Shaun Tan - The Arrival

I was handed this book as a way to pass a small amount of time recently and 20 minutes later my eyes were stinging with tears. Every one of it's pages holds a spectacular pencil drawing that wordlessly depicts a nameless immigrant's journey to a foreign industrial capital. Opposite the cover and back, multiracial head shots (probably taken for identification) checker the paper. This follows the culturally blind scheme of the book as the world described would easily be intensively foreign yet familiar to any modern reader. If the story had been told with words, it would have only needed a few. Soon after it begins, the main character finds himself gesturing more than speaking. I would imagine words subtracting from the gravity of his confusion. Thus, in order to fully understand the story I was forced to examine the pictures more intensively in the same manner I might have walked down the hallway of a museum. I was told this was a graphic novel, but it hardly seems similar to things like Ghost World and Shortcomings. It would be much more accessible to a child then either of those, and would fit well on either a coffee table or in a bookshelf. Pick it up or give it as a gift if you have a chance.