Nicolas

by Pascal Girard, Helge Dascher (Translator)

Girard revisits the childhood death of his little brother in his most emotional and spare work Burdened with grief, confusion, and anger, Pascal Girard explores the childhood passing of his five-year-old brother. Girard delves into the emotional repercussions of this life-changing trauma, from his memories as a nine-year-old struggling to understand up until the present day, twenty-five years after the shattering loss. At the heart of Nicolas lies the question shared by most undergoing Why? This confusion multiplies for a young boy with few answers to his questions, lacking even a basic explanation of the cause of his brother's departure. As sorrow and guilt are muffled by time and the flurry of even the most typical childhood and adolescence, this is a story of grief not grieved, and a glimpse into the ongoing process of reckoning. Pascal struggles to reconcile the magnitude of this tragedy with the minutiae of his daily experience of loss. Nicolas is a delicate, minimalist portrait of the many faces of mourning, identified with surprising humor and pathos by an artist who knows them intimately. Originally published in a micro-run ten years ago, Girard creates new comics and an introduction that contemplate the larger effect of Nicolas's death on his current behaviors and habits. With masterful visual restraint, Girard pens a work of great honesty and Nicolas resonates long after the book is closed, the weight of the story echoing closely the heft of the personal loss.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Bande Dessinée, Nonfiction, Death, Memoir, Canada

112 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Pascal Girard est né à Jonquière en 1981. Dès sa première journée sur les bancs d’école, il remplit de dessins les marges de ses cahiers et agendas. Comme il n’a jamais pu se débarasser de cette bonne habitude, il a naturellement décidé d’en faire son métier. En 2004, il termine un baccalauréat interdisciplinaire en arts à l’Université du Québec à Chicoutimi.

Depuis, il a déménagé à Québec où il mène une double carrière d’illustrateur et d’auteur de bandes dessinées. Ses deux premiers livres Dans un cruchon et Nicolas, se sont partagé le prix Réal-Fillion au Festival de la bande dessinée francophone de Québec en 2006. Il a fait paraître Paresse et Jimmy et le Bigfoot à la Pastèque.

Reviews

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Girard wrote this comic in 3 days in 2006 about the death of his little brother Nicolas. It was published two years later in 2008, and now he has added a new section (and much better drawn) about the years following that time, into the present. In his introduction he says he was inspired by Jeffery Brown's quick sketch minimalist comic work (girlfriend period) and it feels very much like Brown's work. He says he just did it in pen, no revisions, and it gets at these raw feelings of loss.

They were young when Nicolas died. Pascal didn't even initially know the cause, it's almost comic how dissociated he acts about it, but in the story as a whole you can see how deeply it has affected him. He had another, younger brother he never got as close to, he had problems with drugs and relationships with women, suffers anxiety disorder. The overall impact is intimate, affecting, a glimpse into how it is the death of his brother might have shaped who he is. It's a small book, 106 5 x 7 pages, to be read in one sitting.

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very short, rather sad, picture book tale of a boy who becomes a man and his life before and after his little brother died. It shows him dealing with it in various ways as he ages from a kid who is bored at the funeral home, then older and drinking too much, then married and realizing how much he misses his little brother.

Poignant and very real.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Minimal and fleeting with a dream like logic between the different times in the life of someone growing up and dealing with the death of his younger brother. Kind of on the depressing side, if you can imagine that.

[disco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nicolas was short, simplistic, and brought me to tears. Something that I've always wondered about is how younger children process the death of a sibling. The answer? Not well. It's a confusing time, and no one really has the right answer. Pascal Girard does a great job at illustrating the torment and chaos that he felt growing up, with the death of his brother looming over him.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 3 out of 5]

I saw this on eBay going for 99p and saw that Drawn & Quarterly were the publishers so I snapped it up. As I expected Drawn & Quarterly = quality. I don't know if this is part of a series but the label "Petits Livres" is correct, this is a small book, little bigger than a beer mat.

It tells the story of Girard and his younger brother Nicolas. They have a strong relationship as until one day Girard finds that his brother has died. This affects the rest of his life where he gets involved with drugs and has trouble in relationships with women. One day he decides to let go of the guilt and anger by writing a short comic about his brother and how his death affected his growing up. This helps him come to terms with the loss of his infant brother.

It's drawn in a simple style reminiscent of Jeffrey Brown with one or two drawings per small page, no panels. It's a very quick read but worth your attention (though I wouldn't pay a fiver for it!).

[sohrella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow.

