Skim

Written by Mariko Tamaki, illustrated by Jillian Tamaki, 2008.

 Skim and her friend Lisa are working on becoming witches when a classmate’s boyfriend dumps her and then commits suicide.  The GCL (Girls Celebrate Life!) Club is formed in response and begins a vapidly tyrannical reign over how the school should feel and behave in the wake of the event, paying particular attention to Skim who is falling into a deepening depression.  (In a class “self-love” exercise, one girl writes that unhappiness makes her sad, while Skim writes that ignorance makes her sad.  Agreed!)  As if navigating the demented dynamics of her school’s grief isn’t enough, Skim ends up falling in love and having to figure out how she feels about this constrained first of hers that she can’t talk about and that doesn’t seem to fit into the world around her. 

I forgot how lyrical this graphic novel is, especially when you take the time to look at the pictures properly along with the text.

Skim has won several awards and was short listed for a Governor General’s Literary Award in the Fall of 2008.  This first time nomination of a graphic novel for the prestigious award only included Mariko Tamaki and not her cousin and the illustrator, Jillian, creating contorversy over the recognition of illustration and text sharing equal importance in graphic novels.