Review of 'How to understand Israel in 60 days or less' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
So, where to start? Reading through the other reviews I couldn't help but have a bit of a knee-jerk reaction to a lot of the negatives that kept coming up. As a woman with opinions I still spend waaaay too much time worrying that other people think I'm coming on too strong. I mean, please forgive me for actually caring about all the people who are dying and stuff etc. So yeah, I never for an instant thought that Glidden was being preachy or bitchy or anything, but I'm sort of biased like that.
That said, I don't think that we would have much of a book without Glidden and her opinions. The entire book centers around her thoughts as she goes to visit Israel for the first time. If we aren't following her "angsting" what are we going to be doing? Not following her opinion enough is actually one …
So, where to start? Reading through the other reviews I couldn't help but have a bit of a knee-jerk reaction to a lot of the negatives that kept coming up. As a woman with opinions I still spend waaaay too much time worrying that other people think I'm coming on too strong. I mean, please forgive me for actually caring about all the people who are dying and stuff etc. So yeah, I never for an instant thought that Glidden was being preachy or bitchy or anything, but I'm sort of biased like that.
That said, I don't think that we would have much of a book without Glidden and her opinions. The entire book centers around her thoughts as she goes to visit Israel for the first time. If we aren't following her "angsting" what are we going to be doing? Not following her opinion enough is actually one of the biggest failings of the book to my mind, because at the end of the story we wrap up when the trip wraps up but we aren't any closer to understanding even Glidden's opinion let alone feeling like we understand Israel that much more then when we started.
Of course, that is the point of the story right. That "it's complicated" gets repeated over and over and over again because it's pretty true I guess. On the other hand, that's a shit excuse to just not do anything - which seems to be what most of the other characters in the story are using it for. I get that Glidden is ultimately left with less to go on then when she started, but even including some more specifics about the kinds of actions that are going on to bring peace to the area would have been nice. Even I, without very much knowledge of the area, know of a handful of organizations actively working towards reconciliation and I think hopefulness can never be overrated.
Not to say that I didn't learn anything from this comic. I generally found Glidden's thoughts and conversations to be really interesting and educational. I appreciated the fairly level headed and civil way in which she approached the topic. I would have just liked a bit more hope and action is all.
Once again, like in many of the other graphic memoirs I've read, I was really impressed by Glidden's honesty. She doesn't shy away from the big questions, or make herself out to be 100% perfect. Putting yourself out there as a flawed human being is pretty brave and I think it's what keeps bringing me back to these things despite the fact I keep saying no more memoirs!
The art for the book was nice, but the page layouts were pretty basic. Certainly not the worst thing in the world, it really fits with the tone of the book so there's really no room to complain. While there is also a lot of text, it's generally broken up enough in conversation that I never felt like it was super text-heavy.