The Cliff

by Manon Debaye, Montana Kane (Translator)

Overview

Schoolyard outcasts Charlie and Astrid meet up after school near a cliff at the edge of the woods surrounding their sleepy town. They make a blood pact to jump together in five days time, before their thirteenth birthdays. Not that navigating the unspoken pecking order of the school quad makes it easy. Can the intensity of their bond survive the scrutiny of their peers, or will it crumble under the sum of each other’s disappointments? Manon Debaye’s characters live in a world just on the periphery of adult supervision, where kids prey upon one another with casual aplomb only to find themselves completely out of their depth. A deft use of colored pencils brings sleepy but barren suburban landscapes to the fore, further capturing childhood’s last pivotal moments as it teeters on the edge of adolescence with startling honesty in this devastatingly well-crafted debut. Winner of the 2023 Philippe Druillet Prize at Angoulême, The Cliff is a moody, visceral glimpse into pre-teen life, unflinching in its portrayal of trivialized cruelties alongside simple joys. Translated by Montana Kane.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781770467262
Publisher:	Drawn & Quarterly
Publication date:	11/07/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	152
File size:	61 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	15 - 18 Years

About the Author

Manon Debaye is an illustrator and cartoonist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Zadig, Biscoto, and Zeit Wissen. Debaye is also the co-founder of the small press collective Mökki. This is her first graphic novel.

Editorial Reviews

★ 11/20/2023

The soft colored-pencil drawings in Debaye’s Angouleme award–winning, English-language debut graphic novel belie the tragic themes at its center. The story opens with Charlie and Astrid making a suicide pact, promising to jump off a cliff together before their 13th birthdays. Both are outsiders, who share a secret, budding friendship with an undercurrent of romance that thrums with the possibility of danger. Charlie (who presents as “not even a real girl... not even a dude,” according to one of her classmates) is angry and known as a good fighter, which earns her a place in their school’s gang of bullies. At home, when Charlie tells her mother “I’m going to kill myself,” her mom responds, “Sounds pretty spectacular” without looking up from the kitchen sink. A sensitive loner with strict parents, Astrid is bullied relentlessly, and Charlie won’t blow her cover to defend her friend. When Astrid publicly challenges Charlie to accept her, Charlie doubles down and turns on Astrid, leaving her more alone than ever. At multiple turns, there are opportunities for Charlie and other characters to speak their feelings. What they choose instead—silence, fistfights, and, in the case of Charlie’s mother, allegiance to her boyfriend over her kid—pushes them all closer to the cliff. Black-and-white birch trees and decaying animal corpses nod to the world of fairy tales. Readers will be haunted by this simultaneously modern and painfully timeless tale. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

It’s a rare treat when a story containing so much darkness can also be such an engrossing and propulsive read. Debaye’s perfectly-paced debut captures the perils and intensity of adolescence, and rewards the reader with gorgeously illustrated scenes that hit right in the gut.” —Lee Lai, author of Stone Fruit

“An honest, startling, and terrifically skillful depiction of the deep wounds that can grow out of trauma and life as a young outsider.” —Sophie Yanow, author of The Contradictions

“Brilliant, beautiful and bracing, [The Cliff] forces you to remember – whether you want to, or not.” —The Guardian

“Readers will be haunted by this simultaneously modern and painfully timeless tale.” —Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

“This story is sure to sit with readers long after it’s over—especially for those who, like Charlie, spent their adolescence coming to terms with their gender expression and sexuality.” —Maisonneuve

“The Cliff is a dark story that joins the ranks of Lord of the Flies and The Ocean at the End of the Lane in looking unflinchingly at childhood’s twilight.” —NewCity Lit

From the Publisher