[spoon · Rating 5 out of 5]

amazing. the first bit is better than the second imo - can't recapture that magic

[Jeimy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Graphic memoir about how the author has coped with losing his 5-yo brother when he was young.

[Sophie U · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is just a punch to the friggin heart. It’s a book to be read all at once, in one sitting - just make sure you’re somewhere you can cry.

[jmm · Rating 5 out of 5]

Feels like walking over hot coals and tripping and falling chest first into a sharp knife

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

quick read. kinda boring. flat.

[Eviltwinjen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A tiny book drawn in an almost child-like style, Nicolas sneaks up on you. In deceptively simple vignettes, Girard explores his long journey towards dealing with the pain of his little brother's death and reveals the oblique manner in which many boys and men grieve. It feels more like a self-printed booklet you might have picked up in the back of the comics shop than the typical weighty "literary comic"...I guess that's the point of their "petits livres." It also feels distinctly Canadian--so many Canadian artists seem to share a talent for keen observation, as well as for conveying emotion and humor in sparse lines.

[Allie · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the new introduction, Pascal Girard cites the influence of Jeffrey Brown's comics (particularly AEIOU: Any Easy Intimacy) and you can really see how that shaped the book. It's a loose vignette style meditation on losing his younger brother Nicholas, and how that affected his life and relationships. It's not really sad so much as plaintive. Definitely worth reading if you like his other comics or if you're a fan of Jeffrey Brown's girlfriend trilogy-era work.

[Maggie Gordon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nicolas is described as a "spare" exploration of the loss of Girard's brother. This is an apt description given the short snapshots that he gives his readers of various reactions he's had over the years. I quite enjoyed his afterward, exploring more of his adult life and his other, still living brother. Still simple and abrupt, I thought the emotions were stronger and more mature. Both parts are affecting and an interesting experiment in story telling.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

This little book looks sweet, maybe even a little precious at first glance, but actually has much to say (in its spare way) about death, memory and acceptance. I liked it. The artist's drawings remind me of both John Porcellino and Munro Leaf, and the book as a whole is reminiscent of the picture books that Jules Feiffer produced way back when.

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

Girard is able to say so much with so little. There is a huge amount of emotion in between the panels and short stories and the reader feels it all--the loss from the past as well as all the loss since *because* of the first loss. Pretty profound.

[Chris Browning · Rating 5 out of 5]

I probably am predisposed towards liking this book. Girard was inspired to draw and write his brief book about the death of his young brother after reading Jeffrey Brown’s AEIOU and I started toying with doing comics because of Brown’s Clumsy (in my case I walked into a bookshelf in Nottingham’s Forbidden Planet and a copy fell on my head which, given the title, felt like a sign of some kind). Brown has a wonderfully scruffy and immediate style, especially to his early confessional comics, which seem initially bloody easy to emulate but actually bely a sophisticated and intelligent cartooning style that he utilises in his more sketchy moments to illuminate the messier bits of life. Girard emulates Brown’s style visibly in the first half of this book, the second half demonstrating he’s become a far more confident cartoonist in his own right and apparently using Sempe as his main inspiration (as you would, he’s a genius)

I did my own comic about mental health and depression and much more - Grey Fug -about three years ago. My inspiration was Rachael Smith’s Wired Up Wrong in terms of me seeing how simple and profoundly moving a comic could tackle with emotion. Depression comics have had quite an upsurge or late, especially because I think the immediacy of a self published genre allows you to just vent and express yourself in ways you probably would have to temper if you wanted it published by someone professionally. I only really touched on grief in very vague terms, particularly the death of my dad (this very week, eight years ago), because honestly I don’t think I’m up for dealing with it properly yet and can’t really find a way to articulate it that wouldn’t be painfully self indulgent (I am slowly considering a follow up to Grey Fug about my Aspergers, using my childhood obsession with Doctor Who to investigate how I dealt with this undiagnosed mess inside my head) but this book’s profoundly moving, simple message makes me think I could do something to help with that still festering pain. Girard’s simplest storytelling tool is his most powerful, bookending the story with a scene with his baby brother than packs a total emotional wallop

However it’s the second part of the book, the more recent section, that I find the most powerful. This addresses his awkward relationship with his youngest brother and the difficulty he has with bonding with him because of the unspoken figure of his late brother haunting their bond. This piece feels like it’s telling a far more complicated story - and god knows the worst bit of grief can often be sharing it with others and how their dealing with it contrasts with yours - and does so with honesty and grace and sadness and a modicum of self directed anger. Nicolas is a beautiful piece of work, but the follow up story - Joel, I guess - is the one that made me cry. Beautiful work

[Matt Graupman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exploring the moments - large and small - around the childhood death of his brother, Pascal Girard's slim graphic novel "Nicolas" proves you don't have to say a lot for it to have a big impact. Whether he's admitting to his schoolmates that he doesn't know exactly how Nicolas died or he's snorting away his anxious feelings, Girard's memoir doesn't flinch when it comes to the raw emotions involved with a loved one's passing. The fact that he was just a kid at the time makes the vignettes in this comic feel all the more tragic.

