Lost Soul, Be at Peace: A Graphic Novel

by Maggie Thrash, Maggie Thrash (Illustrator)

Overview

Following her acclaimed Honor Girl, Maggie Thrash revisits a period of teenage depression in a graphic memoir that is at once thoughtful, honest, and marked by hope.

A year and a half after the summer that changed her life, Maggie Thrash wishes she could change it all back. She’s trapped in a dark depression and flunking eleventh grade, befuddling her patrician mother while going unnoticed by her father, a workaholic federal judge. The only thing Maggie cares about is her cat, Tommi . . . who then disappears somewhere in the walls of her cavernous house. So her search begins — but Maggie’s not even really sure what she’s lost, and she has no idea what she’ll find. Lost Soul, Be at Peace is the continuation of Maggie’s story from her critically acclaimed memoir Honor Girl, one that brings her devastating honesty and humor to the before and after of depression.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780763694197
Publisher:	Candlewick Press
Publication date:	10/09/2018
Pages:	192
Sales rank:	1,054,770
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Maggie Thrash is the author of the graphic memoir Honor Girl as well as the Strange Truth books. She is a former staff writer for Rookie. Maggie Thrash lives in Delaware.

Editorial Reviews

09/10/2018
In a follow-up to her debut graphic memoir Honor Girl, Thrash chronicles her junior year at a posh Atlanta prep school, adding a magical bent. Maggie’s already wrestling with plummeting grades, depression, her lesbian identity, and her self-absorbed parents. Then her cat, Tommi, disappears and she discovers a secret hallway in her home—and within it, a thoughtful and determined boy her age named Tommy, who looks ghostly but seems real. Their conversations reveal a world Maggie has never seen. Tommy digs ditches to make money for college, and he doesn’t know what a Chinese restaurant is. Her life looks just as foreign to him: when she chooses a college by pointing to one in a guidebook, oblivious to its cost, he says, “Wow. Life is just that easy for you, isn’t it?” Thrash’s bone-dry observational humor stays provocative (“In the South... Democrats go bird hunting while Republicans go deer hunting”), and her rugged draftsmanship and solid toolbox of visual storytelling techniques can handle any emotional register with honesty: teen ennui; cold exchanges with her parents; angry jabs at the rich, bigoted white boys at her school; and the chilling dreams that haunt Maggie’s nights. Ages 14–up. Agent: Stephen Barr, Writers House. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

★ 08/01/2018
Gr 8 Up—Picking up a year and a half after the events of her graphic memoir, Honor Girl, Thrash once again chronicles her adolescence, this time injecting her narrative with a dose of the supernatural. Growing up in Atlanta, 16-year-old Maggie feels invisible. She came out as a lesbian at the beginning of the school year, with barely any reaction from classmates, and though she is depressed, her stern father and her oblivious socialite mother are unaware of her anguish. Only her cat makes her smile, but her pet's disappearance sends her deeper into turmoil. Tommy, a ghost only she can see, enters the scene, and the two try to uncover his connection to Maggie and her family. Meanwhile, she bonds with her father as she witnesses the harsh realities he confronts in his work as a judge. The author/illustrator looks back on her teen years with a pitch-perfect blend of caustic humor, melancholy, and tenderness, depicting her younger self's frustration with her wealthy, ignorant cohorts and her growing understanding of her own privilege. Her linework is slightly unpolished, but her manga-esque illustrations brim with emotion; her use of color is particularly inspired. VERDICT Thrash boldly mixes memoir and fiction for a perceptive exploration of her past that will resonate profoundly with readers of Honor Girl, Laurie Halse Anderson and Emily Carroll's Speak: The Graphic Novel, and Katie Green's Lighter Than My Shadow.—Mahnaz Dar, School Library Journal

School Library Journal

Mixing recollections with a supernatural Hamlet-inspired theme, her watercolor-tinged illustrations add a wonderfully ethereal layer to an already nuanced offering. Defying genre boundaries, Thrash has proven herself a capable memoirist able to pinpoint her own pivotal life moments, turn them into art, and take risks with conventions. Nearly all characters present as white. A thoughtful and compelling exploration of adolescence.
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

The author/illustrator looks back on her teen years with a pitch-perfect blend of caustic humor, melancholy, and tenderness, depicting her younger self’s frustration with her wealthy, ignorant cohorts and her growing understanding of her own privilege...Thrash boldly mixes memoir and fiction for a perceptive exploration of her past that will resonate profoundly with readers of Honor Girl, Laurie Halse Anderson and Emily Carroll’s Speak: The Graphic Novel, and Katie Green’s Lighter Than My Shadow.
—School Library Journal (starred review)

This should resonate with readers looking for unusual realistic fiction that doesn’t shy away from difficult themes.
—Booklist

In a closing note Thrash comments on the facts at the core of her tale—privilege, loneliness, coming out, and yes, a lost cat—and how she reconciles memoir with ghost story. Readers who met Maggie in her Camp Bellflower summer will be happy to see her work her way toward acceptance.
—Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

Thrash’s bone-dry observational humor stays provocative...and her rugged draftsmanship and solid toolbox of visual storytelling techniques can handle any emotional register with honesty: teen ennui; cold exchanges with her parents; angry jabs at the rich, bigoted white boys at her school; and the chilling dreams that haunt Maggie’s nights.
—Publishers Weekly

Simultaneously a coming-of-age tale about a lonely teenager and a ghost story, Thrash's spooky storytelling is a clever tool to contextualize family and identity.
—Shelf Awareness for Readers

[Thrash's] original, challenging, tragicomic story forges new territory in the world of queer storytelling.
—Lambda Literary

From the Publisher