Susceptible
In a series of spare first-person vignettes, Castrée pieces together the difficult childhood of Goglu, a French Canadian girl who lives with her alcoholic, self-destructive mother and distant, resentful stepfather. Goglu—tomboyish and with a perpetual self-conscious blush—strains against the influence of her genes, wondering where her own deep sadness comes from and hoping that she won’t succumb to the same troublesome lifestyle of her mother, who is desperate for her daughter’s attention and beset by manic episodes. As Goglu gets older, she seeks refuge in punk rock and drugs, but the strain of her destructive home life becomes too much to bear and she escapes to live with her biological father in Vancouver. Castrée’s black-and-white, Scarryesque illustrations accompany tiny, precise cursive lettering that gives the whole work a whispered, confessional quality, as if each word were an embarrassing secret. At times, Goglu’s story is overwhelmingly, heartbreakingly sad, but Castrée leaves a glimmer of hope: a redemptive future shaped by art, independence, and unconditional love. --Sarah Hunter