In his introduction to this rereleased version, Girard explains that "Nicolas" was originally a sketchbook exercise that took less than three days to complete and was meant as an homage to Jeffrey Brown's early skip-the-pencilling autobio work. "Nicolas" certainly has that feel to it. What makes this edition work so well, however, is the addition of an epilogue that really showcases Girard's own voice and style. As he talks about how he's learned as an adult ways to handle his anxiety, cope with his feelings, and improve his strained relationship with his younger brother, Joel, there's a sense of growth and reconciliation that gives the original bulk of "Nicolas" some much needed balance. Girard is still in pain but he's learned to channel it and the comic ends on a more hopeful note.

Having two brothers myself, I can't imagine how I would react if one of them passed away. I can only hope that I'd be as open, honest, and eloquent as Pascal Girard. For anyone who has experienced any kind of loss, "Nicolas" is a beautiful guide to navigating your way through pain and coming out on the other side, mostly intact.

[Jay Daze · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very short, crudely drawn episodic, early work which clearly shows that he was already onto his themes of autobiography and peeling back painful truths right from the beginning.

If this edition of Nicolas only contained the early work I probably would have been dissatisfied but Girard adds a companion piece, done in his now more accomplished style which loosely deals with his relationship with his other brother. The contrasts between the juvenalia of the orginal piece and this one is striking. The wonderful leap forward in how Girard deals with his worries and relationship with his still living brother and his still dead one makes the book a really great study of a development of an comic artist.

[Akemi G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an autobiographical story; his brother Nicolas died at age five. It seems the author was only a few years older. People--well-meaning, to be sure--expect him to feel certain ways, which is confusing to the young boy, who barely understands death. The sense of loss continues--of course. It is never the same. Another brother is born, and the story describes how the author and this brother see their relationship differently. (For the author, that brother is the living brother, as opposed to the dead brother. For Joel, Nicolas is only a story, and in effect, he has only one brother.)

I love the part that was originally published; so raw and honest. This edition also has additional cartoons that were drawn later, which only dilute the beauty of the original part.

[Emilia P · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like Pascal Girard. I wish he made more stuff, or that it got translated faster! This one's about the death of his brother as a child. With not coincidental illusions to Sempe's Petit Nicolas, I think. So umm.. yeah! Quite, understated, complex without trying to do too much. Girard is always good.

[Evelyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like Pascal Girard. I wish he made more stuff, or that it got translated faster! This one's about the death of his brother as a child. With not coincidental illusions to Sempe's Petit Nicolas, I think. So umm.. yeah! Quite, understated, complex without trying to do too much. Girard is always good.

[casey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Affecting, but not a tearjerker. A short, illustrated foray into one man's life, bereavement, and healing after his younger brother passes away at a young age. I picked this up at the Harvard Med library, so I think they're expanding their catalogue to fulfill more of a graphic medicine niche. Neat!

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

A string of short comics about Pascal growing up with the tragedy of his younger brother Nicolas's death. Starts when he's young, ends in the current day, there's some nice moments in it, but I wouldn't go out of your way for it.

[Joseph Young · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of Girard's earlier works, and it shows. He deals with the death of a younger 5-year-old brother, and further how it impacts his relationship with another even younger brother. Overall, the art is very simplistic, but forces a focus on the story. A little melancholic.

[Richard Wade · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this graphic novel. Pascal Girard has a knack for capturing complex moments, and relaying that message to readers. I always look forward to reading his works. Despite the subject matter, this was very good.

[Sasha Boersma · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sweet and touching story about the author's reflection on his life after the death of his brother.

Very simple art and story, which is typical for his work. But lovely.

[Samantha Venter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Raw and real.

[Bookthreat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read our review at https://bookthreat.com/2017/05/04/pas...

[Anna Bunce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful book dealing with the complexity of childhood loss and grief.