emotional introspection. This is not a funny animal book, even though the figures may look cute this is a story about some very heavy subject matter, the emptiness of a life misspent, and the horrible tragedies that we carry with us as we try to find our way.

It's an expertly designed story as well, making use of some intriguing comic book techniques to pace the story and provide transitions between past and present. There's also a level of magic realism at work. Adults go to and from work on stilts, and this is evidently a normal practice a metaphor perhaps for how the older generation towers over children and goes about its business in ways inexplicable to young minds? There is also an almost surreal sense of another world creeping into this one, a frightening reality of zombie-like people trapped in a nightmarish existence. By the end of the novel, our lead character must choose to join their ranks and accept his fate as he contemplates the life he wasted. But there's one last glimpse of happiness to be had before the end comes...

HEY, WAIT is a touching ode to childhood but it's a very disturbing one as well. It would be very surprising if the title and its creator, Norwegian writer/artist Jason, don't garner an award nomination or two for next year's Eisners. I'll be watching for it, and once you read this unforgettable story, you will be too.

HEY, WAIT

Grade: A

Author(s): Jason (edited and translated from the Norwegian by Kim Thompson)

Publisher: Fantagraphics Books

Price: $9.95